Tag: half marathon

Woman Down

Jess Guth3 Comments

Kath has hurt her knee. We don’t know when or how exactly. The 11 miler was fine and running the 2.5 miles yesterday she was fine too – a little achey as we walked back home up the hill. It got worse during the day. This morning she couldn’t put weight on it at all. The poor thing is in agony. The doctor was useless. She got a telephone appointment and was told to keep icing the knee, keep the leg elevated, use ibuprofen gel (she can’t take the tablets, they give her ulcers) and wait a few days. If there is no improvement in a few days she is to ring them back for further advice. She has made an appointment with her osteopath for this afternoon.

I should probably wait to blog until we know what’s what but it is on my mind and I am not concentrating properly and thus not getting anything done. I thought getting it off my chest might help with that! So I realise that this is totally selfish, self- centred and just a little bit out of line but I’m back to that honesty thing again: I am scared. Obviously I am worried about Kath’s knee and it is awful to see her in pain and to see her frustration at not being able to do anything. Empathy, worry, concern…all those emtions are there. And then there is also just being scared. Chances of Kath running again before the Nottingham Half Marathon are, I would think, zero. Hell, chances of her running the Nottingham Half Marathon are pretty slim looking at her hop her way through the house. So best case – Kath rests her knee and is ok to run in 2 week’s time. That means I have at least 5 runs to complete ON MY OWN. I have never ever ever run anywhere for any length of time on my own. The idea fills me with horror. I don’t have the self-discipline to do that. I’ll never make it through 3 minutes of running, never mind a full 45 minute loop.

Worst case? I feel quite sick thinking about this. Worst case, Kath is out for a while and not back for the Nottingham run. I need to keep training – Kath is fitter than I am by loads so she’ll catch up. I can’t stop. That means I need to run 13 miles in 2 weeks whatever happens. I will have to run Nottingham by myself. Just me. I may have to run the Scarborough 10km by myself. Just me. I may have to ramp up the mileage to 15, 17, even 19 miles by myself. Just me. Oh hell

Ok let’s try and be positive here. Kath is pretty fit, she doesn’t have underlying knee issues and hasn’t had problems before. She didn’t feel anything tear or pop, she’s had ice on it and has looked after it well since it got bad. She has an excellent osteopath. Surely nearly two weeks’ rest should do it and we can carefully potter our way round the half marathon and then kick on from there. I want to do this together and not just because I’m not sure I can do it on my own but because this is our thing, our challenge, something we said we’d do together. Kath has always promised she’d never leave me behind and she always crosses the finish line right next to me although she could clearly outrun me in every finish – she could just leave me for dust. We are going to cross the RunDisney WDW marathon finish line together but if she is going to be out for a while that means that I have to keep going on my own. Kath might be able to deal with several weeks of not training and I don’t think it will have an impact on her ability to finish a marathon at my pace. If I stop and wait for her to come back I will be too far behind schedule and risk not being able to make it round at all. So for us to do this together I have to keep going on my own.

Just me.

11 miles tomorrow

Jess Guth4 Comments

Another morning run. I was indifferent about running this morning. We decided to go the other way along the canal today. My leg is much the same – a bit sore but not getting worse. So off we went slowly down the hill. I found this one harder than the last two. It wasn’t comfortable at any point. I didn’t enjoy it, it was one of those that just needed doing and I don’t remember there being anything to see which must be nonesense, there’s always something to see along the canal. I just wanted to get to the end, get home and have a shower. It’s not that I was miserable or that it ever occured to me to not finish or anything, it just wasn’t fun. I think it was about 3.7 miles in 45 minutes.

Anyway, I want to write about tomorrow. Tomorrow we are having another go at the 11 mile run that caused my meltdown last weekend. I am, to say the least, a little apprehensive. I don’t really know what went wrong which means I don’t feel like I can stop it from happening again (over-thinking much?!?). I do sort of feel quietly confident though. Preparation for tomorrow is good. I have been drinking water all day and am pretty hydrated, I have eaten the right sort of stuff with fajitas at lunch and a bowl of pasta this evening and I haven’t really done anything this afternoon – just resting, watching crap on tv, chatting and enjoying being at home.

