I ran…

Jess GuthLeave a comment

…it was awful and wonderful all at the same time.My plan was to get up this morning and go for a run. I woke up, dozed off again, felt tired and sluggish and decided there was no way on this earth that I was well enough to run. I had a fairly productive work morning instead. Then, about 11.30ish I started running out of steam. Marking formative student work took longer than it should, I was unfocused… I decided I’d go for a run. Then I procrastinated a bit and mulled that thought over. Then I got changed. In my head I had this notion of an amazing, easy, evenly and fast paced 5k that would see me coming home in glorious sunshine barely having broken a sweat and certainly not huffing and puffing. Well I knew that was fantasy – the sun’s not shining for a start. So for once in my life I thought I’d be realistic. My aim was run to see the sheep and back. Not even the furthest field, just the first field. A round trip of 1.6 miles.

After a few minutes doing battle with the Garmin (I seem to have forgotten how to set it up) I set off at a gentle jog down the hill. Hm, not too bad really. Then I turned right and started up the hill. Oh bother. There was a bloke walking quite fast just ahead of me so I focused on catching him and as I nearly had him it occurred to me that I couldn’t possibly stop now. I mean how silly would that look. So I just tried to keep running a little faster than he was walking. Shit, are your lungs supposed to burn like that?

I turned left and gratefully waddled down hill. I was struggling to get my breath back and recover. I saw a friend of ours who was just loading his van for a trip to his caravan and was more than happy to stop for a quick chat. I stopped the watch, had a brief natter and then carried on. Bugger, forgot to start the watch again. I arrived at the sheep. 8 very pregnant ewes lying in the field looking thoroughly fed up. One ewe is possibly due tomorrow and she was separated. I watched her for a bit but no sign of anything imminent so I plodded on a little bit, said a quick hello to the tups in field 2 and turned round. I stopped for another breather at the ewes again and then set off for the long slog home. I made the first slope. Walked a few steps and then kept running.

I had to walk again a couple of times coming up the next slope and when I finally got to the top and turned right to go downhill my head was pounding with every step. I decided I wouldn’t try to run Ilkley Road, I barely manage that on a good day, but would instead power walk that. Just as I got to the last corner with the last nasty little slope our friends, the ones I’d seen earlier,  came up the road in their van – I set off running and the beep of encouragement and their wave gave me the last bit of energy to power up the slope and round the corner into our road. It was hard, horrible and slow but it was so good to be out. I feel better than I did before I went and am having a pretty productive afternoon. All assessments marked and teaching for next week prepped so I have the weekend free to do nice things – like maybe that 5k in glorious sunshine that leaves me glowing rather than a sweaty whimpering mess? Yeah that.

 

Lurgy update

Jess Guth3 Comments

Day 1 of ‘lurgy might be going’. It hasn’t yet though but I am getting better. I slept better for a start which has got to help with getting better. Kath went for a run – she’s been doing that a lot lately and she’s doing well. I’m really proud of her but I also find it hard to watch her go out while I can’t and then hear about the runs and how much faster her pace is without me and how much further she can run without using intervals when she’s out on her own. I knew this of course, but seeing it is still a bit hard. I don’t want her to stop going out running or telling me about it because mostly it makes me happy.

This morning Kath drove me to Bolton Abbey and we went for a walk. Not a long walk – up to the Strid and back which took a long time. About an hour. The we had a bacon sarnie at the Cavendish Pavilion and then we drove home. I have been wiped out for the rest of the day. I should not be this tired after a slow walk.

I’m going to head off to bed very soon and try and get another good 10 hours sleep to try and recover and heal. I almost feel like I did at the beginning of all this – sore throat, snotty nose, achey head… Sleep, that’ll sort it.

Mentally of course none of this is helping. I’m in the shadows and I think possibly expending quite a lot of energy on not spiralling. I need to run, running will help.

