Track Interval Session at West Suffolk Athletics Arena Bury St Edmunds Suffolk

Tonight my running schedule called for an 8 mile tempo session. I decided to vary it a bit and do an interval session at the West Suffolk Athletics Arena in Bury St Edmunds instead.

This was my first visit to the track this year as I have focused entirely on my half marathon training schedule. This has meant road training and road training and more road training and I haven't been to the track or ventured off road as much as I would normally do. This has been a deliberate plan to see if a focus on a schedule would put me back on the straight and narrow as regards to my stamina to run longer distance and most importantly my confidence. I haven't raced for so long it is now a scary prospective.

So it was with great pleasure that I jogged a mile to the track with a drink in hand wearing tracksters and a thermal top. It was positively balmy this evening and I wasn't in two minds about removing the layers and a short sleeved technical t- shirt and shorts was all I needed along with my Ascics Gel Stratus 2's. These shoes will have to be retired in probably a month or so as I see I have recorded 375 miles in them.

The coach and many of the rest of the Saint Edmunds Pacers club were doing some sets of 4 minute runs but I wasn't tempted to join in as my plan was 6 x one mile intervals .

I felt strong as I set off on the first mile. The main thing was I felt I could keep up a decent pace throughout and my legs and breathing were not acting as a brake as they quite often do. I wasn't sure what time to expect for a mile but I stopped the Garmin Forerunner 205 at 7.32.

Not bad my fastest mile of the year but only because I havent't been to the track. Normally runs at th track are over a shorter distance with intervals of between 1 min and 5 mins so running several mile intervals isn't usually done. Looking back my diary indicates that last year for pace on the track over 3 minutes I would often run around 6.50 - 7 mile pace. 

I tired after 4 intervals but managed to complete the set of 6 to give times as follows

7.32,7.32,7.27,7.22,7.39, and 7.40

In between efforts I had my Asda Isotonic Mixed Berry Flavour Sports Drink

I really like this flavour , very good design of bottles with a good closure cap and cheap  in comapison with the competitors £1.46 for 4. Nice one Asda.





My times were pretty consistent with just 13 seconds between fastest and slowest. I was tired after this and jogged home the mile to give me a warm down and 8 miles in the bag.

Felt good tonight will have a break Thursday before reurning to the road on Friday lunch time.

Risby Suffolk

An out and back run from Bury St Edmunds to Risby in Suffolk. A long lunch time run the weather being a litle cooler and less humid I felt a lot more comfortable then I have done for the last few weeks.

I ran out 5 miles my route taking me out along the Newmarket Road and under the A14 flyover before turning towards Risby past the crematorium. The edge of Risby village is reached at around 3.5 miles. As I wanted to do a 5 mile out and back I continued on along School Road before turning right along Hall Lane and then turning right along the Flempton Road.

What has also helped with the longer runs is drinking my own electrolyte drink before the run. For this run I just added a pinch of sea salt to a pint of squash and it seemed to help though it could simply be a placebo effect!

Since then it looks as if there many recipes for making your own sports drinks and ditching the expensive sports drinks you can buy such as Lucozade and Gatorade.
The recipe I am going to try first is this - One third cup of honey, 1 litre of water,and a pinch of sea salt . Many of the recipes suggest adding half a teaspoon of baking powder as well. Mix all the ingredients together and keep chilled. I will let you know after I have tested and tried this out a bit.
This was a good enjoyable run in Risby.