PUTTING THE BRAKES ON.

 Whilst  training can often be spoken about what we do in a 7 day period, races at the moment are coming up fortnightly.   So it's been a case of looking the bigger picture and not sticking rigidly to a weekly regime.
Again a benefit of not being tied down to club sessions.  
  So tomorrow will be the third track session in 7 days but Friday to Thursday.  Friday 5x1K at 10K pace;
 Monday's satisfactory 5K tempo at 10 mile pace.   A need I think to nudge up the pace with a set of 300s tomorrow.  
  With that session in mind I was careful not to get carried away in the second half of today's 9 miler on the canal.   Settling into the target pace of 8.30 after the first mile, I held this (within seconds)  for the next four miles but the brakes had to go on when the 6th mile was recorded at 8.18.   Telling myself to "save it 'til tomorrow" the last miles were restrained to 8.22  8.21 and 8.17.    Averaging 8.31.   I thought this amounted to a good solid steady outing and hopefully has left something in the bank for a good speed session tomorrow.   Hopefully the wind will be kind;   the last 6 days have been hard enough without having to struggle against the elements .   56 miles including tomorrow.
   Having said that the elements whether wind, rain or heat have to be endured in training because race days are  rarely perfect.   Obviously,  certain venues and dates can be avoided. Like Barcelona in early August.

   It certainly looks like GB's leading runner in the London,  Andrew Lemoncello,  is going to avoid the adverse conditions  marathon runners will no doubt have to overcome in the European championships in Barcelona.   According to his blog, The Life Of Lemon,  his agents and his coach  suggested that he could

"destroy" his "body in the blazing heat of the Spanish sun".  Consequently, despite immediate enthusiasm after London,  he has now informed the GB selectors that he won't be running.  Apparently they were not very pleased!
  Predictably he will appear for his second marathon in Chicago or Amsterdam in the Autumn.   Cynics of course would say that money talks.   An outing at Barcelona in the European Championships would be for pride only and not constitute a pay day?   A sprinter can afford to run the championships and turn out for money the next week.   Could he run 3 marathon in the year  at his level?    I ran 5 in 1984 but they averaged 2.30 pace not  2.13 pace.  

   But could Lemoncello run well in early August and then again in mid October?