Of Lurgy, Bad Days and Needing to Run

Jess GuthLeave a comment

Day ‘what feels like forever’ of lurgy. I can’t shift it. It is the second really bad cold/flu/whatever I have had this year and it won’t go away. Well, that’s not quite true, it is shifting. I am slowly getting better. I started this post a few days ago – on the anniversary of Rachel’s death. She was in many ways the one who got me running in the first place – more about that in another blog maybe. And that day I felt like I needed to run far and fast to outrun my demons – but I was stuck on the sofa. It wasn’t a good day. It was full of memories but focused on the regrets, on the didn’t dos and should have saids. It was miserable and her not being here physically hurt. I didn’t cry. It was too painful for tears.

As I tried and eventually gave up on trying to keep work things ticking over until I can get my brain to function properly again and don’t go all wobbly every time I try and leave the sofa, I have too much time for my mind to wander. This is not a good thing. Sometimes, my mind left to its own devices, comes up with the most amazing creative thought and ideas. My best ideas about how to teach stuff or for research papers have come when I have let my mind wander off and paid no attention to it at all. However, as many of you know, over the last couple of years my mind has wandered off to darker places, places where it then gets stuck and won’t come out for days, weeks, moths at a time. Places where it hides like a scared little creature too terrified to come out into the light. Places that are guarded by an annoyingly bouncy and energetic little black Labrador puppy. Don’t let its cuteness fool you, it’s a right bitch (no pun intended – not really anyway). I don’t want my mind to go there. I am trying to drag it back out of the shadows and tell it that it’s all ok, that we’ll be fine, my mind and me, we’ll be fine.

But the lurgy isn’t the only thing I have been struggling to shift. There are also the rather ominous but familiar ‘I’m not good enough thoughts’. I haven’t run for nearly two weeks and before that it was sporadic at best. I am miles behind (too obvious a pun really) on the 1000 mile challenge, the 10k race is in 3 weeks and I haven’t run that far since the Dr Strange 10k in California in November… so I’m not a good enough runner. Kath has been getting out and running lots and her mileage total is steadily creeping up, her pace is pretty solid and certainly faster than I am – I’m not good enough to run with her….I have done naff all in the house, Kath has done it all – I’m totally rubbish… I have been unfocused at work and have had nearly a full week off meaning that some deadlines for potential projects have been missed – I’m not good enough at teaching, research, organising myself, writing, thinking, motivating others, getting the job done…. I’M NOT GOOD ENOUGH.

I know this is my mind wandering towards the dark places and being stuck in the shadows (we haven’t yet got to I can’t do it at all!). It’s been focused on all the things I haven’t done or won’t get done and it has spiralled from there. I need to run. I need to get out there to feel the sun on my face, to feel the physical effort, to release some of those happy hormones and to just get a grip. I feel like I need to run hard, fast and far, that a run up on the moors or along the canal might just make it all ok. Then I remember that I can’t run. But I couldn’t run when I completed Dopey either so let’s just ignore that. I managed to get out of bed and actually have a shower and get dressed today. Then Kath took me for breakfast and we did our food shop. I also bought some new PJs so really all is well with my world. I can now look at screens and read so I will look at work stuff and make a list and prioritise and get back on track. Tomorrow I will try a little walk and if I don’t collapse in a heap at the end of it, on Monday, I will run. It won’t be hard, far or fast but it will be a run and will at least give the puppy something to distract it so it might not notice me dragging my mind back from the shadows. And if it does? Well, it can catch me if it can.

 

 

Race Planning

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What better way to spend your ‘I can’t run’ days than by planning all the amazing runs and races you are going to complete in record times just as soon as you are able to get out there again! You won’t believe the challenging courses, fast flat courses, hilly routes and muddy sections I have run in my head over the last few days and you certainly won’t believe the pace at which I did them! More realistically though, we have been talking about what races to schedule in, how many, when and what distances. I think we learned from Dopey and London that having too many, too far an too close together is counter productive. We quite like running once we get going and we both quite like the odd race but we don’t like the pressure of running lots of races. Having some booked in keeps us honest and focused but it’s a fine balance between that and feeling stressed out.

