Tag: training

Sunday weigh-in, 5.75 miles and running faster than your ‘black dog’

Jess Guth3 Comments

I woke up this morning with a feeling I haven’t had for years. That feeling of teetering on the edge of depression, of my mental health not being where it should be; the wanting to stay in bed and hide, the barely being able to get up. My black dog was pushing at the door (for some reason I picture my symbolic black dog as a fat black labrador). But there was good news that was worth getting up for – our friends’ baby was born over night and all are doing well. So now I was up, I might as well stay up. I remembered it was Sunday and got an the scales. +1.5 pounds. Hmph (though fully deserved and expected). The plan was to move to the next longer run on the programme, skipping some of the 30 minute ones and moving through to the longer runs more quickly. I had a banana and then we did 15 minutes of yoga.

We set off for our run, heading along the canal towards Bingley for a change. Run/walk ratio continues to be 2mins/30 secs. The first two runs were awful. I couldn’t breathe, my legs felt like led, everything felt like an effort and, if I’m honest, I just didn’t want to do it. It’s hard to describe the battle that went on in my head. Not only did I have the usual ‘ you’re not a runner’, ‘what do you think you’re doing’ and ‘really, you want to run do you?’ going on, I also had a more general crisis. I had a really dark cloud hanging over me which made everything so hard. – the black labrador hanging on to the back of my top and pulling me back. But that wasn’t everything, I also had a tiny little voice, a very quiet voice initially that was trying to be determined not to be ill, not to give in, not to allow the black dog into the room. That voice got louder as we kept going. I had a major wobble just before 2.5 miles where I informed Kath that I couldn’t do ‘it’. I have no idea what ‘it’ was but I was sure that I couldn’t do it. She took no notice of me and just told me that I could and kept going. As she is right about most things I just had to believe her and keep going with her.

The running was hard, I was grateful for every walk break but as I kept going the little determined voice got louder and as we passed 5 miles it got a little bit giddy and almost shouted ‘you can do this’. There was no reply. There was no response saying ‘don’t be stupid’, there was silence. A silence I’m not used to when running. Is this the empty mind, clearing head kind of silence that real runners talk about?  I enjoyed the last half a mile. I actually enjoyed it. I felt like giggling (except I didn’t have enough breath for that), I’d just pictured a big black dog as the symbol of depression running along behind us on the canal desperately trying to keep up with us, tongue hanging out, panting, getting slower and slower and eventually, probably around 4 miles giving up. I win. I ran 5.75 miles today. I woke up not well but I came back from running feeling confident that I will go to bed much better.

So 5.75 miles. Pace of 13.15 minutes per mile. An hour 16 minutes and 10 seconds. However slow that might seem to you, as long as I’m outrunning my black dog it’s fast enough for me. Oh and when I got back on the scales after the run I’d actually lost half a pound since last week. I haven’t changed the weight in the log because that felt like cheating but it felt good.

Calf niggles, eating crap and running in the sun

Jess Guth2 Comments

I was looking forward to a run after work on Tuesday – that never happens! I walked up the hill from the bus stop, got changed and we set off. For the first time since my injury we set off from home rather than heading for the canal bank. The first stretch is a slight downhill. Great. Then a bit uphill, fine apart from the huge gust of wind that nearly knocked us over but certainly took our breath away. As we turned the corner and started on the next little downhill section I felt my right calf complain a little. I finished that 2 minute run, walked and then set off on the next run, it niggled some more. The next walk came quickly and we set off to run again and the niggle turned into a twinge and I stopped. It was so frustrating. We’d been running a consistent pace of just over 12 minutes per mile and I felt strong even on the uphill bits. My calf however is not yet ready for hills!

