Weekly Summary

Total mileage: 56.92 miles
Profile: 100% steady road running, average pace 9.42mm
Longest run: 11.32 miles at 9.29mm pace.
Niggles: Just my right shin!
Sofa-spud days: None.

As predicted, a slower week, with almost 80% of the mileage coming in the 5 days after a blood donation. It typically takes 10 days for my exercise tolerance to come back to normal.

I plan to do around 70mpw for each of the next three weeks, maintaining an easy pace. Leon and I have agreed that we ought to start including some speedwork in December. We'll have to work out the least disruptive way of doing this.

Earlier this year, with the 10-in-10 on our wish-list for 2009, we asked an experienced coach for training advice. He devised a schedule for Leon and tweaked the sessions for me to reflect my slower pace. Unfortunately, the schedules didn't take into account that Leon and I like to train together and that, historically, I'm the one who has been able to tolerate higher training loads. I was unhappy at not being considered capable of handling as many miles, or as many reps on interval sessions, as Leon was, and I was unimpressed that so much of our training would have to be done separately.

Well-intentioned advice on coping strategies, and reminders that lots of two-runner couples don't train together and that maybe I should go out and find new playmates of similar ability to myself, completely missed the point and left me feeling as if I was being unreasonable. My confidence in my athletic ability is a fragile thing, and when Leon said something that I interpreted as "I can't do my long runs with you because you're too slow," which was not, of course, what he actually said, it crumbled to dust.

I barely ran a step from mid-June until the beginning of August. Leon's training log for those weeks looks similarly sparse. What was the point in being divided by a shared interest?

Since we picked up our training again, it's been straightforward. Lots of steady aerobic mileage for both of us, running together whenever we can. More miles overall for me because Leon was sidelined with a virus for a few days. No fancy sessions that we've had to think hard about.

On Wednesday, we did our standard 8-mile route. Leon was wearing his new Puma Salohs and I was as curious as he was to see how they performed when he ran fast, so I suggested that he went ahead, did a faster mile while I continued to plod along at my own pace, and came back to meet me. He did that three times. It was a very successful session and it may be worth looking at variations on that theme.

Meanwhile, I need to make more red blood cells before even thinking about speedwork ;o)