Well, I'm back in Tokyo now until the end of next April. I went out for my first track training session with the Namban Rengo running club last night, down at the Oda Field next to Tange Kenzo's still marvellous 1964 Olympic stadia - in my view, still the best Olympics venues ever built. There's nothing like running alongside great Olympic architecture to get you going! The Oda Field was originally the practice arena for those Olympics. What's amazing is that it is still entirely public and free (including showers and lockers).
There were a lot of clubs out training, inclduing the Tokyo University sprint team and a competitive walking club, but it still all functioned okay - probably because Tokyo people are so used to doing the best with very crowded spaces. And our club is big too: around 50 people turned out last night. We split into A and B groups, with A being people who aim at 4-minute kilometres or better. I had been intending to join the B group as I am still a long way from fully fit, but then I thought what's the point of aiming low? I should start as I mean to go on. So I joined the A group for 6 x 1000m intervals followed by an intense abs workout. Phew! I kept up fine as it happened and was in the middle of the group, and I felt good today on the morning after.
I like the training schedule a lot. Next week is 3 x 1200, 2 x 1000, then a 400. Week 3 is: 600, 800, 1000, 1200, 1000, 800, 600. Week 4 is 12 x 400 (ow, ow, ow... this will hurt most because I am certainly not a sprinter), and the the last Wednesday of the month is a 5km time trial.
Anyway, every Wednesday evening in Tokyo, this is what I'll be doing. I am also running a 5km road loop four mornings a week, increased to either 7.5 or 10km on Saturday and a fast 25-50km riveride bike ride on the Sunday (on my Brompton!). Added together, I should be back to racing fitness - and hopefully race weight - by the autumn, and probably better than I was before.
As a reward, I also checked out my first craft beer bar in Tokyo afterwards, but that's another story... (see the Beer thread in the Café).