London 2018 Part 1 - Look Back on the 2017 Race

I've got out of the way of posting much on my blog for a while now, but there's lots to say so with the London Marathon looming this weekend I thought I'd post a series of updates on what I've been up to since the 2017 race. 2017 was very definitely a year of two contrasting halves....First up is a very late review of VLM17!

2012 to 2017 -  Under 2:30 after 7 goes...

I had a pretty much perfect day by all accounts, breaking the 2 1/2 hr barrier in 2:29:30. Encouraged by Ryan Snell of Exmouth Harriers I'd decided that this year was going to be an all or nothing approach.  I've run fairly conservatively to HR for a few years and ended up with a string of 2:33/2:34's and really didn't just want to churn out another... I also have to give a hat tip to club mate Henry Swinzto at New Forest Runners, he originally seeded the idea in my mind that you don't know your limits until you step over the edge!

A strong run on the lumpy Salisbury 10M race (for 2nd place, it was a warm day) 2 weeks previous had showed that the aerobic engine was in good shape. My last few double digit runs a week out were well below 7m/M so I had confidence that the potential for a fast time was there.

I ticked off a now well rehearsed 1 week taper with a combo of short (3-4M) easy runs, some 'MP' treadmill strides (eg 4-8x200m@17kph) and a daily sauna session (to encourage heat adaptation), plus a quickish progressive parkrun (18:39) the day before. I did the trip to ExCEL to collect my race number(s) on the Friday before and then heading to my Brother's place in High Wycombe for Friday & Saturday night. Everything went smoothly getting to the start and I was great to meet up with the usual suspects for pre-race chat and banter in the UK Club Championship start area.

The weather was ideal for a marathon, overcast and 11-12C with only light winds, The plan was to run 17:45 5k's up to 30km or so and then hopefully be able to hang on for the final stint. The start was a bit of a manic weave-fest with Ryan and George King from Winchester AC, but a few miles in and things had settled down and we'd tag on with a good few other sub2:30 aspirants. The first 5k ultimately was a bit quick in 17:28 with the downhill and by 10k the margin under target had grown to 30s with a 17:38. Honestly in the first 6M I was seriously wondering if I'd bitten off too much, but I'd taken all the HR stats off my Garmin and just focused on the pace. Thankfully as the miles progressed my legs settled in nicely. 

10-15k passed spot on in 17:45 and around that point I found myself drifting forwards into and to the front of the next big group of runners. 15-20k was 17:47 and I started to get the inkling that this could be a good day, but it was a bit early to tell and my mind see-sawing a bit from the positive to the negative going through half way in 1:14:25 and 20-25k in 17:44. A bit of a headwind going south through the Isle of Dogs was enough to push thoughts towards the 'well a PB will be just as nice' but thankfully the crowds around Canary Wharf rallied my mind. 25-30k clocked at 17:51 and the 'av lap time' (using manual splits) on my watch told me I was still on 5:41/M pace, so it was game on at 20M with 30ish secs still in the bank.

30-35k (17:50) was when the mental fight kicked in, my legs were slowly voicing their displeasure louder and louder, nothing critical in terms of cramp potential or the like, just resistance to the task at hand. Going along the Highway through mile 22 the field was becoming quite spread out which made it tougher still. Somewhere in the 23rd mile the thought popped into my head (with the actual pace showing 5:42) that 'that's a decent outing', to which another part of my mind retorted back, 'you don't get the kudos for running a good 23M...there's less than a parkrun to go, GET ON WITH IT...' 

Daddy's Big Shiny Medal!

35-40k was my slowest (admittedly not by much) split of 17:52, but the target margin was down to <10secs.... With only a couple of miles to go finally the conviction that this was going to be the day really started to kick in and it had a rallying effect on my pace with the last 2.2km averaging 5:39/M. The run up Birdcage walk seemed to go on forever counting down the 1km, 800m, 400m, 385yd(!) markers to the turn into the Mall. Sighting the finish line clock at 2:29:0x, for a moment I wasn't sure I'd get there in under a minute! Crossed the line elated and got down to kiss the tarmac in respect. Job done and massively happy 😁 Beers were thoroughly enjoyed on the pavement outside The Red Lion pub on Whitehall 🍻

THe post race elation lasted a fair while and to be fair I wasn't sure I'd have the motivation to try and repeat the feat, however the rest of 2017 didn't go very well running wise....