So we have pretty much made the decision that we will have another go at the Dopey Challenge in January 2019. The races we might  try and do between now and then look something like this:

  1. Keighley 10k – March 2017
  2. Endure 24 – July 2017
  3. Yorkshire Coast 10k Scarborough– October 2017
  4. Harewood House Half Marathon – February 2018
  5. Keighley 10K – March 2018
  6. Hamburg Half Marathon  – June 2018
  7. Endure 24 (if we enjoy it in 2017) – July 2018
  8. Great North Run – September 2018
  9. Robin Hood Half Marathon – September 2018
  10. Scarborough 10k – October 2018
  11. DOPEY – January 2019

That looks like a pretty good list to me really and there are some opportunities there for a decent proof of time run for Dopey. In addition we may actually get out butts to parkrun, too.

Anyway, I think my throat is getting a little better. I don’t think I have a temperature any more so I hope that in a day or two I can try some baby steps towards running again.

On and off running

Jess GuthLeave a comment

Ah yes, that running thing. You would of course be forgiven for thinking that I haven’t been running at all – that’s how it usually works, no blog, no run. It’s not quite true this time though. I have been running but not much, not far and not fast and it has been mostly fairly miserable. I’ve struggled every week to motivate myself to get out and run. Since I last blogged it’s probably been about once a week and I’ve had a couple of 1 mile runs on the treadmill in the gym at work. All of it was pretty hideous and not really in any way enjoyable.

Then we had a lovely weekend with our friends last weekend and just chilled out completely and on Monday I suddenly felt ready to run and we had a short but really good run after work. We ran the .8 of a mile to our sheep to feed them and then ran back. No intervals, no walking. The way there was quite speedy and the way back was also a lot faster than I thought was possible – it’s got lots of uphill bits which I often don’t manage to run at all. I felt quite smug about the run and happy to really get going. It felt like maybe running wasn’t going to be a complete waste of space this year. On Tuesday I started with tonsilitis. I have jelly legs just walking up the stairs in the house so no running until I’m better. Hmph.

So while all this not running is happening I have of course been looking for motivation and things to give me a focus and purpose. Kath joined the Trail Running Magazine 1000 mile challenge at the start of the year and it certainly seems to be helping her get her butt out the door – she’s been running most days – not massive distances but even 3 miles here, a mile and a half there starts adding up! She’s on a roll. I decided to also join. I suspect I won’t get anywhere near 1000 miles in the year but it’s a good goal to work towards and in the Facebook group that goes with the challenge there is lots of motivation to be found – gorgeous pictures posted by people running in stunning countryside. Building fitness so I can get back to actually enjoying being out and looking around is definitely a motivator. So even though I can barely get my backside off the sofa today, I am impatient to get out there.

I’ve also just realised that the Keighley 10k is only a month away. Hm. I do like that the distance isn’t really freaking me out. I am not worried that I can’t do 10k but I’d like it to be a good positive run and of course there is a small (ok, large) part of me that wants to do better than last year. I know this isn’t likely – I was in between Dopey and London Marathon last year. I was a lot fitter with a lot more miles in my legs but I don’t really want to see exactly how much fitness has gone since then!

We are also toying with the idea of entering the Endure24 24 hour race in Leeds in July. It’s 5 mile laps which seems quite doable and teams don’t need to have someone on course all the time so it really does seem like it might be a fun challenge. I think I could do a few 5 miles laps with a little rest in between! But of course I always think I can do things when I am sitting on my sofa. On my sofa I am invincible – sitting on the sofa got me into the whole Dopey thing in the first place.

I’ve rested today and I have no plans for the weekend that require me to really do anything so I can rest and then hopefully next week will be a better week . Let my 2017 running commence!