Bastille day

French national holiday today and so the whole country is entitled to a day off work. The whole country ? Well, not quite as there are all the poor individuals in the army, navy, airforce etc. who have to parade down the Champs Elysees for our dear old emperor Napoleon (that should read President Sarko of course).

I made the most of the morning by going to the clubhouse for 9:00 to meet with the other club members who were interested in a long run. There was a small turnout and the plan was to run a loop towards the St Germain terrasse, up to Croix de Noailles, cross over the main road towards Poissy and finish by the St Germain golf club. It was a beautiful morning with a clear blue sky, a slight breeze and a temperature around 18°C. Ideal for a run.

We started off very slowly on the warm-up and then began the planned programme of 3x8' off 3' recovery. The leading group was composed of Nico, Yannick, Fabrice, Philippe and myself. There were a couple of other faces I recognised but was unable to name. We picked up the speed gradually over the intervals to finish at just under 16 km/h. This was actually significantly faster than we were the other day with Thierry and Jean-Marc, so I was pleased with my pace. I've felt the need to push my speed training a little recently and this type of interval session felt perfect.

Yannick, Nico and I pushed on again for the second interval, with Nico pushing Yannick particularly hard over all 3 intervals. Nico is improving rapidly and at this rate, he should be pushing me hard in the races come September. On the last interval, I stepped off the gas slightly towards the end, as I could feel the fatigue building.

Nice to be out on a Tuesday morning like this. Run felt good despite this being my sixth training session on the trot. I can't remember having done quite so much before.

14 km all up in 1:16. So a slow average speed but very regular intervals averaging around 3:52 per km over each of the 8 minutes.