0:01

I

0:04

like to be fit and healthy so the best way

0:07

I know is to just get out there and run. Running

0:09

wasn't out there for me to

0:11

feel good about myself and take out some of the angers

0:13

that were going on in my life.

0:21

It's 26 days to the London City

0:23

Marathon so it's time to talk

0:25

about the taper. It is one of the

0:27

most important parts of any marathon training

0:29

plan I am told. It is, of course,

0:32

my first one. So I'm taking

0:34

that on advisement from, of

0:36

course, the greatest of all time, the Queen of Irish

0:38

Athletics, three-time world

0:40

champion, Olympic silver medalist,

0:43

Sáinne O'Sullivan is back in Cove.

0:46

Is it good to be home?

0:47

It's great to be home. Yeah. I

0:50

had an amazing day yesterday. It

0:52

was the reckon the nicest day all year. and

0:56

I thought it was going to last

0:57

forever but we're back to reality

0:59

this morning with some heavy rain. But

1:02

we're looking ahead to

1:04

the weekend and it looks there's a chance

1:07

it's going to be a nice

1:08

day or a nice couple of days so fingers

1:11

crossed. Well this is the thing, it is

1:13

a bit of fingers crossed isn't it? We were told

1:15

on Sunday at the Wicklow half marathon

1:18

to expect gale force winds and

1:21

cloud cover and we nearly got

1:23

sunshine. We didn't get a drop

1:25

of rain

1:26

and the wind backed off. And it was

1:28

a heavenly run that we'll talk all about

1:30

later in the show. But the race that

1:32

Sonya is talking about, of course, the Cove 10 Mile

1:35

Road race, your annual race, Sonya,

1:38

does it get you in the fields when you go

1:40

down there and you realize that all of these people are

1:42

coming together to run the roads you trained

1:44

on and it just becomes

1:47

this moment for the community

1:49

every single

1:50

It's just amazing to see everybody

1:53

pulling together and everybody contributing. I'm

1:56

under WhatsApp group, so I see all that's going

1:58

on, all the preparations. There's

2:01

a lot of work to do and there's a lot of people putting

2:03

their hand up and getting involved and

2:06

so it means a lot to me. I think it also

2:08

means a lot to the people of Covid, to the

2:10

Ballymore Covid Athletic Club, to the Covid

2:13

Triathlon Club, Chippin, and lots

2:15

of the different clubs and organisations in

2:17

the town. They all help out, they all

2:19

have runners going around and

2:21

it

2:24

really is a great day and it's been fantastic the

2:26

past few years. I was looking

2:28

today to dig out a few photos from

2:30

the different runs that I've done and through

2:32

the years. I mean, I think there was one, there

2:35

must've, it must've been only raining one year because

2:37

I was wearing a hat, like a rain cap. And

2:41

that,

2:41

and I think I was wearing long tights

2:43

and everything. So I was really

2:45

getting dressed for the

2:47

elements, but every other time it's, you know,

2:49

shorts and t-shirts, shorts and thinglets, sun

2:52

shining, crowds down on, you

2:54

know, both sides of the road. as you run down into

2:56

the town. So, you

2:58

know, I think when we envision

3:00

the race, that's what we all picture is this,

3:02

you know, amazing finish and everybody,

3:05

you know, smiling, delighted

3:07

to see the finish line to be running

3:09

downhill into the finish line. And

3:11

you know, we, I suppose all that

3:14

positive energy, nearly

3:16

drives it and gets it over the line

3:18

each year. So hopefully we

3:20

will have the same this year and

3:23

everybody will be rewarded. It gets people coming

3:25

back. I mean, it's so funny that it is

3:27

such a tricky little race in so many

3:29

ways because of, as you mentioned, the

3:32

hills and, you

3:33

know, the fact that it is a challenging

3:35

enough course. But definitely

3:37

I felt that in Wicklow on Sunday, that

3:40

it nearly gives it a character. It

3:42

has a certain... there's something fun

3:45

about it. And I never really understood what

3:47

people meant when they said running hills is actually

3:49

kind of fun.

3:50

But certainly running around Wicklow on Sunday,

3:53

I got the sense that letting

3:56

your legs go on a downhill,

3:58

having struggled up a hill. It

4:01

would make you come back. You must get

4:03

an awful lot of return

4:05

business to the Cove race. Are

4:07

there people that run it every single year without fail?

