Category: Other Exercise

Happy Running

Jess Guth1 Comment

You might have guessed, if you have been following my blog for a while, that I have not been in a happy running phase. It’s been about persuading myself to get out at all and then just trying to get through to the end. It’s been about trying to stick to a plan, about building consistency and not being hugely successful with any of that.

And then there has been the silly self-consciousness and lack of self-belief. All the nonsense that led me to benching the brain a little while ago.

So I am really just checking in to let you know that I had a happy running week last week. In objective terms it was pretty awful: Slow, lots of walking, short distances… but I loved it. The first run was on Tuesday morning in Bath. I was there for a 2 day thesis workshop. I didn’t sleep well and I felt overwhelmed by work stuff and thesis stuff and I didn’t really want to be away from home. But I had a little plod round Bath. I walked lots. I didn’t go far. I smiled lots. It was perfect.

And then on Friday morning I had a little trot out round Edinburgh. Yep that’s right. On Thursday morning I made my way to Edinburgh from Bath. Again I didn’t sleep well into Friday. I was already over-peopled when I got there and my imposter syndrome was through the roof. It was actually lovely but I should also know better than have 4 days of intense people-ing in a week. Anyway, the Friday morning pootle round Edinburgh was much like the plod round Bath: Slow, lots of walking, stopping for pictures and smiling. I had a great time out there and I didn’t care what people might think.

And then on Sunday I ran at home. I did what we call a backwards sheep loop, just over 3 miles. I should have gone earlier in the morning. It was already quite hot but I just plodded along using 30/30 intervals and walking any particularly sunny or uphill bits. I found it unreasonable hard and it may well be the slowest I have ever run that loop – but again, I had a great time.

Saturday and today I also had pretty good gym sessions where I seemed to get into my little bubble and my brain behaved. So anyway, even objectively awful running, in fact doing something that some people would not even consider ‘going for a run’, can be very happy running indeed!

Benching the Brain

Jess Guth1 Comment

I wrote about my Philly running adventures and noted I was going to come back to the plans for consistency and my inability to actually stick to those plans. So here we go. We got back from Philly and I felt good about running. But then I did almost nothing for 2 weeks. I managed some yoga but not as much as I wanted to really and I felt like jetlag properly kicked my butt. I didn’t really get going until this week. I dragged my butt out for the first run of week 4 of Couch to 5km plan on the bank holiday Monday. On the Tuesday we had a spa day but went to the gym before and I ran down to get there and we did yoga in the evening. That was a good self care day!

I went to yoga on Wednesday and Friday, too but didn’t get out for another run until today. Today I walked/ran 3 miles. It wasn’t fun and it was full of self doubt and negative chatter but it’s in the bank. So I got my three runs in this week. I have also done 2 strength sessions at the gym, a couple of daily stretch and foot re-set sessions on dynamic runner and a couple of Yoga Studio App morning flows. I’m not doing nothing but I am struggling with running consistency. I guess I just need to keep doing the best I can on the day.

I am trying to plan week by week, just one week at a time because that seems to be more realistic. A routine of gym on day X and running on day Y doesn’t work very well at the moment because I don’t have set days where I need to be in the office. I am hoping that sitting down today and looking what is realistic for next week might help me stay consistent and keep ticking the running off. I have to keep believing that the running will click back into place and that at least some of it will be enjoyable again.

I’ve been trying to work out why it is such a struggle to just go out and do it; why I can’t get back to running just being a thing I do. I am not looking for it to be easy. It’s not that I mind hard, in some ways I actually like the feeling of being good at doing hard. Partly I think it is that I am slightly heavier. It’s not the number on the scale (I don’t actually know what that is), it’s about where and how I am carrying the weight. It’s typical premenopausal, right round the middle weight that makes running weirdly uncomfortable. I am a different shape to when I was running consistently and certainly to when I was running happy more often than not. So there’s that. Then there’s the added anxiety, self-consciousness and brain muddle that seems to come with being a woman in her mid 40s. While I am mostly embracing the ‘I don’t give a fuck what you think’ attitude that somehow comes more easily with this age, there is also the imposter part of my brain that has been louder recently than it has been in years. I have stopped believing that I belong on the canal towpath, in the gym, in the yoga class…I know I do, I just don’t believe I do. So every potential run is a battle ground to be negotiated. I have to convince my brain that running is not pointless, that nobody will laugh at me and even if they do, what do I care, that I am perfectly entitled to take up space out there running and that I am capable. My brain thinks it has more evidence to the contrary and of course every time I don’t run as planned it banks that as further evidence that the best place for me is on the sofa.

But I know my brain is wrong. Even with the overwhelming evidence that I am currently an utterly crap runner, I know that I am a runner. I want to run and I want to get better and I know how to do that and I deserve to have the opportunity to try – whatever my brain thinks. So my brain needs to sit this one out. Right now running for me is about doing the impossible and my brain has no business in that. I’m benching it. I’m going to try to get to consistency without thinking, just feeling and doing.

