More trainers...........

My name's Trish and I'm addicted to buying trainers. :)

A nice man called at my door today and delivered what has to be the BIGGEST box containing trainers I have ever seen.

In my defence - there were actually only 4 pairs in there, and I didn't intend to keep them all - I just wanted to try a few things on, you know how it is?

In the case for the prosecution (in this case Jon, who has told me it is now a case of one pair in = one pair out !), when I actually counted how many pairs of trainers I already own, I was quite suprised to find that it was actually 9 pairs. OK, OK that's NINE pairs - yes, that is a lot, but - you know - they are all special.

It is my only vice really - and it's not like I don't use them or anything. Mostly.

Anyway, skipping on from deviances, I liked 2 pairs out of the 4 - one is another pair of Frees (I love them and they are quite difficult to get hold of, and all number of other excuses if you need them) and the others are these in the picture - Nike Air Zoom Skylon Triax. A bit like the Frees (clearly the soles have been given the treatment), and still pretty minimalist - but with more cushioning. I thought they might be good for my longer runs - give my poor leggies a bit more protection from the nasty road.

So, I took them out for a run - I nearly wasn't running, not sure if I was still ill or whatever - but the new shoes said run, so I ran! And it was alright. I did my tempo run today - going to save intervals until Friday - and I was quite fast really - especially considering my mini-cold and race weary legs. Very pleased.

And the new shoes? Well, they are very springy - and I don't like them as much as my Nike Frees - but they are also very comfortable and light and I think with a bit of wearing in, they might be a good option for the marathon.

They don't have my name on though, and they are not orange - which is a shame...........

Thankyou!

A big thankyou to everyone that has sponsored me so far on this 'mission' - I passed the £500 mark today - half way to my self-imposed target of £1,000 - so it's looking good, and every contribution is really MASSIVELY appreciated.

What isn't appreciated is my evil husband and his wicked germs - I am fighting off a cold that he brought home to share with me last week (thanks Jon!), so decided to take an extra day of rest today in the hope that I will be fighting fit and ready to go tomorrow.

Fingers crossed eh?

Bramley - 20 mile race - good grief!

By 9:15am Tom and I were in the car and on our way down the M3 towards Basingstoke - fully fuelled and looking forward to the Bramley 20 mile race we were heading for.

Ha.

The reality is that we were taking turns to list our various ailments / aches / pains / other excuses for why we weren't going to do very well.

This is not a new thing though - is what you do before any race, is like a soothing ritual, and also does ensure (if you cover all the bases) that if things do go REALLY badly that you can refer back to this earlier conversation "see, I told you I was going to have trouble with.........."

Anyway, by 10am we were parked up and walking to the start - when we got there, pretty suprised to find a 20 minute long queue for depositing our bags, but we managed to do that and get in a quick toilet stop before the off.

Naturally I did the first mile too fast (7:18), and despite slowing down, also did the 2nd (7:28) and third (7:38) too fast as well - by the 4th mile I thought I had cracked it - as I did 8:01, but then the 5th I was back to 7:45!

I didn't really have a plan (which may have been my downfall) but I knew I was going too fast - so I did slow down a bit.

Still, I went through the 10 mile mark (which was tough because it was a 2 lap race, and there were lots of people doing just 10 miles) in 1:18, and after that it was pretty much 8:30 min/mile all the way - one part conscious decision to slow down, one part being a bit tired.

Anyway, the 2nd lap was much slower - and I had a few "what was I thinking?" moments, was overtaken by lots of people, and spent some time fantasising about faking a plastic cup based injury so I could stop - but I finished in a not too shabby 2:43.44 (by my watch) and definately didn't feel as dead at the end as I have in previous runs of that length.

Am not sure whether I could have gone any faster, but also not sure whether running more slowly at the beginning would have helped.

It is a tricky one - in shorter races, 10km let's say, I have experimented and found that if I start more slowly, I just get more slow - I don't suddenly find that I have loads of energy left in my legs and put in a stunning second half.

So my theory was - if I run faster at the start, and then just slow down as I get tired - surely I will come off better overall. It does seem to work for shorter distances - not so convinced at the longer ones!

Maybe next time I will try the slower start (yeah right).

