LB Brighton Challenge - Day 1

All roads lead to Brighton!

Well today was the start of the journey and, despite quite a lot of swearing, I quite enjoyed my first proper interval session.  Today's run was not quite in line with the original plan.  Mondays are rest days on the schedule.  However as I am in London tomorrow I thought I had better get Tuesday's session done early.  I also thought that Day 1 of the new challenge should actually contain some exercise!

Part of the challenge is to blog each day I run.

This morning, I had some company with Mrs LB joining me for some of the intervals (although I have to say she cut some corners!), although whilst she missed out on 2 of the intervals she did do some other exercises whilst I chugged away!

So this morning after a 1.5 Mile warm up I did 6 intervals around the rec near our house.  As it happens a lap is 475 metres so I stuck with that and I am quite pleased with the consistency if a little disappointed with the actual pace....  My intervals were:

2:01
1:59
1:58
2:01
2:02
2:01 

So I have got things started at least.  As I will plan on using the same laps, I obviously will be hoping to increase my speed on these as well as the reps.

There are of course 3 parts to this challenge so time to own up to the fact that as of this morning I am weighing in at 15stone!  Scary stuff.  But there it is commited to 'paper'....  The weight loss plan is simple.

Stick to the training schedules, no booze during the week, no bread, no cheese, and no beer at home.  The plan is to hit 13stone although I would be happy with 13.5.

Lots on so better dash, have a good week.

LBx

A Plan Hatched

I always feel a commitment to my blog is a bit of a contract.  When I started out at the beginning of 2011 with the 1,000 mile goal it helped knowing that I was blathering on about it on-line.  It felt like I had no choice!  So here goes....

Simply put a plan has been hatched.  I now have 3 goals set for the next 6 months.

1.       Sunday 9^th December 2012 I will be attempting to run a 10k in less than 50 minutes

2.       Sunday 14^th April 2013 I will attempting to run a marathon in less than 4 hours

3.       By Sunday 14^th April I will have lost 2 stone in weight

Simple.

Well not quite that simple but I have had an incredibly frustrating 2012 with a lot of injury problems.  This has provided devil on my shoulder with the ammunition it needed to make me put weight on this summer and lose my fitness overall.

The last couple of months have been better however, without clear goals, I am afraid that I will fail in any attempts to run faster or lose weight without the goals above in place. 

Any miles I run will, as ever be logged here, but EVERYTHING I do for the next 27 weeks is focused on the 3 targets above.

So what about my approach to each.  I will start at the end by cutting out beer at home, no booze during the week, no bread, no cheese, no biscuits... In fact my diet isn’t that bad but the booze and the fatty snacks are the killer for me.  Whilst building core strength to compliment the running, I hope that the diet will help me hit the weight goal I have of 13 ½ stone. (I know am a fat bastard now, I am not called Lardy Boy for nothing!)

So what about the running, well the first target is to shift some pounds and do a specific 8 week schedule that gets me race fit for a proper hit at a sub 50 minute 10k in Milton Keynes on December 9^th.  I found this schedule on Runner’s World and the plan is laid out below:

Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday
Rest	2M warm up 8x400m with 3min recoveries 2M cool down	4-7M slow	30 mins Light Fartlek	Rest	2M easy 3x1M at 80% 3min recovery 2M easy	5M easy
Rest	2M warm up 6x600m with 3min recoveries 2M Warm Down	4-7M slow	30 mins steady hills	2M easy 3x1.5M at 80% 4min recovery 2M easy	6M easy	Rest
Rest	2M warm up 5x800m with 6min recoveries 2M cool down	4-8M slow	30 mins Fartlek	Rest	Warm Up 20 mins at 70% 20 ins at 90% Cool Down	7M easy
Rest	2M easy 3x500m with 3min recoveries and 800 sets 2.M cool down	4-7 slow	20 mins Tempo	Rest	Warm Up 4x1M with  4min recoveries Cool Down	8M easy
Rest	2M easy 10x400m with 3min recoveries 2.M cool down	Rest	45 mins including hills	Rest	4M easy	Rugged Radnage 10k Race – no chance of PB here!
Rest	2M warm up 14x400m with 400m recoveries 2M cool down	Rest	20 mins Tempo	6-9 gradual with last 3 miles at 10K race pace	10M easy	Rest
Rest	2M warm up 3x1,200 m with 400m recoveries 2M cool down	4-7M slow	30 mins easy	Rest	2-4M easy with some strides	MK 10k Race

I feel bloody knackered just typing that lot out! And this is just the prep for a 10k!  I will share more about the marathon plan after the race in December but I have realised that in previous marathon training schedules I have done too much ‘going for a run’ runs which have either been too slow or too fast depending on what the targets are!  Anyway more on that to come.

i have just got through the 275 mile barrier for the year.  Bearing in mind I hardly ran for 6 months because of injury I guess that will have to do!

As ever please share this on Twitter if you can the more the merrier.  I will also make sure I keep the blog up to date because I have been crap at that too.

LBX