Phew. So, to pick up where I left off: I don't think I actually posted the link to my 22 mile run before, so here it is.
Anyway, this week has been a slow training week but I did do a run I was really proud of this weekend, while I was in Durham visiting my mum - 10 miles with an average pace of 8:25 per mile. This is officially the fastest I've ever run over a mid-distance, so I'm really pleased with it!
Today, I was considering doing 24 miles, but as I'm supposed to be doing a long run next weekend with RHD where we basically run non-stop for 4 hours and hope it gets us to 24 miles, I decided to take it down a little bit as it's good to have something to aim for (and because RHD thought I might overdo it...). So I did 21 miles instead. Couldn't decide on a decent route and then my sister, who is admittedly a bit clever, came up with the idea of running along the canal. So I ran down to Islington (5 miles), found the canal (it isn't obvious at all!!!) and ran along it.
I have to say I found running along the canal without gettting lost quite a challenge. Now, I know how that sounds. And that I'm not doing myself any favours telling everyone on the internet that I found it difficult sticking to following a canal, especially when I'm always harping on about people laughing at me. But it's true! I got to a certain point near Edgware road and the canal just... disappeared. And I spent 6 or 7 minutes looking for it. Eventually I crossed Edgeware road and found it again, but it was a private section so I ran along the road next to it until I could get down onto the path again. Then I kept going until... suddenly there was a LOT of police and crowds, and the smell of burning. This sounds familiar, right? Was I in Tottenham again in the middle of another riot? Happily, no! I had managed to run bang into the middle of the Notting Hill Carnival. There were about a hundred BBQs on the go, hundreds of people dressed in brightly coloured costumes having a good time.... oh yeah and a bunch of young guys in handcuffs being marched along the canal by some policemen. Although that was quite a funny sight, as they seemed to be having good banter with the police and they were all laughing and joking. If I ever get arrested, I hope I get a nice policeman who has some banter with me. Not that I'm expecting to get arrested....!
Anyway, apart from the very last mile (a shocker at 10:44.... my knees were beginning to get a bit tired... weird because at this point last week I was absolutely fine!), I did a decent pace, and overall averaged 9:28 per mile.
Starting to see the end in sight now for the Berlin Marathon... it's starting to be exciting and terrifying! I have already begun to daydream about what my next big challenge will be, which is probably a mistake since I haven't even completed Berlin yet...! I've been reading Born To Run by Christopher McDougall... it's obviously having a (bad?) influence on me :-D although I have to say I'm excited about having more free time to practise my kung fu after the marathon too. My kung fu is nearly as good as my running was 3 years ago. (In case you hadn't worked it out - that means TERRIBLE but enthusiastic.)
Monday, August 29, 2011
Sunday, August 7, 2011
In which I run into a phonebox and a lamppost, and we almost run through the biggest crime scene in North London.
Wow, it's been a long time since I last updated my blog! Although in mitigation I have been busy, first I resigned from my job, then I went to Malta on holiday, and then I came back to London and started a new job. Crazy times.
The last blog post I made was after I did a decent 15 mile run on June 17th. I was pretty pleased with that particular run. However the week after that my fiance and I went on holiday to Malta. Training had been going well so I was a bit apprehensive about how I was going to keep the fitness levels up in 30 degrees of heat. However, we found our hotel had a pretty good - and very under-used gym, so I spent 2-3 hours every day on the cardio equipment. Still, it wasn't the same as proper running, and when we got back to London RHD and I went out on another run. The plan was to do 16 miles, but from the beginning I wasn't "in the head space" and I crashed at about 9 mile. No idea what happened, but it felt as though I'd done no training for about 2 years. We ended up running 12 very sloooooooooooooooooooooowwww miles before I gave up.
The following week, RHD was away so I ran by myself and did 16 miles at an average pace of 9:19 per mile . This was a huge relief: I'd been thinking I'd somehow lost 4 months' training with one trip to Malta. Apparently not. I have to say I didn't take enough water out on this run and ended up having a very quick stop in the Islington Tap to fill up my bottles - much to the surprise of the barmaid and the guy propping up the bar! Presumably it's not every day that people in neon wearing strange running gear come hurtling into the bar, drip sweat all over it and demand a refill of... water.