Useful reminder: It is fun to do the impossible!

Setting Foundations?

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Setting Foundations? Is that the right way to look at what I am doing at the minute? I completed the final run of week 2 of the Couch to 5km programme I am doing. A day late really but it’s a bank holiday so counts as weekend. I did mean to run yesterday but my period was really heavy and I felt crap. Maybe I should have just gone and got it done but I didn’t. I also ran Saturday so maybe it’s ok and a rest day in-between is better anyway.

Saturday I ran to the vet to pick up tablets for our Einstein. We needed to make sure we’d have plenty for when we are away later this week and Kath’s mum is looking after our cats. Running there seemed like a good reason to run and somehow I need a reason other than just running at the moment. Or at least that makes it easier. I can’t say I hugely enjoyed the running but it was fairly uneventful and the distance was about right so it made sense. I found the last running interval really quite hard and I am not sure why. Maybe just because I felt heavy and sluggish anyway.

Today we didn’t get up for our 7am yoga class. When my alarm went off Kath was still asleep. That’s rare. I dozed a while to see if she would wake up and she sort of did but we agreed that actually a slow morning with time spent together over coffee in bed was more important today than yoga at the gym. After breakfast we both pottered a little and Kath’s mum popped in and then it was time to get sorted for out Mind class at the gym. I decided to run down to get that final run of week 2 done and so that I can change the intervals on my watch for week 3 and don’t have to worry about it for the rest of this week. I didn’t bother with the warm up walk and went straight into a 90 second run. Almost all of the running was downhill which I know I need to change but today I used it to just stretch the legs a little more than I have been and go a little faster. Over the distance it doesn’t make much of a difference but I was about a minute a mile faster overall. Again the run was pretty uneventful and again I found the last interval hard.

The Mind class was a bit random. The instructor who taught this one and then one last Thursday is not ideally suited to it. She’s more of a high intensity fitness instructor I think. She’s quite chaotic and overly energiser bunny for this. When she first took the class last week I really thought it was going to be awful but I ended up really enjoying it. Today was the shorter version of the class and it felt a little less calming than it is supposed to but it gave me a useful stretch. Importantly, it also gave me a reason to run because I needed to get there.

I’ve been building my little Lego Disney Castle step by step to represent my progress and the foundations are now done – I don’t think the same can be said for my running foundations. There is work to be done here still but one step at a time!

So, uneventful running really. That’s a good thing. Week 3 looks ok. Running 90 seconds, walking 90 seconds, then running 3 minutes and walking 3 minutes, repeat.

Core Class Take 2

Jess Guth2 Comments

Today I went back to THAT class. I didn’t want to. But I did. We were both tired. Work was busy today and we were both awake really early because there was a very vocal blue tit with a lot to say for itself right outside our window at about 4am. So we nearly talked ourselves and each other out of going to the class. But neither of us wanted a non attendance strike at the gym for not cancelling more than 4 hours before so we put our big girl pants on (in my case literally) and headed for the gym. So the class is supposedly a 20 minute core class. It was again shorter than that. This time we had 4 rounds of 3 minutes. 50 seconds work and 10 seconds rest. 2 rounds of sit ups, leg raises and plank and 2 rounds of leg raises, elbow to knee or bicycle crunches or whatever you want to call it followed by a hollow hold/boat pose.

There were no more instructions, no demo, no information about modifications just lots of bravado and pretend flirting with women old enough to be his mum. But this time I was way more prepared. I was going to speak to the instructor beforehand but I was too tired to deal with him. But I knew how to modify and I knew that I was likely going to get some comments aimed at me. Fine (well not really generally but fine by me today). So round one. Sit ups with 5kg plates which I did without weights much to the instructors dismay. I was right in the middle at the back of the room and where he spent most of his time sort of prancing I was right in his eyeline. We locked eyes a few times and he said nothing. Then leg raises. I did not lower my legs all the way to the floor. Then the plank. Obviously I was supposed to be off my knees and his ‘modification’ for us was to suggest that when it got hard to move from elbow up onto hands. I suspect it has never occurred to him that the limiting factor in a plank might be upper body strength and not actually core strength. Round 2, same thing. Round 3 earned me a ‘make sure those legs go all the way back down to the floor’ on the leg raises which I ignored. Round 4 we locked eyes as I was in a modified boat pose with heels on the floor. He said ‘get those heels off the floor’, I rolled my eyes and mouthed a seven letter response.

My core has had a workout. I pushed myself and I can feel this workout much more than last week’s because I actually did proper exercises I could do properly. And for bonus points, my back doesn’t hurt. Will I go back to that class – only when I can’t go to the morning equivalent which is taught by someone else. Will I talk to the instructor, nope. I don’t think there’s any point. When I am in his class I will just keep annoying him by modifying the exercises where I need to and if he calls me out, I’ll call him out.

