Tom Roper's Running Training

50th birthday run

I marked my 50th birthday today in Cambridge with an early morning run to Barton, Comberton, Toft, Hardwick and back by the Madingley Road. It was icy, but I stayed upright.
Time: 2:05:42
Average heart rate: 146
Distance: probably 15 miles

Total distance this week: 32.4 miles

Now seven weeks to the London marathon and two till the Hastings Half Marathon. And I now have a Garmin Forerunner 301, a birthday present from my mother. I need to set it up.

Hyde Park

At a conference in London, so my running alarm clock woke me at 615 for a run round Hyde Park, a slight covering of snow and more falling as I ran. Even this early, there were a lot of runners around though rather anti-social ones: few returned my cheery "good mornings", the women looked as if I was going to expose myself to them, the men sized me up as if wondering who would come off best in a fight. There were daffodils and crocuses in places and some horses and their riders. The Round Pond was frozen, though not the Serpentine, and the Albert Memorial surprised me, as it always does, with its gilded brightness.
Time: 57:12
Average heart rate: 146
Distance: 6.5 miles, I think 

Stanmer Park once more

Not much time, so a cold run, a few flakes of snow in the air, round Stanmer Park with a colleague in 25:57
Distance: 2.8 miles

A snowy evening run

Not my usual habit, but lunchtime Greek class meant I ran in the evening, cold and in fairly heavy snow but enjoyable, down to the sea front, then west and back by way of Bishopstone.
Time: 41:25
Average heart rate: 138
Distance: 4.2 miles

Stanmer Park

A short and rather stiff run at lunchtime round Stanmer Park
Time: 33:40
Distance: 3.9 miles

Sussex Beacon Half Marathon

Today was the Sussex Beacon Half Marathon. I ran it, along with some 2700 others, on a sunny morning but with a coldish wind.
Time by my watch: 1:43:23 (which I'm very pleased with, but I await the official time, supposed to come it by text, but nothing yet) Post scriptum: it's just come, 01:43:14, and my chip position [sic-is this the same as race position?] was 661. If I was 661st out of 2,700, I think that very respectable for a man of my age.
Distance: 13.1 miles

Total distance this week: 34.1

Now eight weeks to the London marathon and three till the Hastings Half Marathon

Rest day and dates

A second rest day in preparation for the Sussex Beacon Half Marathon tomorrow. I have discovered the pleasures of fresh dates as a training food; chiefly Degelt Noor but today I am tackling some Medjool ones .
I am alarmed though, to read in Jane Grigson's Fruit Book that she advises splitting dates and removing the stone before eating, in case the date beetle may have laid its eggs inside. I have never bothered, but if I perform badly tomorrow, I now have an excuse.

Rest day and Mapminder

A rest day today, as I prepare for Sunday's half-marathon, so I swam 1.25 km.
Lured by an advertisement on the Runners World website, I looked at Mapminder which was offered on a thirty-day trial. It sounded just the thing, far more accurate than my piece of string or thing with a wheel I run over the map, which I'm sure give me odd readings.
But the technical requirements say, "to run Mapminder you need a Windows-based PC running Internet Explorer 5 or above". Really! If it runs in a browser, why not any browser on any platform? Or are their designers too lazy and ignorant to write proper HTML and Java? And, my dear, surely nobody still uses IE?
I shall therefore wait for a GPS-based system. I like the look of the Forerunner 301

Stanmer Park

A quick lunchtime run round Stanmer Park.
Time: 32:35
Distance: 3.9 miles

Seaford front

A  grey and cold morning, down to Seaford front.
Time: 46.01
Average heart rate: 136
Distance: 5.1 miles

Also a 1.25 km swim this afternoon