RHD was so impressed with my 16 mile run that she ventured away from the safe south and came to North London for our 17 miler on July 17th - we did pretty much the same route, just slightly extended with a loop round Finsbury Park. Again, it was a good run - apart from the part where in a fail of the like usually only seen on those silly TV programmes where people send embarrassing videos in of people dancing embarrassingly and falling over, I managed to run directly into a phone box on Holloway Road, to the uncurbed delight of three hooded youths (it's un-PC to actually call them a hoodie these days, isn't it?) - and for the next 7 days walked around with a bruise on my knuckles which made me look like I'd been out on the razz and got into a huge fight. This wouldn't be so bad if I hadn't then run into a lamppost mid-week on my way home from work... aargh!
The following week found RHD and I in my car on the way to Surrey at stupid-O'-clock - we had entered the Surrey Slog. This was the result of me having too much time on my hands after leaving my last job and deciding it would be a great idea to enter an off-road, hilly half marathon. Quite how I managed to persuade RHD to do it, I'm not sure, but it's a good job she did come because my Garmin died 10 minutes in - so here's RHD's record instead which gives an idea of the crazy hills we ran up and down. My official time can be found here at the end of the third page - 2:18 - I was pretty happy with this as you're supposed to add 15% onto your normal half marathon time, which I haven't tried to get a PB in but I think is probably between 1:55 and 2:00 on the flat. This was the most enjoyable run of my training so far apart from my week in Cumbria - finally a chance to run somewhere beautiful, instead of pounding away on the streets of Haringey.
Pleased with ourselves, we decided to go for 18 miles the next week - and again, my Garmin was dead so here's RHD's report of that run. We were pretty pleased - it was boiling hot (about 25 degrees) and keeping hydrated was a challenge. It was also the first week where I've veetoed energy/electrolyte gels on the long run and gone with jelly babies instead, on the basis that gels are DISGUSTING and I think the manufacturers are laughing at us. The jelly babies aren't 100% vegetarian, but then again neither is icecream or wine so I decided to take an executive decision and give it a go. It was much nicer - but by mile 15 we were really struggling for water. We were down by the river and just as RHD said, "well, you can buy some water if we pass somewhere" and I gave her a Look knowing that we'd never pass anywhere that sold water down there, we found an ice-cream van and were saved!!! After glugging about 250ml of ice-cold water in one go, I was almost completely revived and we cantered home in good shape.
Which brings us to this week's run - 20 miles. We decided to skip 19 miles, as we were both keen to get past the mental block of 20 miles, and I'm so glad we did. For whatever reason today when we ran, I just felt absolutely brilliant for the entire run. I don't know if it had more to do with the 6 (yes, really) baked potatoes I ate last night as carb-loading preparation or the adrenalin rush we got when we ran up to Tottenham which was part of my planned route as I hadn't read the news this morning...!!! This was sort of a defining visual moment I will never forget - us dashing up to Tottenham in our neon Lycra and ridiculous running belts, and suddenly hearing RHD yell "Jodie, wait" - as I turned around and saw she had manged to just avoid running into the saddest-looking burnt out car I have ever seen in my life as a result of last night's rioting. We tried to run a little further, but we were quickly in the thick of a huge crowd of people staring at the burnt-out buildings and cars, scores of reporters and camera crews and a large number of police. We had to turn around and take a different route. Anyway, usually on these long runs I get tired after mile 15 and have to push through but today was a milestone as for some reason, even by 20 miles I felt absolutely fine and could've probably run another couple of miles or even a whole marathon distance. Berlin, here we come.... watch out.
The last blog post I made was after I did a decent 15 mile run on June 17th. I was pretty pleased with that particular run. However the week after that my fiance and I went on holiday to Malta. Training had been going well so I was a bit apprehensive about how I was going to keep the fitness levels up in 30 degrees of heat. However, we found our hotel had a pretty good - and very under-used gym, so I spent 2-3 hours every day on the cardio equipment. Still, it wasn't the same as proper running, and when we got back to London RHD and I went out on another run. The plan was to do 16 miles, but from the beginning I wasn't "in the head space" and I crashed at about 9 mile. No idea what happened, but it felt as though I'd done no training for about 2 years. We ended up running 12 very sloooooooooooooooooooooowwww miles before I gave up.
