Fast Slow Fast

Fast, slow, fast was the name of the session tonight. Not very imaginative but very descriptive.

So the training plan for the evening was 2000m of fast, slow, fast with 100m intervals of sprints, interspersed with 100m of medium-paced jogging. Then 400m of recovery and a further 1000m of fast, slow, fast.

I managed to arrive ahead of schedule for the training tonight which was already a victory in itself. I was able to arrive at a sedate pace rather than the frantic sprint in my suit as per usual. Once changed, we set off for a warm-up through the forest and beside the swimming pool at St Germain in a large 4km loop to begin with. This took about 27 minutes and then we warmed up on the track for a few seconds before starting the session proper.

I ran with Bruno very easily to begin with not following the leaders for once. Nick was up at the front running hard with Miguel and Francisco. We gradually caught them up and over the last 5 or 6 sprints we were running alongside.

On the second shorter set, I could feel that Miguel and Bruno were pulling away from me over the fast sections. It was practically an all-out sprint and the Garmin showed that we were reaching almost 25 km/h over these sections. We finished the session and I warmed down with Laurence. It was not as tiring as a normal interval training since the heart was able to recover over the slow sections.

The worst part of the evening was being told by Miguel that the Yvelines marathon course isn't flat at all and if I achieve my objective there then I'll achieve it anywhere. He's sown the seed of doubt in my mind now, 10 days before the race. Bugger !