Club Training Monday 2nd March

It is always difficult to know how hard to train in the week between two races. However, with the Scally being a relatively short but all out 5k race, only a few days of recovery are required and it is more important to have an easier session on Thursday to conserve strength ahead of what is a hilly 5 mile race at Glasgow Uni's  Garscube sports complex on the coming Saturday. That's a long way of saying Monday's session is not a post-race run!

The session is 5 x 6 minutes at threshold (controlled discomfort) with a 2 minute jog recovery. For a change, the session is running laps at Carron Place in an anti-clockwise direction. This circuit provides a good mixture of slight uphill, flat and gentle downhill which gives good opportunities to work out what threshold effort should feel like; i.e. the effort stays the same but the pace reduces on uphills, increases on the flat and increases a bit more on the downhill. The objective is not to maintain a constant pace but to maintain a constant effort, in the same way that you would in a race. A few minutes in to each rep, the breathing should start to be uncomfortable and if asked, only a few words could be spoken. The effort will be something like 10 mile to half-marathon race effort and definitely not as hard as 5k effort for all those who ran so well at the Scally.

Alan