Slogging it out

Tough session last night. You could tell that the holiday season is over by the number of participants at the club: a huge crowd last night. Anne and Nick were back from their holidays to attend the session, along with Bruno, Fred, Jean-Marc and Nico, to name but a few (and not the least).

Michel was taking the session, as unfortunately, despite the end of the holidays for most, Miguel was still away. Michel declared that since everyone had to work a little harder than last week that the session would be 2 series of 4x1 minute. This sounded fairly easy and most agreeable so it was a little bit of a disappointment when Nico asked if I wanted to carry on the specific 10k training programme he's been following. Sucker that I am, I agreed.

I wasn't the only runner to be convinced by Nico and both Bruno and Fred agreed to come along too. Nico's session was 2', 4', 6' off 1 minute rest and then 2 minutes rest over the longer 2 intervals. All of this was to be done twice. We warmed up easily enough for 25 minutes and then left the rest of the group to do our session in Le Mesnil forest. I was awarded the honour of chosing the track so we headed off towards the Mesnil car park and then Chateau du Val.

It was a warm evening, though slightly cooler than of late, and I was soon sweating freely. I set the pace with Nico over the first series and both Bruno and Fred seemed to struggle slightly as they been enjoying some rest over the Summer holidays. By the time we started the second series I was already suffering from tiredness, having pushed a little hard probably from the start. The garmin showed later that the intervals were all run about 16km/h average or 3:50 pace to be more precise.

The second series was harder going and on the last 6 minute interval both Bruno and Fred came past as they had been keeping some strength in reserve. I was shot and struggled to stay on the back, recovering slightly at the end to finsih a yard behind Nico and 15 behind the others. Niso has improved considerably over the Summer and he's going to prove hard to beat at Conflans. Bruno will be tougher still but I have to think positively.

Laurence had a good session with Anne and was pleased with her run. She's getting better and better by the day and I'm really pleased for her. She should beat her objective at La Rochelle if she carries on in this manner.

12.6 km all up in 1:08.