No running Wednesday, instead I curled up on the beanbag (no sofa still), drank a glass of red wine and tried not to think about the utter crap I’d eaten during the day. It started well with porridge (finally found some in sachets that isn’t too sweet) but then went down hill from there with sarnies from work and chips and biscuits and stupid amounts of coffee to get me through the 13 hour day I did. Oh well Thursday was meant to be another day altogether…

So today I didn’t have to be at work early. We did half an hour of yoga (balance for beginners – or in my case unbalanced) and had pancakes and a big bowl of fruit salad. Then I made my way to Leeds. Things fell apart at lunch with crisps, chocolate, more sarnies, more crisps…  Not holding out much hope for the Sunday weigh-in this week. After a day in Leeds I was ready for home and after being stuck on a commuter train packed like sardines I wanted to be outside. I wanted space and I actually sort of wanted to run. We went along the canal for 30 minutes in our 2minute/30 seconds patters. It’s warm. Our average pace was 12.58 minutes per mile. It felt good, I felt ok, my calf muscle is behaving itself. I like running in the sun!

Finding out which bits don’t bend – the yoga experiment

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One of my best friends and colleagues swears by yoga, my mum does yoga and we have been saying for at least a year that we should try it – it will be good for Kath’s back and my core strength… But as usual we didn’t do anything about anything. Then my friend mentioned a yoga app called Yoga Studio (I’m sure others are available but I’m not one for re-inventing the wheel). I had a look at the app, downloaded it, had another look, ignored it for a little while, had another look and then eventually we had a go. Together, sharing a mat because we only had the one; in our hallway because our living room is stripped back to floorboards and full of plaster dust at the moment…

The app has 15 minute, 30 minute and 60 minute sessions for each beginners, intermediate and advanced and splits them into sessions for balance, flexibility, strength, relaxation or a combination. I like this. 15 minutes is easy to fit in. There is actually a chance I will get my butt out of bed to do 15 minutes in the morning. When working at home 15 minutes relaxation at lunch time sounds like a lovely thing to do (not actually had a day working at home to try that yet) and doing 15 minutes relaxation just before bed might be just what I need to clear my head of the clutter accumulated during the day.

What’s interesting so far is that I am clearly very flexible in some areas and not at all flexible in others. My legs, hamstrings, hips, thighs and calf muscles are pretty good and stretchy and bendy although my right side is slightly tighter than the left (which might explain the injury to my right calf). My upper body is shocking and I have no core strength at all. None.

So here’s what I’ve tried so far. All are obviously the beginner sessions

15 Minute Combination

A nice 15 minute session with gentle stretches and about as much strength stuff I can cope with. A good way to start the day because I feel like I’ve done something but it’s not too tricky. The only thing in there that I can’t do for some reason is extended puppy, as mentioned in a previous post somewhere I just end up face-planting. It’s odd because it shouldn’t be a difficult pose!

15 and 30 minute Relaxationcat-supported-shoulder-stand

I like this – probably because I don’t really have to do anything other than stay still in various poses and breathe. I can do breathing. The 30 minute one does have a supported half shoulderstand in it and the ‘instructor’ tells you to enjoy the relaxing feeling of being upside down. This is usually the point where I loose it and start giggling. I do not find being upside down relaxing. I mean does that look relaxing to you? (The picture is from Yoga Catz)

15 Minute Flexibility

This ends up being half ‘oh yes this is fine, I like this stretch’ and half ‘How the bloody hell are you supposed to do that?’ I am hoping that as I do this more often there’ll be less of the latter

The app works well for me, there are pictures and explanations/instructions of each of the poses so you can check what you’re supposed to be doing and the ‘instructor’ talks you through the session in a voice that I thought might get annoying but actually hasn’t so far. We’ve now got two mats and the iPad hooked up to the TV in the living room which is still just floorboards and doesn’t have any furniture in but we are making progress.

I’ll let you know when I tackle strength and balance sessions – could be amusing!