4:10

I think there must be. There's people out there, they're

4:12

collecting the mugs now at this stage. They'll

4:15

have every colour. So we've had

4:17

blue, green, red, and this year is

4:19

black for the rising on the mugs.

4:22

And it looks very classy

4:24

this year, I think, with the Church Cathedral

4:27

and the deck

4:29

of cards houses, even though they're very colorful,

4:32

but in the black and white, it just

4:34

looks very contrast

4:36

with the muggles. Lovely. So I think it's really nice. We're

4:39

coming for the mug. It'll be well

4:41

earned when you run around the streets. I'm

4:43

really looking forward to it. And of course there's still

4:46

time, right, Sonya? There's still time. You

4:48

can actually still get an entry and come

4:50

down. If you're just tuning in, this is your first Irishman

4:53

abroad episode.

4:55

Come on down. Run with Sonya this

4:57

Sunday, April 2nd in

4:59

Cove in her hometown. We'll

5:01

also have a bit of crack afterwards in the pub.

5:04

There's loads of listeners coming down. Get

5:06

to meet the people that you might have been interacting

5:08

with

5:09

on Strava. Sure, what else

5:11

are you doing on April 2nd? The mid-term

5:13

break has begun for the kids. You may as

5:15

well rock on down there. It's actually a much

5:17

easier drive than people let

5:20

on. That's not the case when

5:22

it comes to training for a marathon.

5:24

If people tell you that it's a difficult drive

5:26

to the marathon, they're not messing. It

5:29

is a big undertaking. And the

5:31

part of it that a lot of people can tend to

5:33

overlook is this three week

5:36

tapering period where you reduce

5:38

your mileage. Now it's obviously

5:41

important, Sonya, and that the

5:43

theory behind it is 21 days out,

5:47

you should be allowing your body

5:49

to recharge. Correct? That's that's it

5:51

in a nutshell. Yeah. Yeah. It's

5:54

a very fine line, it's a very difficult

5:56

thing to do, to taper for any

5:58

event. You know, particularly

6:00

with the marathon, I think a lot

6:02

of this tapering is based on, you

6:05

know, what the best runners do. So

6:08

they're running, you know, up to 200 kilometers

6:10

a week. So that's a lot of wear and tear

6:12

in the body. So I

6:14

think, you know, it's a little bit different

6:17

for everybody else who's training

6:19

for marathon because not everybody's running 200 kilometers

6:21

a week. And so you

6:24

don't all taper at the same level. So

6:26

you have to work out the percentages of, you

6:28

know, how much volume you

6:31

decrease and how much intensity you

6:33

decrease. So you've got to maintain,

6:35

you know, some level of running, um,

6:37

over the next three weeks that you

6:40

kind of always start in the engine, but you're not,

6:43

you know,

6:43

running it into the ground. Like, as if you're

6:45

kind of operating at about 80 to 90%

6:49

over the next two weeks, anyway, and then

6:52

with the final weekend, you probably come

6:54

down to about 50 to 60 percent

6:56

maybe.

6:57

I wouldn't be going much lower than

6:59

that because I think it's very important to

7:01

keep moving because otherwise you start to feel

7:04

a little bit lethargic, kind of lose

7:06

that bouncy feeling. If you taper

7:08

too much you get, you start to feel yourself

7:10

getting a bit heavy and you don't want that feeling

7:13

either. So

7:14

yeah, there's probably a lot to

7:16

weigh up between now and you know,

7:18

particularly the few days before

7:20

the marathon, how much you cut back.

7:23

Well, Vinny Mulvey of VinnyMulveyFitness.com

7:26

has been coaching myself and Sonya for the

7:28

last

7:29

few months, and

7:31

he's going to talk to us about that

7:33

fine detail of how

7:35

to make that calculation. You

7:38

will need to hear that. We'll

7:40

have some of Vinny in the free episode

7:42

here on iTunes and SoundCloud,

7:45

wherever you get your free podcasts.