It clearly does work for some though - I saw Alison from the Cove Joggers at the race today, and she had started pretty slowly, and then put in a few sub 8 minute miles over the back end of the race - and she was looking pretty chirpy on it.

Anyway, I was finished - got my goody bag, and some water and then went to see Tom in. He apparently had thought I was running behind him all the way round (we got split up at the start) so was pretty suprised to see me cheering for him at the finish! He was just 5 minutes behind me, and pretty happy with the result.

The 10 minute walk back to the car seemed to be about 10 miles, and we were both feeling the pain a bit by then - 20 miles is a long way you know!

Investigation into the contents of the goodie bag brought some joy though - Tom was thrilled to find a mars bar (just the thought of eating so soon after a race makes me feel ill), and I was pretty impressed with the race momento - a towel with the race logo on it! Never had that before.

Trip home was the usual race post-mortem, a stop in Sainsburys for cake, then back to the house for cheesey baked beans on toast and some sitting down.

Job done!

This week I have been mostly.......................not blogging!

I know, I know - very slack, but sometimes the week just whizzes by, and you can't catch a minute to sit down and blog.

This week has been like that - I don't know where it has gone, and here we are at Friday again!

So, how has my training been going? Not bad as it goes.

On Monday (a day of rest) I appreciated how beneficial running more slowly is, because I hardly ached at all after my 16 mile run the day before. Although at the time it was still tough, definately less tired and less sore the next day - which was great.

By Tuesday I was ready for my intervals - and super ready because it was 400m intervals! I LOVE 400m intervals. They are run faster than the longer intervals - but are just long enough so that you are stopping by the time you are feeling the strain. Marvellous.

The session was 2 x (6 x 400m) with 1.5 minute RI between reps, and 2.5 minutes between the 2 sets. It was great - hard - but great, AND I managed to do them all with the incline set to 1%! Go me :)

On Wednesday I did some cycling. I cycled over to Farnborough (which was incredibly hard because I was running late so had to cycle as fast as I could!) to meet the lovely Louise for lunch in the BAE canteen. That was most pleasant - had a good catch up , a nice bit of salad bar, saw a few other people to say hello too - marvellous.

Cycled home from there - going to put a total of 40 minutes cycling on the training log.

Also, on the way to Farnborough narrowly missed getting dead. At one point you have to move over a bit in the left hand lane due to parked cars, I glanced over my right shoulder just before I was going to move out --- and there was a HUGE Range Rover about 5 cm from my back wheel!! If I had wobbled, I would have been a goner.

Moron.

Often I think it is a good job you can't see behind you when you are cycling - there must be many situations like that which would totally put you off cycling if you realised how often you were close to being wiped out!

Still - I'm not dead, so that's a bonus.

Thursday - tempo run day - and also (at the moment) massage day. Went down to Guildford again for a sports massage. This week I had my legs pummelled by Matt - a very muscular young man, who I was a bit worried was going to snap me - luckily he didn't, although he was quite rigourous - and I came out feeling pretty good. So that was nice :)

Of course I hadn't managed to get my act together and go running before that - so I ended up not running till 6 pm (still haven't quite got into a routine with this working from home), and I have come to the conclusion that running after massage is not too great.

Still, I managed to do my session - 3km warm up, 5 km at short tempo pace (4:30min/km) 3km warm down, and my 5km at quick pace was only 20 seconds slower than it was the other week when I did it - and that week I felt amazing for some reason. Yesterday felt quite tough - especially up the hill - and I thought I was quite a bit slower, so 20 seconds wasn't too bad.

Today, I have just got back from playing badminton over in Farnborough with Mike who I used to work with. I did get my ass wupped - 4 games to nothing (I was close in the 3rd game mind) - but it was great, I really enjoyed it. Am now trying to ignore the fact that my left ankle is sore and my back feels like it is broken :)

Hopefully there will be a next time though - and I will aim to win at least one game then - I think I was just too easy on him this time :)

So, I am looking forward to doing my 20 mile race on Sunday (resting tomorrow I think!), with Tom (who has been a bit ill this week) and Jon (who is doing the 10mile run - and has also been a bit ill this week). I am trying not to get ill - no time for that, I have a marathon training programme to follow!

So, more about the race after the event on Sunday - hopefully I will get round OK, certainly treating it like a training run, rather than an actual 'race' - and it has to be more 'fun' than running laps around here?

