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Meet the Club Member: Will

You are...

Will Green, member since 2009 

PBs

Marathon: 2.27.02
Half: 68.16
10m: 52.28
10km: 31.15
10,000: 31.03
5 km: 15.24
5,000: 15.20

What brought you to the club

I ran as a teenager as part of the successful Wirral AC junior team but then didn't run for many years until I ran the London Marathon in 2008 and 2009. Although I made some improvement running 2:48 in 2009, I thought a club set-up would be the best place to see how much faster I could run. I have been coached by Dave Chalfen since joining the club. 

When you aren't running, you are...

I am currently studying to be an Osteopath at the University College of Osteopathy, having previously worked as a lawyer and a banker in the City.

The most challenging thing you have ever done

In my early career I was often working some very long hours and quite regularly through the night. I was not running at the time, quite overweight and leading a very unhealthy life. It seemed the norm for working in a large City firm at the time (it probably still is!) and is something I am very glad to have left behind.

Your favourite book

Difficult to point to one, but some of my favourite running books:

• Charlie Spedding “From Last to First” - a must read for anyone wanting to achieve their running goals
• Richard Askwith “Feet in the Clouds: A Tale of Fell-Running and Obsession”
• Chris Lear “Running with the Buffaloes: A Season Inside with Mark Wetmore, Adam Goucher, and the University of Colorado Men's Cross Country Team”

If you could be an animal, you would want to be...

I am happy as I am.

What you like best about the club

There is a large group of people wanting to improve their running - they train hard, and individually and as a club continually re-define standards for the club of what can be achieved with good, solid (often hard!) consistent training.

The improvements that can be seen at an individual level and the success the club now has in regional and national competitions is hugely rewarding to be a part of and an incentive to keep pushing to improve.

Everyone is very supportive and encouraging of individual and team performances.

Most unusual race you have ever done

I tend to be a bit conservative in terms of choosing my races so I have avoided anything that unusual!

Your top training tip

I am not sure this counts as a top tip, but from my own perspective, I try to run as often as I can - so as much as any niggles and recovery for the more specific sessions allows and make the specific sessions as targeted as possible.

This would mean typically averaging 75-80 miles per week, running every day other than around a race when I would take a day off in advance and maybe after and when I am a bit sore/niggly I try to force myself onto the wattbike in the gym.

I struggle with double days, so will almost always run singles, although I would probably have 3-4 days of cycle commute (8 miles each way to college which is low level intensity) on top of this.

During my recent marathon cycle, I had 4 weeks out of the 14 that were in the mid-90s and I felt that was towards the top end of what I could do.

Recovery/Easy/Steady running is anything from 7.30 min miling to 6.30 min miling.

I will run a structured session every third day. I tend to do these on the treadmill, at 1% gradient.

Every 7-10 days this will always involve a threshold run of 8 miles which would start at slightly slower than 10m race pace and on a good day end slightly quicker (so, recently this would have been 8 miles in circa 41:30-42 minutes). If this run is going well it is usually a good sign.

Depending on what else I am targeting, I would do a session which incorporated a fair chunk of running at race pace with a short or active recovery.

For example pre-Vitality 10km this year I built to 6 x 1600 at target 10km pace (31.15) with 400m active recovery (90 seconds - so 6 min miling). During the recent marathon cycle, I ran some long marathon pace type sessions similar to the sessions the group does at Battersea (building to 18 -20 m or so at or a bit quicker than target race pace to take into account it was on a treadmill).

My long run in this marathon cycle (on the road, not the treadmill!) built to a maximum of just shy of full marathon distance, averaging around 6 min miles (so target marathon pace+30s or so). Outside marathon cycle I now limit my long run to 15-16 miles.

Whilst I have been largely happy with my running in 2018 it hasn’t always gone to plan, most notably an achilles injury in 2015 that I badly managed and led to nearly 15 months out from running just after my 40th birthday (a story for another day).

Your next big goal

I have a number of targets for early autumn, including potentially the World Masters (V40) Half Marathon in Málaga.

I would still like to run sub 15/31/68/2.24 this year and participating in a strong club performance in the 6-stage relays (podium finish at the Southern’s maybe?!) would cap a good 2018.

Something you have never told anyone else or that would surprise others

There are quite a lot of things, largely too dull or too embarrassing to repeat, but from a running perspective, most people are surprised when I tell them I have never ran a parkrun. In terms of getting more people into sport and volunteering in the community I think they are great and the people behind it have done a superb job. However I have just never found they fitted in with the training I wanted to do on that day (it perhaps says something about a lack of imagination in terms of designing sessions around them!). 

Photos courtesy of Si Davis.

Archive of previous profiles: Elizabeth Ayres, David Evans, Eddie Ware, Coralie Frost, Karen Hancock, Vanessa Armond, Elvira Gonzalo, Aga Wicinska

If you would like to be featured in our 'Meet the Club Member' series, please email me.

Eda Korkmaz
communications@serpentine.org.uk

Submitted: 29 July 2018

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