I am glad I went because I was ready to curl up on the sofa and eat crap and feel a bit sorry for myself. Instead I feel a bit brighter, have a bit more perspective and instead of half heartedly and tiredly trying to do some work, I have made a list of priorities for tomorrow and have let go of the pressure I was feeling to get shit done. So that’s a positive. I am also quite happy with the consistency of doing something the last few days. After my little run at Burnsall on Saturday I had done my 3 runs for week 1 of the Couch to 5k. I wanted to do something on Sunday because I wasn’t sure how much time I am going to have this week. We woke up early so Kath said we could go to the gym before watching the London Marathon on TV. So I jogged down to the gym and for the first time in ages I ran a continuous mile without walk breaks. I was quite pleased with that. I was also quite pleased with the strength session. No drama, no major self doubt, just sort of getting on with it in my little 80s gym playlist bubble.

Then we got home, had a coffee outside and then settled into watching the London Marathon and I was a blubbering wreck within seconds. Anyway, onwards to week 2 running intervals.

Core Strength, Modifications and a run

Jess Guth3 Comments

Meh, meh, meh. The strength session yesterday didn’t break anything. I can feel the work but nothing is sore. I am not entirely sure what I have done today. The day just sort of disappeared. I made breakfast and tea and I vacuumed the bedroom. We did a bit more of our current Lego set (Natural History Museum) but otherwise – no idea. Kath went and ran her intervals. I didn’t.

We had the Core class booked at the PureGym this evening. I decided to run down. Well, it seemed the scenario that was mostly likely to result in me actually running today. The run was ok. As it was my means of getting to where I needed to be I gave it very little thought. I had my Couch to 5km intervals set on my watch and sort of vaguely ran in line with them. The route to the gym is mostly downhill so I ran a little more than the plan suggests. So that’s the run done.

The Core class is usually 20 minutes and I have actually sort of enjoyed it the couple of previous times – there is a lot I can’t fully do like planks and side planks but there’s always an option to modify and do planks for the knees or whatever. Today we did 3 rounds of 4 minutes. Starting with 15 sit ups, then 15 leg raises and then 15 in and outs and then the remainder of the time in plank. I have no issue with the idea of the workout although it does rather encourage rushing through rather than focusing on good form. However, there was no information about any sort of modifications and in fact several reminders to lower the legs all the way back down to the mat before raising them again for the leg raises. My core is not strong enough, so I arch my back and before we know it I am getting almost no benefit in my core but my back hurts. I wasn’t sure how best to modify other than to not lower the legs as far which had already been commented on so I ended up just not really doing it. I have since looked it up and there are several variations that I can try next time. As for the in and outs – I rushed through them with poor form. I have looked up a modification for them too.

The problem is, I am not sure I will want to modify in a class like that if it will basically be called out. The vibe in the room was a sort of weird competitive one, a fast paced, keep up if you’re hard enough kind of feel. A very difficult atmosphere to be kind to yourself in and to do what you can on the day properly. I can do the sit ups – at least in the first round. I can do one or two full leg raises but would then like to modify or just not lower as far to build the core strength without hurting my back. I’d like to be able to slow down the ins and outs and maybe heeltap rather than hover the feet for the duration. I don’t want comments about ‘lowering legs all the way to the ground’ when I have just stopped doing that because my back is killing and I know it’s nonsense. Or comments like ‘lift your knees off the ground in plank’ when I have just held a full plank for a minute and have dropped to my knees because my form has gone. So yeah, I felt judged and not all of it was in my head today.

So the answer is of course obvious – don’t go to that class. But that misses the point. I don’t actually want to go to any class. I am not choosing my classes by ‘want’ here. But, as everything I have written above should make abundantly clear, I need to build core strength. I don’t have any. It’s never been strong but now there is just nothing and that is problematic on so many levels. A Core class should help me work on that. The class should not assume I already have a strong core. And the previous iterations of the class have been better. I have struggled in some of them too and the instructors have not always been great at giving modifications but when they have seen me modify, they have often remembered and let the class know the options or on one occasion an instructor came over to correct me and I confirmed that the move hurt my back and he told me to keep doing the modification and that was fine. Anyway, I’ll go back but I know it will be even harder to walk into that class next time than it was toady. I feel a bit defeated before I even start. I need to shift from thinking ‘how much will I not be able to do in this class’ to something more positive.

And reading this back I get how this sounds so entitled and self absorbed – it’s all a bit ‘make the class all about me and focused on me and my level and my issues’…I can see why your answer might be ‘shut up, get over yourself and get a PT’. It’s an option but I would give myself about 15 minutes before the urge to punch a PT would become overwhelming. And it’s also not really what I mean. I don’t believe I was the only person struggling. I don’t believe I was the only one whose back was hurting and I know I wasn’t the only one whose form had gone to the point that there really was no point. By just outlining different options at the start of the class, that could be avoided. Everyone could work at their level without feeling weird or awkward and everyone could have a hard for them, positive but challenging Core class. It’s not really about me, it’s about everyone.