Till then though - enjoy your weekend!

A lovely bit of company.............

So after a nice rest day yesterday, this morning I actually managed to haul myself out of bed at 7am and was hanging around in Oak Farm School by 7:45am waiting for some Cove Joggers to arrive and take me running!

Yes, today I went running with a running club - a first for me - and it was very nice.

I ran with Brian, Alan and Jon (left to right in the photo) and we did just over 16 miles (3 more than on the programme) in around 2hrs 20 minutes.

It was a nice route - taking in road and a bit of off road up in Sandhurst woods - so a bit hilly, but good and varied.

I was feeling pretty tired by the end of the run, but there was cups of tea and biscuits with the chaps and several more of the club at the end, which was marvellous and revived the spirits.

It was really great to have a bit of company, and another bonus was that I was finished with my run and back home by 11:30am - whereas normally I am still dithering about and not even out of the door by that time.

Brilliant.
Thanks guys!

Friday fun

There are many great things about working from home - but there are also a few problems.

Aside from occasionally going quietly mad from the lack of noise or people to talk to (messenger is good, but sometimes you need to actually talk to people), there is the danger of staying in bed all day, potential for eating everything in the fridge, occasions where you sit at the computer all day without moving - and my new downfall - non-stop internet shopping !!

Because I know that I will be in when the post-man calls, I have been going shopping mad.

Today I took delivery of some new t-shirts from a place called 'on-fire'. Mostly they were a total bargain - £4 a throw in the sale - but I did pay full price for one, because I liked the slogan on the front - could be my training motto I thought :)


In other postie related news - my Polar running gadget was returned from Polar complete with new battery - so I was ready for today's session.

Left my run until quite late - had some work that I wanted to get done before I went out, and then I was eating so I had to wait a couple of hours after that........ I did go though.

Today's session was billed as 8 miles, 1 mile warm-up, 6 miles at Long Tempo pace (4:48min/km or 7:46min/mile), 1 mile cool down.

I set off at a gentle pace, did 2km at that speed and then ramped it up for the next 10km, then slowed down to a walk for the last 500m or so.

It's funny - when I set off I couldn't imagine going any faster than I was, but when the time came to go faster - I just went faster, too fast in fact! The last couple of km were pretty tough - I had big stomach cramp for some reason, but I cracked on and got it finished. Good for me eh?

And a treat for you today - the map of my route :

http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=710834

I am good to you.

Massage

Before christmas I did a course to qualify me to be a gym instructor - another string to the MV bow - and most of the people on the course went on to do the personal training qualification and then sports massage.

Anyway, on Thursdays they practice their massage techniques and need people to practice on - so someone gave me a call and asked if I was interested. Brilliant. Free massage!


So, I went up to Guildford Spectrum Centre - apparently " The most exciting leisure complex in the UK" (certainly looks exciting in the picture to the left there!)- and Claire gave me a leg massage.

Quite marvellous.




It was confirmed that my IT band (diagram below to show you what I am on about) is v. tight on my left hand side - which is likely to be the cause of my knee pain - but apart from that, my legs were pretty knot free, which is brilliant.

Felt great after that - and nice to see how everyone is getting on (very well) - so worth the trip.

Cross training today - intended to go swimming but forgot to take my membership card with me, so came home instead and did weights. Lovely.

More intervals - but getting harder!

...........or so it seems.

For the last couple of weeks it seems that I am finding the intervals more difficult - even when the session is one I have done before.

Saying that though, I thought the one I did today I had done before (6 x 800m) but having checked the plan, the one I was thinking of was actually 4 x800m - so that makes me feel a bit better.

Still, I have found that I just can't cope with the treadmill being on an incline any more!

Let me explain. Running on a treadmill with zero incline is - apparently - slower than if you run at that effort on the road - because there is no wind-resistance to overcome on a treadmill. So, to compensate for that, the accepted thing to do is put the treadmill at a 1% incline.

(here is a link to a chart which tells you what incline you need.......... http://www.trinewbies.com/run_treadmill_chart.asp )
The first couple of weeks I was doing these sessions I managed that just fine, but the last couple of weeks I just haven't been able to - or I have managed for a couple of repetitions, but then had to put the incline down to zero again.

