Sebastien Locteau

The day I became a Zombie Picture courtesy of Vanessa Daws First Irish 24 hour swim in Waterford ( Picture courtesy of Vanessa Daws) A friend John Gilbert from Pulse Triathlon suggested he was going to swim 6h in Waterford. I asked him to send me the email and I discovered there was a 24h swim, which consisted of 24 times 1 mile swim. I emailed the race organiser, Colm and asked him if I could attempt to swim a full marathon. I am preparing to swim the channel for Croi in Agust 2011 and needed a preparation race. Well this is my story swimming the first Irish 24h ultra swim. Me and John Gilbert as a friend and crew where he swam the 6h ! I found interesting while preparing my bag that you only need a swim tog, goggles, towel and hats to make such an event. The hydration and nutrition part was very heavy compare to the equipment required. We all had a different challenge, the guys planned to do a steady 1mile 24 times with 30min recovery...

Series finale ! Sebastien Locteau, Laura O'Shaughnessy, Sonia O'Sullivan ( Irishtown stadium 2011) Another sunny day over the Irishtown stadium today. Today fm, SPAR, Runireland crew were helped by the Crusaders AC for the final set up of the last 5k race today. Sonia O'Sullivan was our guest, and Maired Farell from Today FM our leader for the event. Will Hanafin was brilliant as usual and with Alan O'Donohoe, I really had a great time in the last 5 days. I was very lucky to have Lilly Muldoon and her children today, they just did all the set up and work you saw on the pictures. The two teenager were just fantastic, with a great spirit and were a great crew for runireland. We had a nice photo shoot with Sonia O'Sullivan who held a big number 5 and myself caring the little "K" at the bottom. Not sure how the picture came off after me going around trying to get the sponsors on the shot, and dealing with the participants. The...

Another successful event ! Another beautiful day in Mullingar this time, where Mullingar AC ran a great show ! Lovely location with over 600 people. The celebrity guess was Neil Delemare from "The Panel". I never met him before and will definately be watching him more in the future. A gentleman and everybody knows how hard it is for me to take a joke, well he succeeded and made me laugh. The event itself was a success, and the Today FM team was up early again, preparing the goody bags, banners etc.... The SPAR team was also there as usual making sure people get their Tshirts and sponosred product. Mullingar AC with Bobby leading the team were on the clock and nothing was going to stop the race to start in time. The volunteers, ambulance, garda were like a well maintain clock like a military mission which each details was treated as important which made it a success, congrats to Mullingar AC. I forgot two important people in the last few days I worked...

Galway City Harriers top notch job ! What a beautiful day today in Galway with over 900 people turning up on the beautiful city of Galway. I knew most of the people involved in the race from Galway City harriers and their experience in organising big event is well known. registration went smoothly, plenty of marshals and the weather has been booked perfectly for the race. what could you expect more ? Read on..... Liam Hennessy the president of the Athletic Association of Ireland came to witness the impressive turn out of over 900 people coming for a fun run, in a great atmosphere. SPAR crew, Today Fm and runireland teamed up again with the local club Galway city harriers to provide a fantastic event. As per the last few days, great people, superb atmosphere and great weather. Participants received a great quality Technical Tshirt and the usual goody bag after finishing the event. Galway City Harriers, with the experience of running the famous Street...

Ray Darcy "Join SPAR & Ray for 5k" Credit  S.Locteau   Runireland team led by High performance Coach Sebastien Locteau were in Waterford today for the first leg of the "Join SPAR & Ray for 5k" with over 700 participants The series of 5km runs are held everyday this week respectively from Monday in Waterford, Cork, Mullingar, Galway and finishing in Dublin on Friday. The event is sponsored by SPAR, Today FM, RunIreland, the AAI, local clubs, and Red Tag Timing. Early mornings are never a problem for coaches, but leaving Galway with a small trailer for Waterford, with a full finishing event kit is a bit out of the ordinary. Everyday this week, participants will turn up to receive their technical "I ran with Ray" tshirt and will take to the start of a relaxed and enjoyable 5km run, in the "SPAR & Ray 5K" series. As a french native speaker, I couldn't possibly describe how amazing the atmosphere was and how it p...

