6by3m 2r - take myself to a place of pain and hold it

A big piece of the training at the moment involves us (Q-Power) taking ourselves into a pain place - AKA a lactic bath - and holding it there in order to force the body to overcome it and adapt to it. Unfortunately although my engine is all super duper now - I seem to suffer more on this end of the scale - which means only one thing - I need to  get used to it more than others and that's exactly how I was thinking going into the last few reps today - especially the last one where I could of just coasted in and got the time - instead I ramped up the pace and went sub 1:30 split for the last 30 seconds - oh what a lovely bath it was

Of course what is even funnier is due to lack of sleep last night my heads a little fussy - so Q asked me to target of +5 on 2k which meant 1:36.3 strictly - I dropped that to 1:36 which meant 937m target and set off - that somehow got translated during the row into 947m and that's 1:35.0 pace - oops - blowing like a good un at the end

Ave 1:34.5 for the six r32

Welcome back to hell! 6by1min 1r

"Welcome back to Hell" was what went through my mind once I finished this - although I have done a few interval sessions here and there, I don't think I've attempted one the day after a TT, if I did I swifty forgot about it. Even so I can't remember pushing myself through this kind of pain for a long long time, but today I did.

 

The session was 6by 1min on 1min off (my PB was 1:26.7 - so you know what's coming :lol: ) but after last night’s 30min TT PB I found it hard to sleep, even more so when the baby woke at 4:30am (which to be fair is very rare) after I settled her though I could not get back to sleep and just laid in bed till it was time to get up. (I would have gone into work early and got a row in pre work but my car is in the "shop" - "garage" so I’m getting a lift) so after 3 hours of sort of sleep and legs like lead from last night this session was not something that was going to be very pleasant.

 

And indeed it wasn’t. Drove through the 5k warm up but the HR was struggling to go over 150, a sure sign of tiredness as it normally pops just over 160. Set up the 6 by 1min and got myself set – the target was 348m (1:26.0 pace) set of well on the first rep although I could feel myself of balance as I favoured the non-injured leg (I would say good leg – but that’s my right one – which is injured :lol: ) managed to hit target so happy enough although the stroke rate was a little low maybe. Second rep and it started to bite a little and with the tiredness I lost focus at the end and pulled up short, lost a couple of meters through that. Third set and still going strong I decided to try and make the meters back from the second set which I did. Still in control, then the fourth set and it started to bite, lengthened out the stroke, as again I had noticed I’d been shortening it, and managed to hit target, but that was getting nasty.

 

OK fifth rep and here’s where the benefit from the session comes, although it don’t feel that way when you are in the middle of it, first 10-20 seconds is OK and then it gets nasty – real nasty – so you try and hold on and then push a little at the end at the same time your thighs are seizing up so the battle goes on in your head and legs – I won both but lost 1m – stupid legs. The interval between the fifth and sixth rep is where the war is won, even if you can’t hold on to target, by forcing the legs through that minute you succeed in the training, within 10 seconds it was nasty, real nasty, I called for Beowulf and he gave what he had, but he was spent, about ten seconds to go on the last rep I still saw 347/348m predicted finish but there was nothing left – poor Beowulf.

 

 

Now did I mention that was nasty – cos I haven’t felt that bad in a hell of a long time – welcome back to hell cos there is more and worse to come over the next few weeks – lets go to WAR!

 

Oh ye - I PB'd by 0.4 for the set :-D