The following week, RHD was away so I ran by myself and did 16 miles at an average pace of 9:19 per mile . This was a huge relief: I'd been thinking I'd somehow lost 4 months' training with one trip to Malta. Apparently not. I have to say I didn't take enough water out on this run and ended up having a very quick stop in the Islington Tap to fill up my bottles - much to the surprise of the barmaid and the guy propping up the bar! Presumably it's not every day that people in neon wearing strange running gear come hurtling into the bar, drip sweat all over it and demand a refill of... water.
RHD was so impressed with my 16 mile run that she ventured away from the safe south and came to North London for our 17 miler on July 17th - we did pretty much the same route, just slightly extended with a loop round Finsbury Park. Again, it was a good run - apart from the part where in a fail of the like usually only seen on those silly TV programmes where people send embarrassing videos in of people dancing embarrassingly and falling over, I managed to run directly into a phone box on Holloway Road, to the uncurbed delight of three hooded youths (it's un-PC to actually call them a hoodie these days, isn't it?) - and for the next 7 days walked around with a bruise on my knuckles which made me look like I'd been out on the razz and got into a huge fight. This wouldn't be so bad if I hadn't then run into a lamppost mid-week on my way home from work... aargh!
The following week found RHD and I in my car on the way to Surrey at stupid-O'-clock - we had entered the Surrey Slog. This was the result of me having too much time on my hands after leaving my last job and deciding it would be a great idea to enter an off-road, hilly half marathon. Quite how I managed to persuade RHD to do it, I'm not sure, but it's a good job she did come because my Garmin died 10 minutes in - so here's RHD's record instead which gives an idea of the crazy hills we ran up and down. My official time can be found here at the end of the third page - 2:18 - I was pretty happy with this as you're supposed to add 15% onto your normal half marathon time, which I haven't tried to get a PB in but I think is probably between 1:55 and 2:00 on the flat. This was the most enjoyable run of my training so far apart from my week in Cumbria - finally a chance to run somewhere beautiful, instead of pounding away on the streets of Haringey.
Pleased with ourselves, we decided to go for 18 miles the next week - and again, my Garmin was dead so here's RHD's report of that run. We were pretty pleased - it was boiling hot (about 25 degrees) and keeping hydrated was a challenge. It was also the first week where I've veetoed energy/electrolyte gels on the long run and gone with jelly babies instead, on the basis that gels are DISGUSTING and I think the manufacturers are laughing at us. The jelly babies aren't 100% vegetarian, but then again neither is icecream or wine so I decided to take an executive decision and give it a go. It was much nicer - but by mile 15 we were really struggling for water. We were down by the river and just as RHD said, "well, you can buy some water if we pass somewhere" and I gave her a Look knowing that we'd never pass anywhere that sold water down there, we found an ice-cream van and were saved!!! After glugging about 250ml of ice-cold water in one go, I was almost completely revived and we cantered home in good shape.
Which brings us to this week's run - 20 miles. We decided to skip 19 miles, as we were both keen to get past the mental block of 20 miles, and I'm so glad we did. For whatever reason today when we ran, I just felt absolutely brilliant for the entire run. I don't know if it had more to do with the 6 (yes, really) baked potatoes I ate last night as carb-loading preparation or the adrenalin rush we got when we ran up to Tottenham which was part of my planned route as I hadn't read the news this morning...!!! This was sort of a defining visual moment I will never forget - us dashing up to Tottenham in our neon Lycra and ridiculous running belts, and suddenly hearing RHD yell "Jodie, wait" - as I turned around and saw she had manged to just avoid running into the saddest-looking burnt out car I have ever seen in my life as a result of last night's rioting. We tried to run a little further, but we were quickly in the thick of a huge crowd of people staring at the burnt-out buildings and cars, scores of reporters and camera crews and a large number of police. We had to turn around and take a different route. Anyway, usually on these long runs I get tired after mile 15 and have to push through but today was a milestone as for some reason, even by 20 miles I felt absolutely fine and could've probably run another couple of miles or even a whole marathon distance. Berlin, here we come.... watch out.
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