So, physically I know I can do 11 miles and I do think mentally I am learning to be a bit tougher. I have the sayings up all around the house so I see them all the time and they are lodging in my brain. I have tried my little mantra and it got me through the tough patches today. It’s ready for the next test. I also tried counting backwards from 100 and discovered that I am not very good at it. I particularly struggle in the 60s so my aim is to do a backwards countdown without making a mistake – that should keep my mind off running for quite a while!

The route should be stunning – all along the Wharfe so I could also count ducks. I will certainly be looking out for herons and wildlife generally and it would be really fab to see something unusual or something I don’t see on our usual runs round here. I also have another little trick to try and keep me going. It’s silly, totally silly but it should help for this run as well as for some future ones. The plan formed after the aborted last attempt. I went to the shop at Bolton Abbey and bought two postcards, one with a picture of the Abbey ruins and another with pictures fron Burnsall. We will turn round at Burnsall and I have written the postcard showing Burnsall. I am going to post it in the village as we go through. It says: ‘You know you can do this because you are doing it’ and is addressed to me from me. The second card I will write once we are back at the Cavendish Pavillion at the Bolton Abbey estate enjoying a bacon sarnie- again from me to me. What I write will depend on how I feel then but the idea is to have something other than the voices in my head. I will actually have postcards from me to me telling me that I can do this. So obviously I have finally lost the plot!

Getting carried away

Jess Guth4 Comments

I am getting over-excited. Perhaps it is that this evening I am finally starting to feel a bit better after after 3 days of feeling pretty crap, tired and miserable; perhaps it is because my visit to the osteopath seems to have sorted my leg and I am going to be able to have a go at the 11 miles tomorrow, perhaps it is because I have finally made some real progress with my teaching materials for the coming semester (I know I know but there is a week yet before induction week starts!). Whatever it is, I am getting carried away. In an attempt to make myself feel better yesterday I spent rather a long time looking at Disney stuff online.

Don’t judge me, I know, corporate America at its worst… I can’t help it. I believe in the magic that is Disney and I get excited about our trip. I spent a while looking at what I’d like to do at the parks. I’m not a big rollercoaster fan, I get motion sick really easily and thrill seeking has never appealed to me. I do like a little rollercoaster type fun though and the Seven Dwarf Mine Train looks fun – it’s new since we last went so I have no idea what it’ll be like but I’m looking forward to trying it. It always takes me a couple of walk-pasts before I decide I do want to go on the Big Thunder Mountain Railroad. That’s probably my rollercoaster limit (pathetic, I know) and I have to be in the right mood for it. I might not do this until after the marathon! I’m always scared of tweaking my back or something – is that actually likely? And then if I am feeling really brave which in my stupid over excited state this evening I am, I will ‘Blast off on a rip-roaring rocket through the darkest reaches of outer space’  and get myself onto Space Mountain. I have done that before and enjoyed it – I think it’s because I can’t see what’s coming and have no option but to go with it.

I’m also scared of heights so was only persuaded to go onto the Astro Orbiter on our final day of the last trip (which was January 2013 by the way – we don’t do this often!) and I actually really enjoyed it – it was lovely to have the views across the park and back towards our hotel. So I won’t wait until the last day this time! I could go on and on with other rides but I will stick to the Magic Kingdom for now or this will be a very long post. I am excited about walking over from our hotel once we’ve arrived and just wandering through the Magic Kingdom. I am excited about not being cold in January. I am excited about walking up Mainstreet USA and then just seeing where our feet take us. Ok, yes, I am just excited!

But I am not there to have fun, well not only to have fun. I am there to run. I’m there to run the RunDisney Disney World Marathon.so of course I got carried away and excited about that too. I got sidetracked looking at all the info on the RunDisney site and came across this pacing chart

Pace/Mile
Half Marathon
Full Marathon
9:30
2:04:00
4:09:00
10:00
2:11:00
4:22:00
10:30
2:18:00
4:35:00
11:00
2:24:00
4:48:00
11:30
2:31:00
5:01:00
12:00
2:37:00
5:14:00
12:30
2:44:00
5:28:00
13:00
2:50:00
5:41:00
13:30
2:57:00
5:54:00
14:00
3:03:00
6:07:00
14:30
3:10:00
6:20:00
15:00
3:17:00
6:33:00
15:30
3:23:00
6:46:00
16:00
3:30:00
6:59:00