This means that I am - I guess - doing my intervals slower than I should be. But then, I wonder how much it matters - it really kills me to do, and it's faster than I normally run, so surely it is still doing it's job?

Also, I discovered the other week that if I put one of my hands on the bar at the front of the treadmill, that makes running easier (?) - so trying not to do that when I get tired is a bit of a challenge. A bad habit.

Anyway, I did the 6 intervals, had a good stretch afterwards - glad to find that my knee is feeling alright - and then I was off home: another session completed!

Creaky

So today my plan was to go over to the Farnborough Aerospace Centre and take part in the monthly 'Hare and Hounds' handicap race as an alternative to the intervals that were on my plan. I thought it might be quite interesting to see how much faster I am than the last time I did it - must be nearly 4 years ago!

The best laid plans though!

This morning I got up and my left knee was still grumbling, after being a bit uncomfortable all night (it hurts most when I am lying down!), so I decided (for once) to do the sensible thing and not run.

Look at me go eh?

Can you imagine how bad it would be if I had to bail out at this point?
Very bad.

So - better an extra day off running than risk an injury. And, infact, it isn't really a day off running because I will go tomorrow instead - it is just a rearrangement of the programme (see how flexible I am?) and a shame that I didn't get to do the race.

Still. There is always next month :)

Couldn't just sit around though - that isn't allowed for on the programme - so I went out on my bike instead (doesn't bother the knee which is lucky!). Went out for an hour - did about 16 miles I suppose, and didn't even get killed, although the way people drive around here it was a close call a couple of times - there just isn't quite enough room on some of the roads for me AND 2 cars - but it doesn't stop people trying to squeeze by!

Was nice fun though, and a change from running. Not easy mind you.

So, please admire my bicycle (above - not Topbike - not sure knee could cope with that kind of punishment!) and also our new-look back garden - now complete with gravel.

Amazing.

Isn't Sunday supposed to be a day of rest?

I wasn't sure what I was doing today - 18 or 20 miles was my rough plan - but I wasn't definate when I set off.

It was one of those days when I just didn't feel good from the start: Some days you feel like you are flying along and it is so easy, other days (like today) it feels like a slog.

Made harder by not having my gadget so I didn't know how fast I was going (sometimes it helps because it shows you that the reason it is feeling so tough is because you are going too fast!), I just didn't get into the groove at all.

I did one lap of 10km and stopped at the house to get a drink (hidden round the back to stop the squirrels), I then persuaded myself around the longer 13km circuit, but when I got back to the house I felt like sitting down and giving up.

I'm sure a lot of it is about mental attitude, and today mine was very bad - "how can I possibly run 26 miles", " I can't do this", "my legs hurt", "I could just stop now", etc.

Anyway, I stopped at the house and had a drink, a bit of a stretch, a short catch up with Jon and then........... I went on my way. I was so tempted to stop - it would have been 15 miles after all - but then, I knew I would be disappointed, so I thought I would just run to the end of Frimley road (another mile) and then I could always run back.

When I got there I managed to talk myself round to the next turning point, and then I thought if I could run until I had been going 2hrs 30 minutes then it would be OK, and then to the bottom of the hill, and then to the top of the hill, and then............ well, I managed to keep it going until I had been going 2 hrs 50 minutes - which turned out to be 31.6km (19.5miles) - which on the one hand I was very pleased with, and on the other - slightly disappointed because if I had just managed to carry on for another 5 minutes I would have broken the 20 mile mark!

Stupid but true.

Also, I was quite a bit slower this week than last - no real explanation for it, just feeling more knackered on the way round.

Will it ever feel easy?

That's the bad thing (mentally) - you think that if you can run 20 miles, surely running 13 miles will be easy - so how come I was still so tired all the way through my run?? Doesn't seem fair somehow.

Still, on the upside - I did do my 20 miles, which means that I can enjoy next week's 'step-back' of only 13 miles (how nice will that be?) before my next 20 miler which will actually be a race at Bramley the weekend of 25th Feb. That will hopefully be better (surely it has to be more interesting?) than running laps!

Golf as cross training?

I'm not convinced - but that was today's activity.

Last night we went to High Wycombe to suprise my future brother-in-law for his 29th birthday. There was curry and beer involved and it was very nice.