A selection of reasonably fast Dorset/Hampshire Marathoners

Winter Cross Ultra 50k - The Ultimate MPCR*

After a lack lustre Christmas Eve Parkrun (18:30, a minute down on 2 weeks previous), I was having doubts about the sensibility of the post Christmas trail 50k (Seoond Wind Running's Winter Cross Ultra), but with the option to call it quits at 30k I figured it would be a decent long run either way.... 

A 5am start this morning was a bit of a rude awakening to say the least and it was pretty cold to boot. This was my first 'proper' Ultra event with indoor aids stations, food (inc minces and mulled wine) so unsure of the expected routine with such things I resorted to type and just ran non-stop!

Thankfully it was just getting light as we were led out at 7:30 for the start, so no need for head torches. The race gets it's name from the shape of the course, consisting of a north, east, west & south out & back leg (if you are doing the full 45 mile version, strike the south bit for the 50k). The initial north bound section was an easy 9k along an old railway line (i.e. flat), which served as a good shakeout and left me in a group of 3 at the front, although the other two were in for the full 45 miles. It was into and out for the race HQ and on to the east leg 2.

On the way out on leg 2, at top of Old Winchester Hill

An undulating mile or 2 later and I hit the first serious climb of the day up Old Winchester Hill on the South Downs Way. The top was reached without too much hassle and then down the other side. A bit of farmland meandering and it was up climb 2 of leg 2, a delightful chalky gully up between two fields, which left me thinking that will be fun on the way back.... Reached the checkpoint at the end of the leg and was still on sub 7:30/M av pace and feeling pretty good. Turned around and was pleasantly surprised by the gap back to the 2nd place runner which was up to a couple of minutes. The return run was uneventful, although by the the time I can down off O' Winchester Hill my feet were beginning to sting with hotspots quite badly and there was the definite possibility of a decent blister forming on my left ankle... non-stop through race HQ again and out on to the last leg.

The pace had crept above 7:30 by this point and I was wondering what I would be able to sustain from 19 to 31 miles. A quick jog through he village of Meonstoke and then it was on to the piece de resistance of the course, a 2km uphill drag on tarmac to the top of Beacon HIll. It was head down and work time! By the top my upper legs were giving me a lot of gyp, but I carried on, getting close to "one foot infront of the other" mode. The next 4 or so miles undulated along farmtracks and road and I just tried to ignore the pain in my feet and hip flexors.

The final checkpoint, with 6ish miles to go eventually appeared and turning back revealed that the next runners were in sight (but I neglected to note if they were 45M or 50K entrants). This spurred me on, although my legs didn't really respond to any requests for acceleration... A great aspect of the race was that you pass a lot of the other runners as you come back towards HQ, which proved much needed motivation and support.

By the time I reached the start of the descent back to Meonstoke from Beacon Hill, I was past caring about whether I could hold on to first place, I just wanted to stop running! I got back the hill with no issues, but there was one final stumbling point, the only stile on the whole course, strategically positioned with half a mile to go. My quads had nearly cramped up climbing over it on the way out and I was praying they would play ball on the way back too. Thankfully my left quad almost went, but I straightened it just in time to save a painful hobble to the line!

At this point I was happy that the win was in the bag and as an added bonus the whole family (parents included) were waiting just before the finish to loudly encourage me on. Over the line in 4hrs 7mins to take the overall 50k win (and default course record, only because it was the inaugural race!). Took a while to get changed as my legs and feet were in a bit of a state, prize giving was quick and then it was off for a dirty great big burger and pint of ale in the village pub to refuel. Overall a great event and really well organised. Think I'll have a day off tomorrow though.

*Mince Pie Compensation Run :-)

Marathon Training While Travelling (inc videos)

I got back to the UK the weekend just gone from a 2 week work trip to North America. Running while away on business is always interesting as I love being able to get out and explore new places, and this enables you to cover more distance/areas than if you just walk (and you miss lots if you drive everywhere I find!). It also makes planning marathon training a bit more challenging!

