My colleague and co-blogger @jimbocoyle isn’t leaving this blog, but he is moving on from B2L towers for new challenges. “Valete” is Latin for goodbye, but literally translates to “be well / stay strong” which seems a more than appropriate wish for me to send in the direction of a man who is training for both a half marathon and a triathlon simultaneously. And no, I’m not some great Latin ponce, but I picked up a few words by osmosis as a result of having been schooled poshly.
James delivers his running wisdom directly to me at the moment (he’s sat behind me at work for about three years) — so really this is good news for you all, devoted readers of LSR, as it means we’ll have to use communications platforms like this one to discuss our running geekery.
Join me in wishing James luck as he goes off to work in, it won’t surprise you, a more sport-related field [sic].
In tribute to his departure, I returned to running this morning and recorded a personal best time for a 5k, 28.53. That’s an appropriate leaving tribute for a man who can beat my time by nine minutes.
As great as it is interacting digitally with y’all, its great to catch up via other media too. Tonight I had an hour long chat with Sensei Paul and Rach, about all sorts, catching up on life… and of course, getting the Sensei’s guidance on all things running related.
Specifically, we talked about:
- Limbering up – how it takes both of us the first couple of k’s of a run to get the stride going
- Endurance training – how interval and speed training help (and how much they matter) in long-distance run training
- The life-span of a pair of trainers – about 300 miles, apparently, which means (at current rates) that I’ll need a new pair of New Balance 850s towards the end of July
- Injuries and sore knees
- Building stretching into the running routine (as recently blogged about)
- What race conditions do for your motivation and your personal bests
- Readjusting my half-marathon goal (from sub 2hr to sub 2hr10 – a bit more realistic)
- Sensei Paul’s target of sub-17 minutes for a 5k he’s running next week (!!)
We also discussed the possibility of a guest post on the LSR (whaddya say, Sensei?), and the potential for a blog about home produce growing – when I have a bigger garden I fully intend to plant us some leeks, onions, carrots, etc….
Anyway, that’s off-topic for LSR. More to follow next week y’all!
Readers of the site (rather than the RSS feed, Facebook links etc) will have noticed a new tab in the navigation taking you through to a “Friends of the LSR” page – this is where James and I will list our running mates, friends and colleagues – the people that inspire us to all this running lunacy. I’ve started plugging a few names and “bios” in as I frequently reference odd-named people in my posts (my curious personality has me consulting with all my friends on running technique, tips and technology), so hopefully this will demystify it for you… if you were wondering who Sensei Paul, BIL, Jimjamjebobo et al were, have a look… and if I’ve left you off, let me know and I’ll fix that toot sweet.
Today’s Juneathon effort (day 8): 10.4km in 63 minutes – pretty much bang on a 60 minute 10k, which I’m very pleased with. Felt like a ‘return to form’ after a slow couple of weeks. Was tough work in the pouring rain, though…
Armand David's personal weblog: dadhood, technology, running, media, food, stuff and nonsense.