Today though, Andrew finished work at lunch-time and I was hanging around (finished my work last night) so we went to the driving range so I could try out my new golf clubs (lovely christmas present).

It was good - Andrew gave me a few tips - and I was hitting the balls quite consistently, if not amazingly. Tiring stuff though - so I reckon it does count as cross-training, it does now anyway :)

A run and a rant

You know things have gone a bit far when the first thing you think of when you wake up and see snow isn't "woo-hoo no school" or "let's get outside and make snowmen/go sledging/ have a snowball fight" but "oh - no, how am I going to do my run"!!

That's what I was thinking this morning, but luckily by the time I got around to running the snow had turned to freezing rain and the pavements were pretty clear.

Of course freezing rain isn't much fun, but once you get running you don't really notice these things and to be honest I had much bigger problems.

Here's a tip for you - don't go out for a run at 3:30pm on a school day unless you want to spend the whole journey dodging randomly moving kids, or worse, idiot parents driving oversized cars, parking all over the pavements, speeding out of junctions or blocking the roads.

I'm sure that all these people have good reason for collecting their children in cars, but it's so dangerous. I was running past a school up one road - which only has a footpath on one side of it - and you could barely get one person past the cars they were parked so far onto the pavement, never mind one runner and gaggles of children. And what happens when people are parking up or leaving a space? They just blast in or out without much looking at what is going on, they are so fixated on what's going on in their cars - rather than outside them.

I'm alright, I can look after myself - but what about all those kids milling around? I'm amazed there aren't more accidents.

Rant over.

Makes me so cross though.

Did 5 miles at my mid-tempo pace which is 4:40min/km (7:31 min/mile) and despite going off too fast, having a couple of evil hills to cope with, and not having my gadget to tell me how I was doing (it's been sent off to have a new battery fitted), I somehow managed to hit exactly the right speed overall!

Marvellous.

Tuesday intervals

I had a rest day yesterday to get over my Sunday epic.

Didn't feel too bad, still getting a bit of trouble with my left knee - just along the outside - which I suspect is something to do with my IT band (can't beat a bit of self-diagnosis) so I am stretching it and being a bit careful. Doesn't bother me when I am running, or even walking, mainly it hurts when I stand up from a crouching position or - oddly - when I am lying in bed!

Still, apart from that and a bit of tightness in my calf muscles and my shoulders (?), pretty much unscathed!

Today was about the same - but today I had to do intervals.

I probably mentioned, I joined a gym pretty much just so I can use a treadmill for my intervals. The gym's not too bad - there is a picture so you can see for yourself - (I was on the treadmill just this side of that pillar to the left of the shot) - and it is only £22/month which includes full use of the 50m pool as well! It is the Aldershot Garrison Gym - not flash, but it does the job!

Anyway, intervals work along the lines that you push yourself hard for a short period of time, take a short recovery interval, then push hard again, recover, etc...... and it is supposed to be super excellent for improving your fitness pretty quickly.

The type of intervals on my programme tend to be something along the lines of run intervals of distances from 400m - 1600m with rest intervals (RI - jog or - more usually - walking) of 200 - 400m.

The pace I have to run the intervals at varies - getting faster the shorter the interval. For 1600m intervals I have to run at a speed of 14.5 km/h for the 400m intervals I have to run at 15.5km/hr!

Todays was an unusual one:

10 minutes warm up
2 x 1200m with 2 minute RI
4 x 800m with 2 minute RI
10 minute cool down.

The main reason I do intervals on a treadmill is because they are hard, and I am soft. That just about sums it up, but what I mean is that you are going fast and it makes you tired - and it is really difficult (I find) to keep pushing yourself when it starts to hurt.
On a treadmill you don' t have any choice, you either keep running - or you fall off!!

It's a killer, but it seems to work. Despite thinking I wasn't going to get to the end of my 10minute warm-up without wanting to go home, I managed that and all of the intervals.

One small confession though - I did have to take the incline off for the last 2 x 800m - I had it set on 1% to compensate for the lack of wind resistance (makes it more like being outside) but I was feeling like I was going to fall off backwards, so I put it flat. A slight cheat - but better than packing it in altogether!

To be honest, if anyone had told me 2 months ago that I would be able to run 20 miles on a Sunday and then go and do an interval session 2 days later, I would have said they were delusional - but that's what's happening!

