And by fast I mean fast for me, not actually fast. Our weekend run this week was only 3 miles. We have previously talked about extending the ‘short’ weekend runs to 5 miles just to get some miles in the legs and get more comfortable at that slightly longer distance but then we decided that we would use the 3 miles to work on getting a bit faster instead.

I got up not long after 8am an got ready to go for the 3 miles. The first run section didn’t go well, I’d obviously not tied my pants properly so at about a minute in my belly had escaped and I was desperately trying to pull up my pants, keep running and not get cross at Kath who was, with some justification, falling about laughing. At the walk break I tied a knot in the elsastic to keep my pants up come hell or highwater – it will probably have to stay in there forever.

I struggled on the run from the start really. I think possibly the less said the better. It was quite fast for us – 11.24 minutes per mile. 34 minutes 11 seconds. I’m happy with that but I didn’t enjoy a single second of that run. The good news – I’d recovered pretty well by the time we got home.

The guys over at BritsRunDisney are following a very similar training plan to us to get ready for the Wine and Dine Half Marathon soon. They’ve been thinking about fuelling for their runs and we’ve been thinking about that too. We need to get better at eating the right sort of things before and after running to help us on our runs and to help recovery. We’ve been on with that, experimenting with what to have before a morning run (we’ll get to the afternoon/evening runs eventually but they seem less crucuial as our marathon will be a morning run). What we haven’t yet got our heads round is fuelling during a run.

Pre-Run

Kath quite likes to do the morning runs on an empty tummy. I struggle with that (it was ok today but it was a short distance). I like a banana about 15 – 20 minutes before we start. If I am going to be up much longer than 40 minutes or so before heading out then porridge 90 minutes to an hour before, followed by a banana about 15 minutes before works well. I also want to try peanut butter on toast and see how that works – bascially I just like peanut butter.

We will have to start thinking about the day before etc soon too but let’s take one step at a time

Post-Run

We’re relatively good at this as we both like things like tuna steaks on quinoa with a bit of salad or just a big salad with feta cheese and seeds or a chicken and avocado salad. So for the longer runs we tend to plan a pretty good recovery meal in.

During Run

Hm, we are rubbish at this. So far we haven’t even been taking water. I haven’t felt like I needed it yet. I try and drink a bit before we head off and I drink quite a lot of water when we get back. As the distances get longer we will have to fuel as we go though. Our attempt at taking the Camelbak water bottle the other week failed (the belt and little bottles that go with it are now in a charity shop donation bag). Carrying a hand held water bottle for any distance doesn’t work either so I’m not sure what the solution is there.

As for anything other than water – I don’t like the idea of the gels. I don’t really know why, I just don’t. we might try jelly beans – I was given some giant ones as a present a while back – they might work. We might also try some dried fruit and nuts, something like a trail mix or something. I suppose using a run/walk strategy means that any nibbles can be comsumed during a walk break making it far easier than trying to learn to eat on the run. Whatever we ultimately come up with, it needs to be something that I can take with me to Florida because having to find something else when there will probably mess with my tummy and will almost certianly mess with my head.

Oh Sunday Weigh-In. I lost a whole two ounces – we’ll call that staying the same!