7:47

But if you'd like to hear that deeper dive discussion

7:49

with Sonya and Vinny,

7:51

come on over to patreon.com forward slash

7:53

Irishmanabroad,

7:54

hear the whole thing, and it really gives us

7:56

the space and time to get into what is quite

7:59

a complicated thing. As you say,

8:01

Sonia, it is fine

8:03

margins. As you say, we're trying to replicate

8:06

something that elite athletes do on

8:09

a much smaller scale. Where

8:12

does sleep factor

8:14

into this thing? Because I'd imagine

8:16

you nearly need to up the hours of

8:19

sleep that you're getting in that tapering

8:21

face. Well, it's all

8:23

kind of contrasting what you're doing

8:25

and a bit of catch-22

8:28

stuff going on in there because when

8:30

you're training a lot, then

8:32

you sleep better. When you

8:34

train a bit less, then it may be harder

8:36

to sleep. Like when you, it's

8:39

the same thing when you're training a lot, you eat

8:41

more. So when you're training less, do

8:43

you eat less? Or, you know, how do you get that

8:46

balance right? I think that's why

8:49

I asked you on the weekend, I said,

8:51

what did you eat? The night before the half

8:53

marathon. Cause you said you felt great. You loved it.

8:55

The half marathon. I did.

8:58

So then, but you weren't too keen

9:00

on what you ate the night before. Yeah, I

9:02

had an Irish stew the night before, which

9:05

I thought was going to be magical food,

9:07

true Irish cuisine.

9:10

But it was the hot wings that

9:12

I had at lunchtime, which proved

9:14

not to be such a good idea. I don't blame

9:16

the stew. I was in

9:19

smithereens digestively

9:21

for the duration of the evening

9:23

and morning of the race.

9:25

So I actually forgot

9:28

that this is, as you always say, a dry

9:31

run, a dress rehearsal.

9:33

And I wasn't concentrating on what I was

9:36

putting into my body

9:37

the night before. Such a rookie

9:39

error, clearly, Sonia. But we can get

9:41

some more practice in for the 10 miles

9:44

in this weekend and go and see if we

9:46

can fix up your pre-marathon

9:48

dining choices.

9:50

I think if you can kind of settle on something,

9:53

then it's one less thing that you

9:55

have to worry about.

9:57

as if you're

9:58

going right out to the line.

9:59

and you're wondering what you should

10:01

be eating and what you shouldn't be eating, then

10:03

it's just a little bit of a worry, a little bit

10:05

of a stress that you have in there that you're

10:07

not too sure how you're going to feel.

10:09

So I think you have

10:11

a long run planned around your coke 10

10:13

mile on the weekend.

10:15

So there should be ample

10:17

room to test things out there on

10:20

Saturday with treat you to some

10:22

fine pre-raised food and coke. So

10:24

you're going pizza. I heard you suggest

10:27

pizza.

10:28

And Mick Classy suggested

10:30

pizza the last time I was down there. That's what he went with.

10:33

Yeah, I suggest Rush Pizza

10:35

out in Ballynope. They have, it's a

10:37

takeaway place, but the pizza is fantastic.

10:40

I mean, I got one last night and

10:43

I thought I was going to only eat a few slices,

10:45

but before I knew it, it was gone. Pretty

10:48

moreish. I had a 10-mile

10:50

run in the morning, but it was a relatively easy

10:52

10-mile. I'm hoping to go maybe 10 minutes

10:54

quicker

10:55

on some day, a minute, a mile quicker. Oh my gosh,

10:58

it's putting

11:01

me to the test. Talk to

11:03

Joe on 1850 715 815. Good

11:07

afternoon to you, Vinny Mulvey. Great to have

11:09

you back on the Live Line. Charlotte, how you

11:11

doing?

11:12

Good to be here. We are in the

11:14

tapering period, aren't we? 26 days

11:17

to go to London. You've

11:20

been here a bunch of times with people. You've

11:22

done it yourself. I wanted to ask you straight

11:24

out the gate. What's the number one

11:26

mistake you see people make in this period?

11:29

What you alluded to it when you were talking

11:31

to Sonya, I'd say the number one thing

11:34

is people

11:35

trying to chase up things

11:38

that they missed or they feel like they've missed

11:40

or they're listening to what other people are doing

11:42

and they're like, Oh geez, I need, I

11:44

need another long loan or I'll, I'll do a

11:47

faster one or they just

11:49

try and do cramming. Yeah.

11:52

cramming the last 10 days

11:54

of the of the marathon prep and you

11:57

know it and it is like. the

12:00

Leaving Search, like you mentioned that the

12:02

Leaving Search earlier, but it really

12:04

does feel like it. Yeah. It

12:06

is like that where if you haven't done

12:08

the work, like you're only going to do

12:10

as well as you've prepared, you know? Yeah.

12:13

There's no way, there's no fake in it. No.