Brilliant.

20 miles - did I do it?

I finally left the house at about 12:30pm after having porridge with raisins for breakfast, a banana for a post-breakfast snack, and 250ml of energy drink while I was dithering about getting ready.

Jon took my 'before' photo (left) - I appreciate it's not a particularly good look, and I didn't realise how un-colour co-ordinated I was until I just looked at it - but hey, who cares?

I am wearing my new Macmillan running vest - getting it worn in before the marathon comes - my skins leggings (about which I have mixed feelings) and my lovely personalised Nike Free trainers.

I am also modelling our new paving round the back of our house in the photo - it was finished on Friday and we are very fond of it!

Anyway, on to the running. Today I decided to do 3 laps again - 1 x 8 miles, 2 x 6 miles to get my 20 miles in. I put 2 bottles of energy drink out by our front gate for me to pick up on my way round, and took one with me to start with.

I set off and felt tired pretty much from the start. I think the weights on Friday and cycling yesterday really made my legs weary, and I was probably going a bit quickly - just for a change. I was a bit worried though, some bits of that first lap were pretty tricky - the hilly bits really did for me, and I was breathing pretty hard, and by the time I got back to the house first time I had only done 13 km out of my planned 32km!

The next problem was that when I got to the house my drinks were gone!!! I couldn't believe it. When I finally realised that Jon hadn't moved them or anything - they were vanished - I dashed into the house, found my remaining sachet of energy drink and made up another 500ml bottle to take back out with me. I also left a bottle of plain water in the hall to pick up on my last lap.

That whole thing really threw me - where did the bottles go? I mean, did someone really steal them?

Worst thing was getting going again after my impromptu stop - but at least I had managed to pick up more drink - I think I really needed the extra energy to keep me going.

So. Back on the road, and my next lap of 10km. Nothing too remarkable - I was glad to get to the top of the hill and enjoyed the subsequent down hill, but by the time I was getting close to the house, I was thinking about packing it in. That would have given me 24km (~15miles), which wasn't bad.

Of course I didn't stop!!
Did you think I would have done?

I stopped briefly to pick up my water bottle, and carried on.

It was getting really hard by then - but I slowed down a bit, got my head down, and pushed on. I didn't have to go so far on that last lap - because I ended up only needing 8km by the time I got home the 2nd time. Bonus!

I took a bit of a shortcut to stop me having to walk so far home (I was planning on stopping as soon as I hit the 32km, wherever I was), but that meant running up a short steep hill - which nearly had me on my knees! My legs were REALLY tired by then, and I couldn't wait to get to my last 2km which I knew were going to be downhill!

Even then though, I wasn't quick even on that last downhill stretch, and when I hit 32km (which is actually 200m short of 20miles if we are being picky) I stopped!

I was done.

I walked the last kilometer home, limped into the shower, didn't take an 'after' photo (too tired), had home-made vegetable soup and a cup of tea for 'lunch', found the sofa and that was me.

I did it!!

Cycling legs

I have just been out for a spin on my bicycle.
Did about 18 miles or so - and it was very hard work.
Unfortunately my cycling legs are rubbish - all that hard work I put in on Top Bike over the summer - all gone!!

Still, it was lovely - such a beautiful day - and it was fun, and made a change from running, so well worth it.

Also, I did weights yesterday, so I am putting some of the blame for my slight rubbishness on that - my quads are sore from doing squats, and my arms and shoulders................oooooo

20 mile run on the agenda for tomorrow.
Will I do it?

February begins...........

So, according to my newly installed google countdown timer (thanks for that one Tom - now I can obsess about it every second of the day!), it is now 2 months 18 days 16 hours 27 minutes and 56 seconds (and counting) until the marathon kicks off.

Simultaneously seems like ages, and yet not that far away!

I was really tempted not to run today - despite the programme - because I have had a killer headache, and boogly feeling eyes all day. To start with i thought it was the result of the 2 glasses of wine I had last night, but it lasted all day - and I'm not that much of a lightweight - so I surmised that maybe wasn't the problem.

Anyway, I did run, and it was great - really quick, even up the hill - so feeling sooper pleased with myself now :)

Also, I am going to yoga this evening - trying something new, and hoping it will compensate for my complete rubbishness when it comes to stretching!