Something unexpected happened this week. I found a running partner... A year or so ago, Ollie was my running partner but as his age has started to catch up with him, he's decided that running is on his terms these days and it's pretty much limited to a mile. Which is fine. He's my best buddy and totally adorable. After our other dog, Leia, passed away from heart failure in June 2016, I didn't think we'd be a multi-dog household again. But then Lexi came along. She belonged to a local family who didn't have time for her, and I umm'd and ahh'd before offering her a home. We had a 48 hour trial period. She was totally loopy, literally bouncing around the house to begin with. She arrived with us on Tuesday evening. On Wednesday morning we walked 1.5 miles and ran 1.2 miles. Then we walked 5 more times during the day! On Thursday morning we walked 1.5 miles and ran 2.5 miles. She started to calm down significantly. Today we walked 1.5 miles and ran 1.25 miles. I've been taking her on the school run (she loves being in the car and just snuggles down to sleep, which she was struggling to do at home initially), and in fact anywhere she can come with me, she does. This is a massive difference as Ollie hates being in the car and is leash-reactive, making it difficult to take him anywhere. Lexi seemed to have no "off" switch when she came to us, but it turns out that she does. She now settles happily next to me and is zonked out asleep as I'm typing this. She's tiny, I'm not sure whether she'll ever make marathon material (then again I'm not sure that I will!) - but she'll give it a damned good try! ParkRun tomorrow. Woof woof! P.S. Just realised I'm on day 37 of my running streak!
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I think I (accidentally) picked a very good time to have an "easy" week - we are now in the middle of a mini-heatwave, with temperatures peaking at around 31 degrees today (and still around that even now it's evening!). This morning I went for my little mile-and-a-bit run around the local housing estate (slightly better than it sounds) and was extremely glad not to be going any further. Most of the rest of the day was spent at a local country park with Pickle, who had a whale of a time in their splash pad and sandpit, including making friends with lots of little people! In fact there was one little boy (around 18 months) who took a real shine to him and followed him around for about 2 hours, taking his hand and leading him where he "needed" to go. The little boy's mum was so impressed with Pickle's kindness and patience that she treated him to an ice-cream. Yesterday I did my yoga in the garden and I'm now off to do the same again.
Namaste. This week has been hot (for the UK) and heat is something I don't really like that much, even more so if I'm running. But run I did - my highest mileage week to date, I believe.
I'm now 25 days into my streak and can see both pros and cons to running daily. This morning I set out before 7.30am for my planned 10.2 mile run and even at that time it was unpleasant. There were a couple of moments when I considered quitting early, and not because I'm a total wimp but because I was feeling so flipping awful! But I made it. I did run:walk:run intervals (4:1 minutes), and I think the walking saved me from quitting! I also managed to keep fairly even splits again which was nice. Yesterday's ParkRun wasn't much easier to be honest, but I made it round in 29:11, so not too terrible. I'd made a conscious decision not to push at all as I really don't want to make myself ill by pushing too hard in hot weather. Next week I am planning a low mileage/low effort week - Monday to Friday I am just going to do my 1 mile-ish circuit in the mornings. ParkRun is cancelled on Saturday, but I may turn tourist (not sure where yet!). My "long" run will be around 6 miles on Sunday. Hopefully I'll feel refreshed... So this weekend I did my long run (9 miles) on Saturday as I knew I was going out in the evening. I ran to town and back which is fortuitously exactly 9 miles. I won't say it was easy, but I did run/walk - I was aiming for 10:30 minute miles but ended up bang on 10:00 minutes per mile with fairly even splits.
On Sunday morning, not wanting to break my streak but feeling really tired after 5 hours' sleep, I set out for a 5k run. After about 3 steps I realised it wasn't going to happen, so settled for a "streak holding" mile instead. Definitely the hardest run of the week! So I'm now on day 18 of my running streak and I have to say I'm really enjoying it. I wondered if I'd feel too tired or injure myself but fingers crossed all good so far. As long as I stay injury free, I may continue for longer than my planned month streak. On Wednesday, Dave and I went on a pre-birthday shopping trip and bought me a few bits and bobs including some new running gear - a crop top and some new running shorts (see photo). It's been rather warm recently and not having to totally cover up was very refreshing on my run yesterday. The other big thing for me has been that I would never have had the self-confidence to wear something like that in public until very recently. I only bought my first bikini a couple of years ago. Very liberating! My mid-length run this week was an eye-opener. I was aiming for an easy pace, which I tried to gauge by how I felt, so I was maintaining a breathing pattern that was "easy" and not running so I felt fatigued. I tried to avoid looking at my FitBit as I had my route planned. In spite of all of this and not feeling like I was pushing myself, I ran 4.87 miles at an average pace of 9:26, a minute faster than my target pace.
No ParkRun for me tomorrow, as I'm going out in the evening so want to do my long run (9 miles planned) on Saturday rather than Sunday. I am not sure whether I will aim to run or run:walk:run yet, but I am going to be really aiming for a very easy pace! Really really! I've been keeping up with my yoga as well (most days), which is really great for stretching me out and relaxing me. My anxiety is pretty much a thing of the past, which is a fantastic feeling I have to say... I had my first attempt at purposely running slowly today. One thing it certainly did was to show me how far my running has developed in the past few months.