12:16

And you have to face up to that and say, right,

12:18

this is where I'm at. You know? And

12:21

let's just go for it. And, you know, I might do

12:23

a little bit better on the day than

12:26

I am expecting to do, or I

12:28

might do a little bit worse, like whatever, like,

12:30

well, I should be in or around such and

12:33

such a time. Of course, there's other variables

12:35

with temperature and

12:37

wind and rain and, you know, stuff

12:39

like that. But yeah, you should kind

12:41

of have an idea of where you're at and

12:44

just be at peace with that and say, right,

12:47

let's go for it. And this is where I'm at. And let's

12:49

just do it. Well, you

12:51

offered to tell me what pace you want me to run

12:53

the London Marathon at. And

12:55

I said, don't text me. Don't tell me. hear

12:58

the reasoning on the podcast. And

13:00

we'll, as I said, we'll get to that later

13:03

on in the London's calling section

13:05

of the show, and I am really

13:07

excited to hear what it's going to be. Because

13:10

you put down a pace for

13:12

me to run in Wicklow that

13:15

was bananas.

13:17

And somehow I did it. Yeah.

13:20

You know, that can be that hubris

13:22

though, that can be produced

13:24

by, let's say, somebody doing

13:27

a tune up race like a half marathon, heading

13:29

into their taper period and going, I'm

13:31

actually, you know, I'm

13:34

in a place that I've never been in my life.

13:36

The person that heads into tapering

13:39

seems to be divided into a couple

13:41

of categories. The person who thinks they haven't done enough,

13:44

that's the person who's cramming

13:46

down the library, looking at books they've never seen

13:48

before in their life when they're not focused

13:50

on what they have done. the

13:53

person that is overdoing

13:55

the taper, that is over

13:57

resting in some ways and

13:59

actually

13:59

detraining in the process.

14:03

And then this third person,

14:05

and that's what the question's about, the

14:07

person who is actually

14:09

disconnected from what

14:11

they have and they don't even know what

14:14

they have. And that's quite

14:16

a few people who haven't

14:19

employed someone like yourself. That's

14:22

what I was gonna say, that's where a coach comes

14:24

in or some

14:26

outside voice, you know,

14:29

who actually knows what they're talking about to kind

14:31

of tell you, right, this is what shape

14:34

you're in and this is what we're going to aim for. You

14:36

know, and you just say, you trust what they're saying.

14:39

But the mistake to me is

14:42

when you start listening to too many people or

14:45

reading stuff on your Strava

14:48

or whatever, people telling you, oh, I think

14:50

you should do this, or, and you start kind of thinking

14:52

about that and going, Jesus. And then you might

14:56

start questioning things. Like if you had a total

14:58

people

14:59

last week, well, I think you did actually.

15:02

But if you, if you told people the paces I was

15:04

giving you for a race, you

15:06

know, I'd say some people were doubting you

15:09

and you knew the second

15:11

guess yourself.

15:12

Oh, a hundred percent. I mean,

15:14

I, I haven't, but I don't hide, you

15:16

know, this journey that I've been on or the

15:19

numbers that you give me because it's part of

15:21

the story, but I can't

15:23

imagine what it's like for somebody who doesn't have a coach

15:25

and is basically relying on, you

15:27

know, Runner's World magazine or

15:30

whatever articles they're stumbling across.

15:33

So what you're saying is probably the

15:36

biggest mistake you can make at this point is let too many

15:38

cooks in the kitchen.

15:39

Yeah, yeah. And like a big mistake people

15:41

make as well is they do a half

15:44

marathon and they

15:46

say whether it's, you know, 1.30, 2 hours,

15:49

whatever, and they just double it and say that's

15:51

what I'm I'm going to shoot for the marathon. That's

15:53

a mistake. Okay. and

15:57

You're more likely not going to do that unless

15:59

you're

15:59

doing the half marathon and you're absolutely just

16:02

jogging, you know, and your

16:04

plan is to run at

16:06

your marathon pace or something, but like

16:09

very unlikely that you'll just double the

16:11

distance at the same pace. You usually

16:13

should double it and kind of adds 10 minutes

16:16

or something like that, you know, depends on the runner

16:19

and depends on

16:20

the pace. Yeah. But let me ask you in

16:23

this section of the show to round things off.

