Auldhouse Time Trial - June - Another Virtual one

The June edition of our Auldhouse individual 5k Time Trial will also be a virtual one. All the rules and requirements are in this previous post. This month, I will accept any Auldhouse TT time set between Monday 1st June and Sunday 7th June 2020. I will update the results database the week after that.

Last month I missed quite a few individual times on Garmin Connect for a variety of reasons (e.g. I have dozens of  connections on Garmin Connect and it is difficult to find every Auldhouse session among the list of hundreds of sessions recorded during the week; easier to find on Strava but not every Harrier is on Strava yet; not every Harrier is connected to me on Garmin Connect or Strava). So, please send me an e-mail (w.alan.derrick@gmail.com) or Messenger IM when you have completed your session so I can file them all together and find them easily.
Alan

Training Monday 1st June

Following the great turn-out for the club over the weekend doing the Scottish Athletics 30 minute Virtual Race, Monday is definitely a recovery session this week (for those who have done the 30 minute challenge). 

For those who have not done the challenge, please go ahead and do it. The Harriers' ladies' and men's teams are sitting right up at the top of the leader board (in fact, at this moment, our ladies are leading and our men are third). This can all change overnight as more clubs upload their results, so if you have not yet done it, do have a go on Monday, instead of doing a rep session. You have until midnight Monday to actually do the run. It may well make a difference to the final team positions! The pace should be very close to the 10k pace we have been training at over the past few months. Therefore it is a good check on that.

For those doing a recovery run, please do 5 to 8 miles very easy.

Alan

PS just a crucial little detail on uploading your link from Garmin Connect (must be on a laptop or browser, not the mobile phone app), you must unlock the little padlock icon beside the "share" icon in the top right corner to make your session visible to all. Otherwise you can't copy the link and/or Scottish Athletics won't be able to verify your run.

Example of setting up Garmin for 30 minute virtual race

For those doing the virtual 30 minutes this weekend, here is a useful way to set up your Garmin such that it bleeps/vibrates at quarter, half, three quarter and full time (or you can split it into two halves or eighths, tenths etc using the same process). Here is another video of setting up a custom workout via Garmin Connect to do this. As before this is the Android version but the iPhone steps will be similar.  Remember to synch your watch with the app at the end to transfer the session to the watch.

When ready to start your 30 minute race, select the session from "My Workouts" on the watch; select Do Workout and finally press the "Start" button and run like hell. The watch will bleep/vibrate every seven and a half minutes and will stop automatically at the end of the 30 minutes. All you have to do after finishing is select "Save" on the watch.
Alan

Training Thursday 28th May

I've been taken a little bit by surprise by the Scottish Athletics 15 or 30 minute distance challenge this weekend. This means we have to be a bit relaxed on our Thursday session if planning to do one of those hard, sustained race pace efforts over the weekend. Therefore do around 8 miles easy. Finish with 6 x approx 100m fast strides on the flat.

Can I ask the team captains to organise their strongest team effort for the distance challenge. See the SA event page for details of teams and categories. It's basically 4 per team in various gender and age categories. We need to make sure our strongest runners are doing the same time duration event and not split with some doing 15 minutes and some doing 30 minutes. Our ladies did exceptionally well in the 1 mile challenge. Let's do the same or even better this time.

Alan

Training Wednesday 27th May

Another easy recovery run day today with 5 to 10k (or even as much as 8 miles!) at a leisurely pace and on easy terrain (and a soft surface if possible). Let the leg strength recover. 

For the evening circuits session, we are on to a consolidation phase now, so having built up to 3 or 4 sets the past two weeks, step it back down by one set to 2 or 3 sets.

Alan 

SA VIRTUAL CHALLANGE

This weekends virtual challenge gives you a choice.
As far as you can go in 15 or 30 minutes make your choice before you start so you know your pace.
Same rules apply as the virtual 1 mile 3 weeks ago.
No laps under 1km, no point to point and no overall loss in elevation.
Everyone that still has a valid SA number has been entered and you have from Friday till Monday to do the run and you have to submit it on the events page by noon on Tuesday.
Only Strava or Garmin can be used.

Training Monday 25th May

A slight but difficult progression from last week's session. This week the 10k pace session is as follows:

3 x 1200m + 2 x 800m, 1 minute recoveries. 

Consistency of pace is the name of the game. The total rep distance has increased by 400m whilst the total recovery time is the same as last week, so is more challenging.

For those not familiar with how to programme such a session into a Garmin watch via Garmin Connect, I have created the following video. This is for the Android version of Garmin Connect but should be similar on an iPhone. Note that only the higher spec. Garmin watches can be programmed with custom workouts. If you go to the Training menu on your watch and the first item you see is "My Workouts" then it is likely that your watch can accept custom workouts.

Once the above session is loaded to your watch, select it and press the Start button (usually the upper right button) when you are ready to start your warm-up. Don't press anything else until you are ready to start the first rep. Then press the "Lap" button (usually the lower right button). The first rep timer will begin and you should not press any other buttons until the session is finished and you have finished your cool-down at which point press the Start/Stop button (usually the upper right button) and then save the session as usual. Apart from the first rep which will start as soon as you press the rep button, all subsequent reps will  give you a 5 second count down before the rep begins.

(PS of course, if you have 1200m and 800m distances marked on the ground, then that is the most consistent way of doing the session. In that case just set it up using the interval function on the watch as a set of 5 open reps with 1 minute recoveries. Then just press the lap button to stoo each rep when you reach your marker. I will be setting a Zoom exam on all of this in a few weeks). 
Alan