Filed under: half marathon training, leicester half marathon, running | Tags: running
Since the Leicester Half nearly two weeks ago, I haven’t felt quite right. I’ve had a bit of a cough that hasn’t developed into anything serious, but I can’t shake it off. I thought I was feeling better yesterday, but woke up this morning with a sore throat again.
Unsurprisingly, I haven’t felt like doing any running, or even going for a swim – and common sense tells me I should wait until I feel a lot better before I do any strenuous exercise. It’s not exactly salad weather, so I’ve been eating comfort food and feel a bit flabby as a result. The scales tell me I haven’t put on any weight (hurrah), but I’ve got to say I’d like to get back into the gym to tone up.
I quite fancy the off-road Cardiac Arrest run next weekend, but I need to feel a lot better than I do today to even consider it…
Filed under: half marathon training, leicester half marathon | Tags: half marathon training, leicester half marathon
On some days, you feel like Forrest Gump…like you can keep on running and running forever. Yesterday wasn’t one of them.
I almost didn’t do the Leicester Half Marathon. After a hectic week at work, a night out, a few restless nights and an ever-so-slightly sore throat – I wondered whether I was up to it – but at the last-minute, decided to go ahead. Big mistake: my legs felt like lead from start to finish, I nearly pulled out around the mile 9 mark and felt thoroughly disappointed with my 2:14 finishing time. Hard to believe that I ran 2:04 two weeks ago at the Great North Run and 2:01 at the Reading Half earlier this year.
There’s a lesson to be learnt there somewhere. I hadn’t racked up enough running miles since doing the South Coast Triathlon in September and I didn’t feel 100%. My gut feeling was not to do it, but I went ahead anyway. Should have listened to my body and stayed in bed!
Filed under: half marathon training, leicester half marathon | Tags: half marathon training, leicester half marathon
Sometimes, no matter how much you want to run, you just don’t feel like it. I headed off to the gym early this morning to test out the new shoes. Did an hour on the treadmill and it felt like three. The shoes were actually fine (against all sensible advice, I will be running the Leicester Half in them next weekend on the basis that they cannot possibly be less comfortable than the ones I ran the GNR in last weekend), but the rest of me wasn’t.
Not sure why really. I had a big meal out last night, which probably wasn’t the best idea. I didn’t sleep very well due to the man upstairs playing loud music throughout the entire night, as well as some nasty dreams that caused me to start shouting and swearing in my sleep. My heartrate was up at 182 even plodding along at 10km/hour which, even by my standards, is a bit high – so maybe I’m just a little under the weather.
Anyway, definitely didn’t feel like running twice that distance – which is what I need to do in a week’s time. I take comfort in that fact that I managed that distance with relative ease last weekend, and just need to put this morning’s experience behind me. Off to bed now…hopefully for a better night’s sleep.
Filed under: half marathon training, leicester half marathon | Tags: half marathon training, leicester half marathon
The running shoes that I bought earlier this year have never been quite right. After the Great North Run last weekend, my right foot was blistered on the inside around the ball of the foot and some toenails were threatening to fall off. It was time to buy a new pair.
Talan and I trundled off to Bristol this morning to the newly opened Moti on Whiteladies Road, where a very helpful and knowledgeable chap took a look at my current Mizuno shoes as well as an old pair of Sauconys that I loved, but now feel like planks underfoot as they’ve lost their bounce. With the aid of a couple of clever bits of software, a treadmill and a video camera, Moti-man did a complete gait analysis on me. He looked at my old shoes, the way my foot landed/lifted on the treadmill, then got me to do various bends and stretches including – weirdly – one that looked at how flexible my little finger was. This apparently gives some indication of the flexibility of the ankle…and mine are, in fact, very flexible .