-1.5 pounds, sunday dinners and stupid dog owners

Jess Guth1 Comment

It’s Sunday. I used to like Sundays. Sundays were for lazy mornings reading in bed, for pottering about, for spending time just watching our flock of sheep and for playing with the crazy kitten…. actually that is still exactly what Sundays are for but they now have the added dimension of the Sunday weigh-in. It was uneventful this morning. I was just awake enough to pop the scales on before standing on them and my eyes had adjusted enough to see I’d lost a pound and a half (and a bit but we’re only recording halves). So right direction after an indifferent food week (with a biscuit or two too many at my work writing retreat).

We’ve just come back from a Sunday dinner at Kath’s mum’s. A beef roast with amazing yorkshire puddings and with chocolate pudding for pudding so I can now safely write about the food plans for the rest of the week without making myself hungry. We’ve got some falafels, some koftas and other bits and pieces for a little picnic tonight, just in case we actually ever want to eat again and we’ll do the same for lunch tomorrow. The rest of the week we have pasta bake, beef stirfry, greek salad, baked spuds and salmon and veggies planned for main meals, the usual mix of eggs, mushrooms on toast, porridge, pancakes etc for breakfast and mostly left-overs and salads for lunches. Kath made some lovely cereal bars last week and we still have a few left so that will do for nibbles.

I’d rather not talk about this morning’s 30 minute run. Horrible horrible horrible. Not made better by some idiotic dog owner not keeping his rodent sized mutt under control. It ran alongside Kath for a bit – I was behind her freaking a little bit – then it was called back and stopped dead – right in front of me. It nearly ended up launched into the canal but instead I managed a rather inelegant hop over it. It then started running after me and you know me and dogs, I freaked a bit, well a lot. In fact I should check whether there is a spike in pace, there probably is. Anyway, Kath ran and I plodded for 30 minutes this morning, let’s just leave it at that.

Happy Sunday everyone

5 Miles!

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It seems very few things are impossible (apart from doing the extended puppy yoga pose without face planting first!). I did the 5 miles this morning. That’s 8.04672km, also known as a long way. We ran along the flat along the canal and we went for scenic rather than even path and headed towards Silsden/Skipton way. It also has the advantage of being slightly quieter than going the other way. We ran 2 minutes walked 30 seconds for most of it (see below – go me!) and we were out 1 hour, 7 minutes and 59 seconds which gives us an average pace of 13.37 minutes per mile. So how was it? Well I didn’t hate it. I remember some very young ducklings – 8 or so in a brood (they move, so counting is tricky) and further along there were some bright yellow ducklings – bathtub rubber duck lookalikes and very cute. There were also a few people out on bikes and one or two dog walkers but mostly it was quiet. So I remember stuff from the run which is a good sign. The first couple of runs were awful but then we settled into things and as we went through 1 mile it seemed to be going fine.

A little while after that 1 mile mark the path turns from proper footpath to just a track and grass bank and I lost all confidence in my footing. I felt like bambi on ice and had a couple of nasty little pulls in my calf muscle and in my left ankle. We slowed off dramatically with the pace dropping to something like 14.5 minutes per mile. I wobbled myself on to 2.5 miles and we turned round. I still felt a bit unsure of my footing for the next two runs and then something changed. Partly I just wanted to get off the uneven ground and partly I gave myself a right good talking to in my head. We started running again and I felt great (well I felt like I could go a bit faster and I wasn’t huffing and puffing); we missed out the next walk, I still felt strong, we missed out another walk. I ran for 7 minutes at what I now know was a fairly even pace around 13 minutes per mile. Then we walked our 30 second walk break and all felt pretty good. Another couple of runs later and it was starting to get hard but then, quite suddenly really, there was less than a mile left, then half a mile and from there I just kept going – focusing on the bridge where we started. 5 miles, done and I feel ok. I paced up and down a bit sucking in the air and then we walked back to the car. I was talking before we got in the car, I could breathe. I felt fine. I’ve had a shower, nothing hurts, all good. 5 miles. Done. Oh and for those of you are wondering what an extended puppy pose is. Here you are: The one on the left is from a yoga classes page – the one on the right is more akin to what I am sure I end up doing!