Wedding Weekend

It's always tough to keep up with training when you've got something on at the weekend. Well, for the second one in a row, we were attending a friend's wedding. This time round, it was in Germany, adding a slight twist in the running route stakes.

Thank goodness for gmap-pedometer and it not being restricted to the environs of Kingston and Richmond. This week was "easy" week. I'm not just making that up. Every 3-4 weeks, you're advised to relax your training a little, down to a modest 20 miles in this case and not tackle the long Sunday run. The plan was for two 5 mile runs one on Saturday and one on Sunday.

Saturday went well. I managed to get up before breakfast and get 5 miles in before indulging in a huge German style buffet breakfast for nearly 2 hours. Sunday didn't go so well and the couple of drinks I'd allowed myself, combined with two late nights on the trot, meant I didn't actually wake up until there was only 20 minutes of breakfast remaining. I made the hard decision to forgo the run and take on the buffet once more.

Back to training today as well as a quick physio session (thanks Sam!) to try and prevent me damaging my knee any further.

101 miles down. Training run missed shocker!

Nice morning in Richmond Park

Tuesday was meant to be the day for passing the 100 mile barrier. And what did I do instead? Went out for a few drinks, didn't I. Well, it was a nice evening and it was my birthday, so I'm not going to beat myself up over it. So I put the moment on hold for a day and tackled it after work on Wednesday, once the effects of the night before's wine had had a chance to wear off.

Disappointingly, my iPod, which occasionally talks to me at the end of a session, congratulating me on running the furthest I've ever run, or the fastest I've been and so on, had nothing to offer me for running a hundred miles since starting my training. I suppose I shouldn't be making such a big thing of it either, I've got another 300 to run before the big day.

A 10k run round the Kingston and Hampton Court river circuit to get myself around tonight. Something I would have never considered being able to do after cycling back from work a few weeks ago.

Approaching the 100 mile mark

Since my training began 4.5 weeks ago, I've racked up the best part of a hundred miles. Aside from the slight nagging in my knees when I go for a longer run, I'm generally feeling pretty positive about the whole thing.

I polished off another 10 miler at the weekend, this time I was in the flooded Midlands. I ran alongside the Stourport canal to the river Severn, where the last lock from the canal to the river was completely submerged. Obviously, the route we'd picked to run along the river for a little way was completely out of bounds.

The 10 mile run was followed up with a glass of wine (after the water, bananas and skimmed milk of course) and a huge Sunday lunch. Needless to say, this combination is lethal, in terms of making you want to sleep. Not an ideal way to spend an afternoon with the in-laws.

It's a rest day today, but Tuesday's run will see me through the 100 mile mark.

Week five fatigue

I chatted to someone in the running shop, when I was buying my trainers, about the effects of cycling to work and still sticking to the schedule. The answer always seems to be not to sacrifice any of your training runs. So, unless I wanted to get the tube in everyday or fork out to get my scooter back on the road, I'm just going to have to deal with it.

He did point out, however, that he recently started cycling to work and that, for the first 4 weeks, he was absolutely fine. Week 5 and he was suddenly hit by fatigue. I'm there. It's not a show stopper and the runs are going well, perhaps my body just needs more food to help it recover more quickly. Well, I kicked that off last night by going for a bowl of spag bog followed by a whole pizza and garlic bread. Nice.

Mileage so far this week: Tuesday - 3 miles; Wednesday - 3 miles; Today - planning on 4.

A brush with injury

Looking back on my 10 mile run on Saturday, I was begging for an injury. Didn't give myself the two rest days, ran at pace in two races during the week, picked a route with steep ups and downs and had a few pints the night before. As a consequence, I felt the first twinges of what I self-diagnosed as the much written and moaned about Iliotibial Band Syndrome, or ITBS for short.

Locating the nobble

Without plunging into too much detail, I'll give my understanding of why. The IT band runs down the outside of the leg from your hip to your knee. Its purpose is to assist abduction of your leg which, in this case, is nothing more sinister than the outward motion you would have made while doing star jumps as a kid. When you run and your knee bends, the band slips over a nobble on the outside of your knee. My running style, like many others, isn't perfect. My legs collapse inwards, putting the IT band under extra strain. With gravity assisting, running downhill puts it under even more strain and if it's not strong enough and flexible enough, as it slips to and fro, friction causes the tendon to become inflamed. Hence pain.

The cure? RICE. And cut back on the training. I'm no medic, so please don't take any of this as gospel and do not quote me on the medical term "nobble", I'm pretty sure it's not called that.

Anyway, the result is, after a couple of day's RICE, I'm back to more steady training.

Breaking the 10 mile barrier

Running 10 miles seemed a long way off when I started my training, but 4 weeks in, I've notched up yet another longest run in my life record. I'm going to hold off from saying that I'm totally fine and injury free, for a couple of days, as the lower right calf is giving me a bit of jip at the moment.

This should have been my Sunday run (tomorrow), but I looked at the weather and decided not to risk running it in heavy rain. Unfortunately, I hadn't had my two days of rest before the long run, nor had the effects of the Friday night ales had time to completely disappear. Without a doubt, both of these factors affected me. Lesson learned.

The 10 mile route is good one. It took in the river, the park, hills and knee-kind tracks. I also had my support vehicle in tow again, although I lost her as she stopped to take in the Kingston regatta. There are a few steep hills on the route, one as you enter the park at Ham Gate and another long one as you turn round and head back towards Kingston Gate. I'm glad I took on board some energy at this point as I was starting to fade and mentally preparing to get the bus home!