Interestingly, one of the options the software threw out at the end was the exact pair of Mizunos that I’m not happy with! Nonetheless, my man said these are quite narrow and I have really quite wide feet. We didn’t go any further with those. Instead I looked at the two Asics options, and settled on a pair of Asics Foundation 7 in grey and lime green. Very fetching. My very first pair of proper running shoes were by the same manufacturer and they were very comfy, so I’m hopeful these might do the job. I’ll be trying them out tomorrow.
Filed under: half marathon training, leicester half marathon | Tags: half marathon training, leicester half marathon
I went to the gym on Monday for a good stretch out with PT Simon the day after the GNR. He looked at me as if I was insane when I said I was contemplating the Leicester Half Marathon in less than two weeks’ time and advised me to rest completely for a week. I ignored that and did a nice four-mile run on Wednesday. The way I see it, if I was marathon training, the half-marathon distance would constitute a training run and I wouldn’t take a week off afterwards to recover.
So I have signed up for the Leicester Half with a bunch of people that I did the Great North Run with. I entered online on Tuesday and received my race pack 36 hours later. Very efficient. I’ve never been to Leicester before, so that’ll be exciting.
My running partner has issued a few of us with another challenge: to compete in seven other events before the Great North Run 2008. The Leicester Half will be the first, and we’re contemplating some off-road running and maybe more triathlons.
No training today as I’ve just given blood. I did go for a six-mile run after a donation once, but had to come back home and lay on the floor with my legs in the air until the woozy feeling went. It’s not clever. Planning to head out for a long-ish run at some point this weekend though…
No matter how many times I enter an event, I still wake up on the day feeling a mixture of nerves and excitement. Sunday was no exception, as I woke up (late) to a beautiful day in Northumberland – on the day of the Great North Run 2007. Talan’s relatives had kindly put us up for the weekend and also volunteered to ferry us around to and from the start and finish areas – and we couldn’t have done without them. Having dropped Talan off at the start line, I managed to meet Phil and friends without too much of a problem, and we headed to the start pens.
It’s been a few years since I’ve run Europe’s largest half marathon, but it was everything I remember it being – and more. My favourite bits include:
- The camaradarie in the start pens, as we watched the wheelchair/handbike competitors (including Talan) and elite women set off on the giant LED screens.
- The chap in blue who somehow managed to fight his way to the front of the elite men/mass start and pelted off ahead off the crowd – arms doing some crazy windmill action - as 49,999 other runners watched with a mixture of admiration and hysterical laughter. What a legend.
- All the people in fancy dress, especially the sunflowers and bumblebees. (I will dress up one of these days…)
- Jogging across the Tyne bridge in the middle of a heaving mass of colourful runners.
- The Red Arrows passing overhead around the 2-mile mark…and their fabulous display off the beach at South Shields after we’d finished.
- All of the Bands On The Run – some more gifted than others…
- Realising the hills weren’t as severe as I had remembered.
- The Nike+ guys at mile 9 (perfect spot) playing power songs on some whopping speakers…ours was Jet’s ”Are You Gonna Be My Girl?” Classic.
- The support along the way – particularly the children handing out ice-pops and sweets. And all the kids who shouted “oggy oggy oggy” at around mile 11 – with little response from the runners who had got bored of that little ditty under the tunnel around mile 1.5.
- Turning the corner onto the seafront for the last mile.
- Crossing the finish line – in a degree of pain, but with a big smile on my face.
- Hearing about Andy’s tactical chunder at mile 9.
- And Tim (one of the wheelies) making use of the hay bales at mile 12 as he careered around the corner and flew out of his chair.
- The taste of my first pint at the Sand Dancer.
Our official finish time was 2:03:59 – exactly as on my watch – and this included an unscheduled pee-stop behind a bush around mile 4. We knew we weren’t going to break two hours, and our split times were a little erratic, but I was still pleased with the result – my second fastest half-marathon time. Still trying to decide whether to give it one last shot this year at the Leicester Half in a couple of weeks’ time. I think I’ll sleep on it.
