I did the Pontypool birthday parkrun on Saturday, which was really nice because I haven't run that course in such a long time, and I had a course PB too. 😊
On Saturday evening, my Friend Jenny of Griffithstown Harriers, Cwmbran was hosting a fundraising event for the Children with Cancer charity, as she is running in the London Marathon in April for this event. These charities obtain quite a few marathon places and successful applicants have to promise to raise a certain amount of cash to be able to take part. The amount does vary but it is often around £2k - £3k, which is a lot of money to raise, and Jenny managed to raise in excess of £700 at this event.
Whilst I was there, Jenny asked me if I would be happy to help her with some speed training, as she is feeling the need to improve her run times. Now I'm no coach, but I do take part regularly in the Thursday evening speed interval sessions with my own club, so I felt I could pass on the knowledge I have gained from my own sessions to help her, and we decided to meet up on Monday evening and run the Riverfront Parkrun course.
I decided we should begin with a sort of fartlek/tempo session, so my plan was that we would run the out section to the turn around point at Jenny's usual parkrun pace, about 10 minute miles, stop for a quick breather, then the return would be at a quicker pace.
The outward section was nice, we managed to chat and I could hear Jenny breathing fairly heavily, but not so much that she couldn't hold a conversation. The return leg was a different kettle of fish. I pumped up the pace so that I could still chat but, Jenny had to work harder than usual, and in fact I did all the chatting because Jenny couldn't breathe and talk at the same time, so I knew the pace was good.
I gave her lots of encouragement along the way, and more so in the last ¾'s of a mile as I could sense that she was tiring but, all credit to Jenny, she pushed herself all the way and didn't slow down at all, right to the finish.
The Riverfront parkrun route
My picture above shows a time of 30 minutes, but I was actually slow in stopping my watch and it was actually 29 minutes. Jenny was very pleased when she checked her watch and saw this, and she told me she hasn't run a 29 minute 5k in a very long time. She was also happy that she had been pushed harder and that she had coped with the extra pace, and she certainly has extra pace in her. My own pace has improved no end due to my increased fitness from doing regular speed/interval sessions, so as long as she keeps it up, her younger age will probably mean that I will be struggling to keep up with her in a few months time.
Next Monday we will be back on the Riverfront but doing sprint sessions, and I have my own CRC session tomorrow evening. 😰
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