Longford marathon presents a unique opportunity to achieve this elusive goal. Michael Rice Italy 100k World & European Championship 2008 For many serious marathon runners, finishing a race in less than three hours is a lifetime’s ambition. Such an achievement is no trivial matter and can often be the result of many years dedicated training. Although there’s no particular magic in the number, and accepting that any marathon finish is a magnificent achievement, running sub-3:00 still has a special allure for many runners. This year the Longford marathon presents a unique opportunity to achieve this elusive goal. Over many years the Longford race has established itself as one of the best-organised and friendliest races in the country. From a performance perspective, an important factor is that the Longford course is almost dead flat, and is therefore conducive to fast finishing times. Athenry AC runner Mick Rice has offered to pace anyone with a sub-3:00 fi...

The last few months have been very hectic  I never experienced such struggle to keep my coaching plans up to date and for the first time in 13 years I was not able to provide a plan to some of my athletes. Mike Flannery from Atlantic Masters jumping from blackrock in stormy weather I always say to my athletes that there are no reasons to miss training, that you can always do something else if there is an issue with a session that is logistic, social, physical or mental. This rule could be applied to coaches. The floods made my life impossible at home and professionally. My partner and little girl could not get home and were stuck in the village of Craughwell which was on the main road from Galway to Dublin before they open the new Motorway and it was under the water. I decided to keep working and travel from Wesport, Roscommon, Dublin and Galway and even if many young athletes could not travel we kept some session going. I also made the trip to Naas for the “Pulse” Tria...

I have been extremely busy in the last few weeks, coaching is a 24/7 job and my coaching plan didn’t reflect the progress I was expecting. Sickness has been around too and many of them had to recover from it. I traveled for 24h in the last 48h between car, plane and train. I had the time to do some interesting thinking about my new article. Our readers are always looking for the extra tip which will make them quicker. I was trying to look at the way the athlete’s footsteps can be improved; we know for the last 50 years that the foot optimize itself by automating the motion along with body posture. The human body is made to run, but even if most people think that there are not many skills or postural development to be made, we all heard about injuries, and new techniques developed such as the Chi-running which has been proved been beneficial. But generally, the body is capable to learn itself how to save energy naturally. Why do we let our head change this natural ability? ...

Is there a real Technique to follow or more a guideline !        Pictures : Forest marathon 2017 S.Locteau Athletes always ask me what is the best running technique. I don't believe in a universal running technique, but more in adapting the run to each individual. I always follow some basic guideline: Technique Many people do not know what they should do with their arms and hands when running. Your arms and shoulders will be tight from the swim and bike ride by the time you reach the running portion of the race. Try to focus on swinging your arms forward, but keep movement in your lower arms to keep your muscles loose. Your elbows should be bent about 90 to 110 degrees and keep your hands loosely cupped. Don’t clinch your thumb in your hand, but rather place it on top of your index finger. Your arm movement should be rhythmic and easy. Your hands should stop at the midline of your torso. When running, you want to foc...

My athletes know me as a hard task master, but I never lie to them. I tell them what is going to happen straight away so they are ready to focus instead of them discovering bit by bit and get afraid and can’t concentrate on their skills. So let’s be honest and put it this way with you: It is going to be scary! Now that you expect the worst the following should be easier to swallow. Swimming in open water is a great experience, from beginners to experienced athletes, the main difference from a pool aside from the depth is the f Fly Shannon Thomond Swim 2017  (Picture Limerick Masters Swimming Club) ear of the unknown, the darkness of the water or when there is a good visibility the fish, jelly fish and other aquatic “monsters”. Technically you only scared by what you don’t know or have a bad experience of, or been taught it was scary or dangerous. It is like having your first driving lesson and you don’t know how to drive and you know you can hurt yourself or someon...