16:27

If somebody doesn't have a coach like you. They're

16:29

not a member of a club. They're

16:31

just training for a marathon

16:34

on their own. What are

16:36

the rules of thumb when

16:39

heading into three weeks to go to begin

16:41

a taper that's self-designed?

16:44

I usually don't start the taper till

16:46

about two weeks ago,

16:48

you know? You're right. And there's a lot

16:50

of people that would disagree with that. Yeah. That's

16:52

my approach usually. Okay.

16:54

And I usually have you do your last long run

16:57

two weeks before. Right.

16:59

And that's usually like

17:01

a 35k run and then you just

17:03

back up, you know, but

17:05

going back to someone who doesn't really know

17:08

where to look or what to do, I

17:10

just try and keep it simple and tell it, like say,

17:12

look, you're better off under cooking this than

17:14

overcooking it. You know, you're better off

17:17

being fresh going in rather than not

17:19

easing off.

17:20

I don't, you know, so yeah. Yeah,

17:23

well look, everyone has different

17:26

philosophies and marathons and some people

17:28

like to do the longest run to be an over distance

17:31

run like 45 K or something.

17:33

A lot of elites would do that. I don't

17:36

subscribe to that, but that

17:38

doesn't mean I think it's wrong. I just,

17:40

you know, just, it's just my approach,

17:43

you know?

17:43

Sure. Um, I

17:46

usually like to have

17:48

at least two 32 K

17:51

runs done and one 35 K. you're

17:53

in a different boat because you're you know

17:55

you haven't had enough time but I actually think you're

17:57

going to actually think bizarrely you're going to

17:59

be

17:59

fine, you know, um,

18:03

because there's loads more on the tank and I

18:05

saw it yesterday. You know, you

18:07

probably noticed you are easing off this week coming

18:09

up, but that's only because you want cove.

18:12

Yeah. You know, and, uh, and you just

18:14

did a half. So I'm kind of wary. I

18:16

didn't want to give you too heavy

18:19

a session midweek because I want you just

18:21

to recover from the half.

18:23

Your prep for Dublin is going to be different to

18:25

this, but

18:26

your prep for it's kind of a unique

18:29

situation because you

18:31

were injured and we didn't

18:33

know where you were going to be. You

18:35

know, once or two months or three

18:37

months and it's been just going so well.

18:41

You come off the weekend there,

18:44

run in the half marathon and we

18:46

assume we're going to talk about that race later.

18:49

I just want you to stay in that positive

18:52

kind of

18:53

bubble, you know? Talk

18:55

to Joe on 1850 at 715 815. I

18:59

will do one final final

19:02

long run before

19:03

London and if you're training for the Connemara marathon

19:06

this might be the perfect final final long run

19:08

for you too. It's in our Strava

19:10

Club group there, it will take place

19:12

on April 8th in the Phoenix par and

19:15

there's a good gang of 15 hardy

19:17

runners already lined

19:20

up to join me including Wes Kenny,

19:22

Farid Rafa, Paddy, Martin,

19:24

Sophie Weber, Winona Grant is gonna

19:26

make an appearance, Alain D'Corsi,

19:29

Rafale, Brendan Coughlin, Emre Chennade,

19:32

Rojo, Ronan Johns is gonna

19:34

show up, Steven Daly, Fiona

19:36

Jarrett, Niles Sheedy, the legend

19:38

Jan O'Hearnone and James

19:40

Burke. Join us, there'll be two pace

19:43

groups so there'll be no hassle if you want to go bit slower.

19:45

That'll be cool too.

19:46

And I'll have Easter eggs for everybody

19:49

who shows up. That's right. It's an Easter

19:51

Saturday meetup run for the Irishman

19:53

abroad. So if you can't make it to Cove, maybe

19:55

pop down.

20:05

Okay, well, it might not be a bad

20:07

time to go around the parishes. We had some tremendous

20:10

performances from our listeners. It's

20:12

only one that stood out to me right away.

20:15

It's a very strange one. We like to include

20:17

a couple of oddball ones as well.

20:19

I don't know if you saw this one yourself

20:22

in the group. And that

20:24

was Deirdre Crawford, a 7

20:27

mile recovery run. She

20:29

said the music died at 15. So

20:33

obviously the plan was to run longer.

20:35

So she says at 5 miles she

20:37

started to think it's time for an impromptu

20:40

detour for a pint in

20:43

the middle of the run. I

20:45

just don't see that happening in 1996 for Sanjos

20:47

Open. I'm

20:50

gonna cut this run short and have a Guinness.