I managed to keep an average pace of 10:22 per mile (I was aiming for 10:30), which I know was a fast pace for me back in February (I happen to remember a training run where I pushed and kept a pace of 10:30). Also my heart rate was massively lower than it usually is when I run (average 136 bpm compared to 152bpm during my interval session yesterday for example) and I got home feeling like I hadn't exercised at all (I did only run 1.3 miles as it's a short run day, but I wasn't really out of breath). So this has made me feel more confident about keeping a more gentle pace in some of my long runs. From everything I've read recently I do need to work on this aspect of my running as well as my speed work. Tomorrow is ParkRun, then on Sunday I have a 7.8 mile long run planned, so watch this space! I'll be honest, when I decided to start my running streak, I wasn't sure if it would suit me or where it would take me (metaphorically), but so far I am loving it. Having picked up injuries in the past, I am very conscious that if I start getting any niggles it will have to stop, but so far so good.
I have found a nice little loop (around 1.25 miles, as you can see) that I have done on my 3 "rest" days, meaning I don't have to plan a route, I just go. I am not planning to extend these runs at all. I have also started running in the mornings again, which used to be my "time" before Will started at college (meaning I now have a school run at 7.45am). I realised that for most of my weekday runs, I can fit them in either by making sure I don't hit snooze at 6 or by setting my alarm a little earlier. Morning exercise suits me really well (sets me up for the day), and some days I've been doing yoga directly after the school run which means I don't have "when am I going to fit my exercise in" on my mind all day. Also with the warmer weather coming it means I don't have to run in the heat, which I hate. Of course, since it's half term this week, that's irrelevant! I've also made a minor adjustment to my long run plan, adding 1.2 miles per week rather than the 1/16th of a marathon that I had planned on. Subject to further adjustments in the future, of course! I ran pyramid intervals this morning (Power Up 2012 from Audio Fuel), which went pretty well (3.29 miles in 30 minutes including warm up and cool down). I was remembering as I did it when I couldn't finish the session or I had to walk between the intervals rather than jogging. It does feel good to improve. It's going to sound crazy, and I have spent some time analysing myself, but I actually felt bad about my running after Sunday's 10k.
What it boils down to is that I pushed myself (hence the PB), so the running felt difficult (it was!), leaving me feeling bad because I took a few walk breaks, legs felt shoddy in the final few kms etc etc. It was a weird juxtaposition because I felt awesome about the PB but bad about the actual running. Anyway, today I thought I'd just run and see where it took me. I set out aiming to run for around 4 miles/40 minutes and ended up doing an extra mile. Although it was warm and muggy (I was sweating like a pig by the end), the actual running felt good. I know that for the marathon, endurance is going to be key and speed matters not (except that bit of my brain that currently tells me that if I push a bit I'll get there sooner - must work on that). I'm aiming for strong, longer runs (with some tempo work for variety). Faith restored. Yoga done. Gratitude felt. In 8 weeks, Pickle and I are going to doing Race for Life together, something that he's been very excited about. Now that I've got a few ParkRuns under my belt, I thought I'd see if he fancied giving it a go, so I registered him and off we tootled on Saturday morning.
We had a bit of a wait before the start as he said he'd rather get there early and park closer (!!!), so we looked at the geese and goslings by the river and watched the rowers. What can I say? He kept going - even though his legs "hated him"! We were lucky that a rogue photographer was hiding in the undergrowth, so I have some lovely photos of us running (1st lap) and walking (2nd lap). With the end in sight, his little legs decided to get a second wind and we ran to the finish. Although I let him go through first, we shared a finishing time of 38:44 - not bad for a first time and a non-runner. A PB set...watch this space! Yesterday saw me, Dave and Pickle heading to the Green Park Royal Berkshire 10K and Mini Mile. Poor Dave had a gig on Saturday night, but still dragged himself out of bed after not enough sleep to be chauffeur and to run the Mini Mile (1 mile) with Pickle. Pickle had done his first ever ParkRun with me on Saturday morning (a respectable 38:44) - apparently his legs hated him (during and afterwards). We arrived bright and early at Green Park (before the crowds), but unfortunately the start of the Mini Mile (the first event of the morning) was delayed by about 20 minutes, which was quite frustrating. Nonetheless, Dave and Pickle eventually got underway and ran the course in 12 minutes (probably less as it took them a fair while to reach the start line). Pickle got his first ever running medal which is a weighty beast and should be approached with caution! Due to the delay in starting the first event, the 3k was also delayed, pushing back the start of the 10k run. Eventually at 10.45 we were off. I'd managed to squeeze in just in front of the 55 minute pacer and had a fairly fast start (for me) - my first 3 miles were sub-9 minutes. My aim was to beat my previous PB of 57:28, and I'd decided to aim for an average pace of 9 minute miles, which would have given me a time of 55:54 (I know it's a 10k, but I work better in miles). Just before the 6k mark, I was passed by the 55 minute pacer, and then slowed down by his "entourage" jostling to keep up with him - this was unfortunately at a narrow point in the course, and as much as anything I was aiming not to end up flat on my face! I'll admit that at this point I was pretty demoralised as I was quite hot and tired, and ended up taking my first walk break.
I watched him gradually move into the distance and annoyingly felt like I'd failed myself, which of course I hadn't - I was still averaging under 9 minutes per mile and was well on course to meet my goal. The last 3k were pretty tough and in retrospect I could have done with starting out a tad slower as my legs were heavy by now and I was feeling shivery. Finally just before the final 1km, we turned back into Green Park - the end was (metaphorically) in sight, although the downside of Green Park is that there is no shade. I will admit to several more short walk "breaks" in the final km, but finally the end was in sight and I caught a glimpse of Dave (the Pickle) waiting to cheer me around the final bend. I found a final burst of speed from somewhere and passed under the gantry with a gun time of 56:11. My chip time was later confirmed as 55:22, so extremely close to my 55 minute target time. Extremely proud of myself, but exhausted, we ambled back to the car, popped home for a quick shower then out for a well-deserved meal. |
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May 2018
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