Thursday Intervals with Rocket Lockets

Not many at the meeting place today and those that did turn up looked pretty useful.

By the time we got to the canal there were 10 of us and 2 went for the "Full Monty" a threshold run right around the entire Vicky Park boundry as part of their marathon prep.

Fair bit of debate ensued about what the rest of us were going to do. There is a measured 200m on a clear and flat section just before the bridge before the humpbacked bridge over the side canal - that makes sense if you've ever been to the canal. The wee white sign on the wall is the start and the last white bollard is the finish on the outbound.

We did twelve sets of the following: 200m sprint, jog back to the start with both sprint and jog inside 2mins. I was clearing the 200m in 34-38 seconds, getting stronger as we went on. I was keeping up with the middle group (no back markers today) and by rep 4 I was somewhere between the elite and the middle. Someone ducked out around halfway and then I was closing the gap to the elite with each rep.

The pep talk from the tramp on the bench at the end was amusing. Fag and beer in hand he assured us he could not even do one of the reps above walking pace.....

A group of fatties with guides wearing yellow bibs waddled through us and obeyed the orders to keep left so we could sprint through them. On their return leg we actually over took them on our recovery jog. If we are the rocket lockets they must be the damp squibs. Harsh but true.

By the last one I actually caught one of them and went through to finish the last rep 3rd of 7. Wow! Don't know where that speed came from, but it was a great feeling to hold my own with the elite and get the chit chat about what the aim of the session was, how hard to each of the reps ought to be (85%) and why we switched direction a few times (as the wind changed). Very happy with that and relaxed about going off on holiday skiing with not much prospect of running in pipeline for the next couple of weeks.