The trip was pretty varied, starting off with a week in Houston, Texas, where the temperatures were nicely in the range of 15-25DegC, before flying up to Calgary, Alberta the second week, with a overnight excursion to Edmonton (3hrs drive north). The temperature differential was stark, from +25 in Texas to hovering around freezing in Canada, there was even snow...

Houston involved mostly running from my hotel to the approx 3 mile running loop at Memorial Park, which is very popular with Houstonians, as most of the city is dominated by cars and quite frankly a bit rubbish for running in! The track circles a golf course/parkland and is hard pack gravel. It makes a perfect marathon training circuit, plus there are lots of other runners so the atmosphere is great :-) There is also a local trail running club which meets in the park to run offroad, the Houston Area Trail Runners (http://www.trailrunninghouston.com/), but I didn't get a chance to meet up with them on this trip.

The run below is typical of the "Sub Lactate Threshold" work I've been doing in this springs marathon training campaign. It consists of 10mins Easy running followed by 70mins at "SubLT" heartrate (approx 155-160 for me currently) and a short cool down. More on the general training approach I am using in the near future.....Note for this run I was coming straight from a work meeting, so just drove to the park and started on the running track (saves the 2 miles of concrete sidewalks and busy intersections from the hotel!)

I also got the chance to explore the pathways and trails along the Buffalo Bayou slightly further out to the west of the city. This was pleasantly surprising as along side the tarmac bike path that runs the length of the Bayou, there is also an decent amount of lovely dry single-track trails to run on, some quite technical in places.

So on to Calgary in the second week, I had been there before so was very familiar with the extensive network of pathways along either side of the Bow River, so spent the majority of my runs doing different combos of distance/bridge crossing etc.. It was quite hard work to start with and then after a day or two I remembered that the city sits at an altitude of 3,000ft, which isn't massively high, but probably enough to be felt during exercise. Here's a on-the-run video of clips taken with my Garmin Virb Elite camera one evening, it's just a rough edit so it's a bit long, feel free to skip through!

Towards the end of last week I then drove up to Edmonton for an overnight stay. It was a bit colder in Edmonton (-5 or so in the mornings) and there was quite a bit of snow on the uncleared pathways by the North Saskatchewan River (which was frozen over). It took a bit of getting use to running on snow and ice! I did another run vid with the Virb camera, this time with some of the HR/GPS data it records overlaid on top.
Apologies for the shakiness of the footage, it was shot handheld (the Calgary one is on a telescopic pole which steadies it a lot)

On my last morning before flying home I was running down to the river in Edmonton when I came across a good 100 or so runners doing hill reps at 6:30am, turns out it was a club called the November Project (http://november-project.com/edmonton-ab-canada/) who run 3 times a week in the city, whatever the weather (down to -30C sometimes!!!). I jumped in for a single up and down, there was even someone taking pictures halfway up...

Overall a decent couple of weeks training, on the return from an ankle sprain about a month ago, with 97 and then 103 miles. Including a good sprinkling of Sub-LT workout runs (one in a 20 miler).The second week was compressed into 5 days, which wasn't great and left me pretty tired. But I assumed that with the flight home and associated jet lag that running at the weekend probably wasn't going to happen!

XMiles.co.uk Brand Ambassador Announcement

I'm very happy to announce that I have been selected to be a brand ambassador for the awesome endurance running website and online store XMiles.co.uk, from the website;

"XMiles are proud to announce Alistair Pickburn is joining the Brand Ambassador program, the program has been created to give something back to the sport we love and provide support to athletes during the calendar year. Our aim as an independent running nutrition store is to support and be active in the running community.

Supported by XMiles, the full team will be a community of amateur athletes who follow the XMiles ethos of supporting individuals and teams in challenges without barriers of ability.

The program is part of an initiative from XMiles to support athletes and events at grass roots.

Al is joining XMiles as a Brand Ambassador in 2016. Keep up to date with his approach and progress with training for this year’s London Marathon. Following a string of good marathon performances in 2014 & 2015, Al is looking to modify things quite a bit from previous years to see if a change of training approach can help him break the 2:30 barrier. This includes changing some aspects of his diet and nutrition including introducing concepts from Renee McGregor's book 'Training Food'.