20:53

Did you spot this run first of all? I

20:56

loved the idea that she just went fuck it, I'm going

20:58

to the ball.

21:00

And how did she get home after? Did

21:02

she end the run there? Or did

21:05

she get a new lease of life and leg it

21:07

home?

21:07

I know that's

21:09

pretty impressive. I've known people to stop

21:12

and have to buy a bottle of water

21:14

or something or a gatorade or something like

21:16

that. But applying to Guinness for strength.

21:19

I've never seen that before. Pretty impressive,

21:21

yeah. You've got to get the iron in. It

21:24

takes a recovery to a new level altogether.

21:26

I could see how she's feeling the day after. There

21:29

is a few biggies around, though, wasn't there? Dunne,

21:31

Boon, 10K, of course. There's the OMA

21:34

half marathon. Did anybody jump out to you?

21:36

Yeah, the Dunne, Boon, 10K. On

21:39

your doorstep, and you missed it. I missed it,

21:41

yeah. Raging my own club and everything.

21:44

Is it your own club's very tall? Yeah. Is

21:46

it a flat course? Oh, it looked

21:48

very flat. People running all kinds of

21:50

times. Well, Elaine D'Corsi

21:53

ran a PB, so I was thinking it must be

21:55

fairly flat. A trill, she says, but

21:57

a new PB of 41.

21:59

42 that's 4.10 per kilometer

22:02

yeah and the the elevation

22:04

gain was only 29 meters so I suppose that's

22:06

not too nearly the top pretty good here's

22:08

the opposite well done Elaine my next shout

22:11

out goes to Pete Howie who has

22:13

gotten I think he's probably got the record for

22:15

most shout outs in random parishes

22:17

but that's because this man Sonia is

22:20

unrecognizable from the runner that

22:22

ran the the Cove 10 last year. He

22:24

did a little warmer upper in Malo, a 10 miler

22:28

and just stormed it in a

22:30

one hour flat. Like what

22:32

has Mary DeBarrabendoon to this fella

22:35

to turn him into the athlete that he is

22:37

in 2023?

22:39

Did you spot that run yourself?

22:40

I did. He just ran over an

22:43

hour. We actually met him down the town yesterday

22:46

and he was delighted with himself running a PB.

22:49

And this is going to be a real test I think now

22:51

because piece is going to run

22:54

in the Cove 10 mile as well. So

22:56

that would be a good comparison of, you

22:59

know, is the Cove 10 really

23:01

that hilly that you run slower

23:04

on it? So we'd be able to work out

23:06

maybe based on his runs, how

23:09

much slower it is, or maybe it's not slower at all.

23:12

We were discussing this earlier that even

23:15

though there's a few hills in there, you also

23:17

get a few downhill and

23:20

then you also get the variety in the course

23:21

so you're not looking at straight roads which

23:24

can be quite difficult

23:26

to do as well to you know just

23:28

be running on the flat the whole time there

23:30

with no variety. 100% yeah.

23:33

To change it up and

23:35

you probably noticed that yesterday with the half marathon.

23:37

Yeah. It goes by a bit quicker sometimes

23:40

because you're going up

23:41

and down and you're... Well yeah no

23:43

I was just about to totally agree with you and and

23:46

it made me excited for Cove because

23:49

when you settle into the idea that this is going to be a bit

23:51

of a roller coaster you you

23:54

kind of embrace it a little bit you're

23:56

suddenly like well well Oh, well I actually am gonna run

23:58

fast at-

23:59

times on this and they will compensate

24:02

for the slight slowing that the

24:04

hills are gonna have. I

24:07

loved Wicklow. I have to say this

24:09

experience I had there the

24:12

only downside of it was that we got What

24:14

corners? a What corners were you cutting? distance. I don't

24:16

know if you saw that. I never got

24:19

a single corner, son. You know

24:21

what?