Going to get another 10 miles in next weekend, then it's "easy" week!

Easy week, in beginner marathon training terms, means that the long Sunday run is a mere 5 miles. Hardly worth getting out of bed.

Deja Vu

A number of us got together to take part in the JPMorgan Chase Corporate Chall...

At about 5pm yesterday afternoon, I had a call from my still coughing wife asking if I'd take her place in the same race that I'd run the previous day. The event lasts two days so that a total of 25,000 people can have a go running round the park. I was hesitant at first, but since I had to go for a 4 mile jog that evening anyway, I figured I may as well do it in the company of strangers.

Despite setting out determined only to jog it round and not go for a time, at about the half-way point, frustration set in and I began the steeplechase route down the outside of the track. I tired after 3 or 4 bouts of this and decided to relax back into a jog.

The result? I shaved 0.2 seconds off of my time. If only there were prizes for consistency!

Race Day

A number of us from Universal got together to take part in the JPMorgan Chase Corporate Challenge, a 3.5 mile charity event, run around Battersea Park for SportAid. 12,700 people running around the paths of Battersea Park makes for an entertaining run. if not that runnable,. You'll invariable come up behind people walking 4 abreast after a kilometre and find yourself zig-zagging, sprinting, jogging and even walking as the path narrows to turn a corner. My recorded pace, for a kilometre, bounced between 10 and 4 minutes throughout! That said, I still managed to get around in 27m 4s, which is nearly 3 minutes quicker than my efforts last year, which I'm going to put down to training.

Of course, we rewarded ourselves with a deserved trip to the pub , a couple of pints and a doner. Despite feeling sure at the time, I still haven't managed to find the training schedule which pointed out the benefits of the pint and doner combo.

Back to training today, with a gentle 4 mile cruise. And a doner.

500 pound mark passed!

A huge thank you to everyone who has sponsored me so far, it's been a great response. Hopefully the momentum won't die down, we've still got a way to go!

Today was another fartlek (relaxing jog interspersed with pacey running for about a minute) day. I rolled out the lunchtime 4 miler and set off on my way. The key, to the pacey sections in fartlek, is timing. By which I mean, spot a runner in the distance coming towards you and work out when to raise the tempo so that you pass them at optimum speed. You will neither appear to be out of breath, nor breaking a sweat but you will pass your target at a suitably unnerving pace. Obviously, make sure you've turned a corner before you slow it back down.

Another Sunday, another run

Couldn't have asked for better conditions. No rain, no hayfever and no hangover. Even managed to get the wife to ride alongside me as a support vehicle with inbuilt video camera!

Took on board a good, healthy breakfast before heading out and it gave me plenty of energy for the the whole run. I have to thank Max for his invention of muesli for that one. We've (well, the better half) started making Bircher Muesli, which is almost like a cold porridge but full of fruit. Keeps you going for hours.

The longer distances are definitely getting easier, which has to be good news. I jogged through nearly 12k this morning in just over an hour and kept the heart rate nice and steady. Not like my 10k experience a couple of years ago when I stumbled over the finish line after 50minutes, topping out at a whopping 192bpm! I'd say my fitness was on the up.

Tonight, I mainly ate pasta

Yes, lots of pasta, in the vague hope it will help me through this Sunday's marathon. Sorry, that was just a metaphor. I merely meant a long distance and not an actual marathon, still a few months away from that one...

Thankfully, it's Friday rest day tomorrow and it couldn't have come any sooner. I'm spent. I'm about to finish my first full week of training. Ok, so it's actually week 3, but I've not skipped a single run, so that's got to count for something.

Running on empty

I'm shattered. It was bound to happen. I can't pretend I'm an athlete when I spend the majority of my waking life sat at a computer box.

So, I suppose my tip for the day might be not to expect to feel comfortable running 5 miles after one bowl of cereal 5 hours earlier and a 10 mile cycle in between. I'll be sneaking in some mid-morning pies in future!

Took the camera with me today, hoping to catch a massive hail storm or something on the way home. There's not really a niche for attempted retrospective photo journalism and all I ended up with was a snap of me at the top of the hill in Richmond Park with a puncture. Perhaps I'll shoot some deer tomorrow, photographically speaking.

Muddy river runs

Taking a pair of trainers into work and going for a lunchtime run is a great way to get the necessary training in and get away from the desk for half an hour.

We're pretty fortunate to be able to run along the river pretty much directly out of our office, that is, when the towpath's not a swamp. Of course, once you're 200 yards in and, up until then it's been totally dry, there's no turning back. I'm not sure how many miles I added to the run by side-stepping, zig-zagging and long/triple jumping my way along the south bank of the river, but it certainly got the heart rate up. So, I counted it as my fartlek training. Yes, I've learnt another new word.

Longest run of my life...so far

Today I ran further than I've ever run in my life. So 12k is not quite, well nowhere near, a marathon, but I didn't collapse at the end of it and I'm still able to walk up and down stairs, so I'm happy.

It's a good route with a couple of good psychological milestones in the form of bridges at about a third and two thirds distance.
It does take you along a route through Kingston which can get crowded with pedestrians in the proper summer, but wasn't really a problem today. It seems like July's taken it up where June left off, with plenty of summer rain.

I did catch 30 minutes sleep not long after I got back off the run, but I blame the lack of bananas in the house, which have now been duly stocked up. One thing I'm really starting to notice about this training malarkey is that the food really counts. If you run to the point of making you exhausted, a banana can genuinely pick you up. And to think I spent all that money on Red Bull through my university days!