LACTATE TESTING CASE STUDY

51 year-old Superveteran distance runner Tracey Lasan

PART 2

The Reading Half-Marathon

Tracey strides home to take the titleTracey’s longest distance event of the Lactate Testing cycle came on March 29th 2009 at the Reading Half-Marathon.

The Reading Half-Marathon is one of the largest Half-Marathon events in the country featuring a field of 17,000 runners and is the only event of it’s kind in the UK to feature a major stadium finish with the participants cheered to the finish in the Reading Football club stadium.

Tracey performed in scintillating manner to leave her rivals in her wake with a stunning win in the Women’s Senior Veteran (50+) category.

She romped home in a new personal-best time of 1 hour 31 minutes and 33 seconds to win the coveted Senior-Veteran’s title a whole four minutes ahead of her nearest rival - from the field of 17,000 runners!

Tracey with her medalIndeed her success came in just her second Half-Marathon to date, beating her previous personal best by an enormous 17 minutes and placing her in the elite-ranks of UK Senior-Veteran distance running for the first time ever!

PHASE 4

Phase 4 of the Lactate Testing cycle needed to bring Tracey into peak competitive shape for her final two months of the Lactate Testing cycle – she was scheduled to perform a series of 5K and 10K road races in her main competitive racing season in April and May 2009.

'Anaerobic capacity' was again a priority for these shorter 5K and 10K events and phase 4 therefore included the following training criteria:

  • Maintenance of base 'aerobic' conditioning at 'long-slow distance' or ‘zone 1’ training speeds.
  • Increased volume of interval repeats at 'medium distance' (half-marathon specific ‘zone 2’ speeds) and ‘race speed’ (‘zone 3’ speeds).
  • Relatively high volume of overspeed repeats over 400m to improve ‘leg-speed’, ‘anaerobic capacity’ and the technical efficiency needed for the 5K and 10K events.
  • Maintenance ‘Corrective Strength and Conditioning’ training.

The Competitive Racing Season

Tracey in action in the Dorney 5KTracey produced a series of stunning performances in her 10K and 5K road races throughout April and May 2009.

She returned four consecutive personal-best times in the 10K and 5K events - commensurate with the considerable improvements seen from the Lactate Testing results!

Her winning performances came in the Windsor Asthma 10K, Dorney Lake Charity 5K, Cardiff Blackweir 5K and the ‘Battle of Tri-Nations vs UK’ Windsor 10K – claiming the fastest senior-veteran female’s time and placing in the top-three females across all age categories in each race!

Indeed Tracey smashed the veteran’s course record at the Cardiff 5K with a swift performance of 19 minutes and 23 seconds!

Tracey with her proud coachShe also dipped under the elusive 40-minute mark for her first time ever at the ‘Battle of Tri-Nations vs UK’ 10K on May 2nd - with a well-earned time of 39 minutes and 59 seconds.

Her fast performances placed her in the UK-Elite ‘Top’Ten’ rankings for senior-veteran (50+) 10K and 5K runners for the first time ever - signaling a jump of more than 100 ranking places since she began training with Kinetic Personal Training!

The Future…!

A well-earned ‘off-season’ rest period beckoned for Tracey following her extremely successful first complete Lactate Testing cycle.

The next exciting phase of her training thus awaits her!

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