24:24

As

24:30

honest as the day is long, I was both,

24:33

Patty Booth and I were a little bit upset over

24:35

that because we both had such a good time. Patty

24:37

Booth's an old friend of mine who ran the

24:39

race with me. In the second

24:42

half of our show,

24:43

I'll play a couple of voice notes that I

24:45

took so you can really get the sights and sounds

24:48

feel of the Wicklow Gale

24:50

Break half marathon. But

24:53

having a buddy with me on

24:55

a course like that sign, that was another kind of

24:57

life hack or cheat code. I wondered if I put

24:59

to you. Having somebody who's a

25:02

little bit stronger than you as a runner on

25:04

your shoulder, who also, this

25:06

was the other thing with Patty, he knew

25:09

the area backwards. So I

25:11

would be saying to him, tell me there isn't another

25:13

hill after this one. He'd be like, no, we've

25:15

got two more. And I

25:17

was going, okay, I can do two. But

25:20

that bit of knowledge really,

25:22

really helped. And is

25:25

that something you'd recommend people do? is

25:28

kind of tag on with a group of locals

25:30

if they're heading around Cove this weekend. Yeah,

25:32

there'll be plenty locals going around.

25:34

And I think I had a similar

25:36

experience last year running with Rob Peppernett.

25:39

And I was actually telling him what was going

25:41

on in the course, but just having

25:43

somebody alongside you, it does help a lot

25:46

to kind of keep you a bit

25:48

more focused, a bit concentrate. It's

25:50

a little bit like what I was saying the other week back

25:52

when you're in a run and you just notice

25:55

the people around you. And once

25:57

the race settles down, then... everybody

26:00

finds their pace and you do have the same

26:02

kind of people around you. So then you're all probably

26:04

watching each other and trying to hang on to each other. And,

26:07

you know, sometimes without even discussing

26:10

it, you're helping each other. And you become

26:12

familiar with the people in your surroundings. And,

26:15

um, so I think, you know,

26:17

if you have somebody assigned to

26:19

run with you or that, you know, then

26:22

absolutely it helps a lot. And

26:24

I think it generally comes down to

26:26

the stronger runner runner being

26:28

willing to back off a little bit at

26:30

times.

26:31

And, and sometimes that can help

26:33

you both, you know, that you don't kind of feel like

26:36

you've got to really push on, you know,

26:38

this is feeling a bit easier now I got to, I got to head

26:40

off.

26:41

Yeah, well, run together. Absolutely.

26:44

And I definitely know that Patti Booth was

26:47

slowing down. Where have you gone

26:49

a couple of times, Edgar, and

26:51

that's a shout out to him. My final shout out goes

26:53

to Seamus McAtear. He's pictured

26:55

here with David Graham at the OMA half.

26:57

They both ran it. David ran a PB of 120

27:00

and shameless. Not

27:04

bad at all. 155. Fair play to you.

27:06

Do you have one more yourself, Sanya? So

27:09

I did have one Brian O'Connor.

27:11

He's up there in Dunleary and he

27:13

did a bit of a session that is kind of a nice

27:16

one on what would be a windy

27:18

day because there's been quite a few windy days

27:20

out and when it's very windy

27:22

it can be hard

27:23

to decide what to do you know

27:25

the longer sessions can be quite hard

27:28

and he went to a nice look

27:30

on field and he ran 12 times 200 meters with 200 so 200

27:32

meter pass 200 meter

27:36

slow and just kept running

27:38

and so you couldn't choose to go with the wind and then

27:41

go slow against the wind and

27:43

it just helps you to put in the time

27:45

I think on days when it can be a bit blustery

27:48

out there and I think the wind is

27:50

probably one of the hardest things to run

27:52

in. It can really

27:54

throw you off in a bit. It's

27:57

hard to get into rhythm and

27:59

so sometimes

27:59

you have to adjust things a little bit just to

28:02

get the running, to get the sessions in. I'm

28:05

happy to say it looks like a 13

28:08

mile an hour wind forecast for

28:11

this Sunday. So that'll,

28:13

that's a west north

28:15

westerly.

28:16

So using your own internal

28:19

compass there, Sonya, will that mean that the wind

28:22

is behind us coming down the hill? West

28:26

north westerly sounds like that could be the case.

28:29

It'd be nice if it was with us going up the hill. Last

28:32

year we were absolutely blessed. The sun

28:34

split the stones and everybody

28:36

came home with a smile on their face. So

28:39

fingers crossed we'll get the weather.

28:42

And next week on the show you will get to

28:44

hear all about it in our sights

28:46

and sounds episode. It's going to be

28:49

so much fun. So if you can't make it wherever you

28:51

are in the world, Sanya and myself will do

28:53

everything we can to bring you there.

28:55

One of the keys to maintaining your brain

28:57

mass is pushing past

29:00

that comfortable zone physically, you

29:02

know, exercise wise.