Watch out for his blogs on XMiles and on his own blog including a look at his 2016 targets/training approach, reports from some key races leading up to the marathon and the results/analysis of recent lactate threshold & VO2 max lab tests he has taking part in."

(link to announcement on XMiles.co.uk).

Set up and run by fellow athlete, Anthony Clark (Bournemouth Athletic Club, marathon PB 02:30:06 London 2015), XMiles.co.uk is based in Dorset. XMiles is a vibrant young company formed by runners focused on nutrition products, advice and guidance for endurance sports. They are committed to sharing knowledge and experiences whilst supporting individuals and teams in challenges without barriers of ability.

Whilst growing a brand that will be recognised for excellent customer service and connections with the roots of our sport,  XMiles aims to support runners of all levels along their journey, whether they are attempting 1 or 100’s of miles over one or many days.

Xmiles stocks a great range of some of the best nutritional products for exercise, including my personal favorites for race nutrition; Gu & Cliff Shot Gels. I'm also a fan of the Beet-It sport shots and Nuun electrolyte tabs. The full range of brands in the store are shown below

Xmiles has a great loyalty rewards scheme, sign up and each £ spent gets you a reward point, £500 points = £5 off in the store. You can sign up by following this link

I'm really looking forward to my involvement with XMiles and contributing to the online running community surrounding it! 

New Socks

Every since I bought my first pair of Injinji running toe socks (on a whim in a branch of REI whilst on a work trip to the US last year), I've been really impressed with the comfort of them for pretty much all runs, including long ones and races.

So pushed the button yesterday on an order from www.ultramarathonrunningstore.com for a couple of run 2.0 'lightweight' and a pair of 'original weight' no-show (i.e. low profile) Injinji's. The lightweight's may well be a contender for replacing the Faulke RU5 socks I've generally used for racing over the past couple of years... Come in a nice range of colors too!

Salisbury 5-4-3-2-1 50k Trail Race 10th August 2014

I entered the 50k race of the Salisbury 5-4-3-2-1 trail running/walk event this weekend just gone as a debut for me to dabble with a couple of ideas. Firstly that, based on my relative short to long distance PBs, I might do better at longer distances and secondly that it could also provide good training due to my apparent predisposition to endurance running. It would also be nice to run an event which is much less time/pace focused. 

My initial plan had been to run the first 5-6 miles with the leaders (assuming similar times to recent years of c. 3hr50ish) and see how I felt and then decide whether I could push on, based on my recent 50k run-commute I did in 3:40. I had purposefully had a light taper week and bit of a carb depletion (mostly to try and get my weight down a bit) and load the day before. I fitting in a sneaky Parkrun jaunt the dat before too, just to keep the legs fresh for Sunday.

On Race morning I filled up with a big bowl of banana porridge and honey before leaving the house and took 6 gels with me as a precaution (wise choice), as I didn't really want to be testing my fat burning capacity in an hilly ultra for the first time too!

Weather was looking ominous, but actually turned out to be reasonably good, got a bit wet at times, but the sun came out in the last 6-7miles and it got fairly warm. Milling around at registration I bumped into local Commonwealth Games marathon runner, Steve Way, who had decided to enter the race late instead of a solo 35 mile Purbeck Hills run. Don't say I blame him given how windy it was on the coast on Sunday! So then the plan changed a bit and I opted for the run with Steve for as long as it felt comfortable option.... 

We were off at 9am and the first few miles wound up the river valley north of Salisbury with a few stiles to navigate (good time being at the front, no queuing to get over!), followed by a very scenic lap of the Old Sarum Castle overlooking Salisbury. At about 7 miles we were suddenly joined by a third Italian sounding guy, who was clearly up for stretching things out a bit, so at that point I let him and Steve go on. I was fairly sure I wasn't going to be able to keep up with them going up the hills ahead! From then to around 15 miles was quite pleasant, a bit up and then a long descend down over a river and past a stately castle. Some-where around 15 miles I came into a field with no route arrow marking the exit which resulted in a moment of panic as I wondered which way to go, thankfully I was rescued by the guy in 4th place who caught up and had the route loaded into his GPS and we got going in the right direction again. Less than a mile later we came into a field to find Steve and the 2nd place guy in the same predicament, the cause was a herd of cows standing in front of the gate with the route arrow on it! A bit of cow shooing ensued and we were momentarily running in a group before the two leaders started to pull away again. I then lost touch with 3rd place going up the second major climb of the day, to compound things I started getting worrying twinges from my right ankle. Worried about a potential retirement I eased up a bit and tried adjusting my gait to try to alleviate the problem. Thankfully it eventually passed, but I did have an wife-and-car based escape route at 22 miles which would have come in handy if it hadn't.... At this point I was just in 'long training run' mode, no pressure to catch 3rd place (still in sight though) and just get to the finish.