So the  full chart actually starts at 6 minutes per mile but that is just stupid pace so I cut it down a bit. In 2013 we completed the half marathon in just under 3.5 hours – so very very slow but then we hadn’t really trained –  we’d never made it past 10km. I am looking at our pace now – 12.55 minutes per mile for the 9 miles the other week with a bit left in the tank at the end – and wouldn’t it be just amazing to complete our upcoming half marathon in under 3 hours – maybe even closer to 2 hours 45 mins than 3 hours? And then aim for a marathon finish somwherere between 5.5 and 6 hours. I get quite giddy at the thought of that. Too giddy. This was never about a time, this is just meant to be getting round and enjoying it. But, but.. but just look, the time allowed is 16 minutes per mile. Even on our slowest days we are significantly faster than that. I MAY NOT COME LAST! OMG I may actually not come last.

Grumpy Sunday

Jess Guth8 Comments

I’ve put on a pound and a half. I’m not too grumpy about that. I had a couple of pints, cake, two meals out and pizza. I am pleased it’s only a pound and a half really. I’m grumpy because I’m impatient and I want to be making progress and this is supposed to get easier. Instead I seem to be struggling more than ever with 45 minute runs and 3 milers on our ‘easy’ week and just the idea of running generally.

So Tuesday we had a good postive run which I blogged about in the last post. The next run was supposed to be Thursday but I was curl-up-in-a-ball-and-cry tired so we postponed the run until Friday. Kath had suggested upping the running to 3 minutes (with a 30 second rest still) and that seemed sensible. the 2.5 minutes running had been going really well. So Friday was a decent run. We went at a slow pace just to see what the 3 minutes would be like and actually I didn’t find that harder than 2.5 minutes. I did wonder though whether it would start to tell if we picked up the pace.

Saturday was our planned 3 miles and we also still had a 45 minute from the other week to catch up on. We had planned to go to Bolton Abbey and run the 45 mins on Saturday and then do the 3 miles Sunday (today) but the Kath had a disturbed night and the kitten woke her up at 4.30am ish so by the time I got up she was tired and hungry.

Don't be fooled - he may look cute but he is a complete lunatic
Don’t be fooled – he may look cute but he is a complete lunatic

We went out for breakfast instead and postponed the run until the afternoon. We decided to try the 3 miles. We nearly didn’t go. We’d watched the Challenge Cup Final and has pizza, we were both tired and it would have been easy to put it off. We did get our backsides out of the house though and went to run along the canal – a simply 1.5 miles one way and then back. It was horrible. I felt sluggish, then I felt sick, my left knee felt uncomfortable and my right leg felt a bit weird. 11 and a half minutes per mile pace and to be fair I did feel more awake and positive after having done it. It also highlighted that pizza and salad are not at all good for pre-run food. It was just over two hours between eating and running but I won’t be having pizza and salad before running again!

So this morning. The cats were being rowdy again so we were both awake early. We did 15 minutes of flexibility yoga (I didn’t bend at all this morning) and then went to set off from home for our ‘past the sheep’ loop. My right leg felt weird. I can’t really explain it. It feels sort of tight and weak at the same time. Like it needs stretching out but also like it might give way. It’s not pain as such, it’s just unpleasant and unnerving. We set off for the seocnd run interval and I nearly fell over. I have a sort of slightly odd tension in the right side of my butt and it sort of carries down my right leg.

It is hard to explain how I felt walking back home. It’s always me that pulls out of a run, it’s always me that lets us down. I am so worried that I have basically reached my limit, that plodding round for 45 minutes 3 times a week is my level and that if I push beyond that with a longer run I basically just break. For a minute there I just wanted to give it all up. Why bother with something that I am never going to be good at?  I’m going to try more yoga and stretching throughout the day and see where I am this afternoon. I’d really like to do the run and get rid of the gap on the training plan. It’s only 29 days to go to the Nottingham Half Marathon. I need to get my act together and keep it together – and ideally not break.

Eek -race numbers and shirts - nice to get long sleeved Ts
Eek -race numbers and shirts – nice to get long sleeved Ts