Pretty wet at around 12 miles!

Last climb up to Salisbury race course actually felt good and I was glad to turn downhill at mile 24 for the run home. The last 6 miles are flat tarmac, but before that we had the entertainment of some low hay hurdles, where wheat had been harvested and the straw left in tall piles across the race route! Getting on to the road at Wilton I could see 3rd ahead of me, but my legs were starting to hurt pretty badly, so I wasn't trying to catch him. Never the less I slowly reeled him in and then nipped past as he stopped for a drink. It was then just head down and get on to the finish, the pace was decent on the road (comfortably sub-7 miling), but my legs were struggling with fatigue. The energy levels were good (thank you gels!) and with a few miles to good 2nd place came into view. Given that only a couple of miles earlier I had been told that 2nd was 7mins up on me I realised he must be slowing a lot, so tried to maintain my pace. He gradually inched closer, but even as we dodged passed ambling tourists outside Salisbury Cathedral with under a mile to go he was still holding a good 50yd lead. I finally got to him coming up the river footpath with under 500m to go and then gave it as much kick as I could muster into the finish straight to hold him off by 2secs at the line . Finished in 3:35:07 with legs shredded, the walk to the leisure centre for a shower was not much fun!

Overall an awesomely organised race in lovely scenery and very happy to bag a good result and training run.

A 'sprint' finish in a 50k,race - 3rd place just out of shot right...

Top 20 Results (full results available online here)

Low Carb (Jamie Oliver based) Fish Pie - Best Ever?

This is a recipe for possibly the best fish pie I've ever had. It's a low carbohydrate twist on a Jamie Oliver original recipe. Beware though it's extremely filling, this recipe serves 4, but could easily do 5 as a quarter left me stuffed!

Ingredients
1 large cauliflower, cut into pieces
2 eggs
2 large handfuls of fresh leaf spinach
1 onion, finely chopped
1 handful of fresh parsley, chopped
1 clove of garlic, pressed or very finely chopped
1 TB extra-virgin olive oil
1 1/4 cups of heavy cream
4 oz of grated mature cheddar cheese, and another 2 oz for later
juice of 1 lemon
1 heaped tsp English mustard or French will do
1/2 pound haddock, cod or other white fish, skinned, boned and sliced into strips
1/2 pound wild salmon fillet, skinned and sliced into strips
salt and pepper

Instructions

1. Preheat the oven to 450 degrees F (230 degrees C). 
2. Put the cauliflower into a pan of salted, boiling water. Bring back to the boil for 10 minutes. 
3. At the same time, hard boil the 2 eggs. 
4. Steam the spinach in a colander over the pan that has the cauliflower. This will only take about a minute. 
5. When the spinach is done, remove from the colander and squeeze out excess water. 
6. After 10 minutes remove the eggs from pan. Cool under cold water and peel and quarter them. Put to one side. 
7. Drain the cauliflower in the colander. 
8. In a separate pan, slow-fry the onions in the olive oil for about 8-10 minutes. 
9. Add the cream and bring just to a boil. 
10. Remove from the heat and add the Cheddar cheese, lemon juice, garlic, parsley and mustard. 
11. Put the spinach, fish and eggs in an decent sized casserole dish with a lid and mix together. 
12. Pour over this mixture the creamy vegetable sauce. 
13. Mash the cooked cauliflower - adding a bit of olive oil or butter, salt and pepper. 
14. Spread the cauliflower on top of the fish, cover with leftover grated cheddar. 
15. Place in the oven for 25 - 30 minutes taking the lid off for the last 10 minutes of cooking to brown the top.