A Lost Day

I wanted to do a 10 miler today but woke up feeling feverish and coldish so rather fed up. I'm not doing nearly enough miles, as it is.

Bummer

Hello Everyone - Starting Again

And so we start again; both this blog and marathon training. Having failed to get a place in the ballot for the 2012 Virgin London Marathon (VLM), or through a charity I was pretty well happy to let this year pass by without a marathon. Now, I'm a guide at the Royal Navy Submarine Museum on the submarine HMS ALLIANCE, which is looking to raise funds to complete its refit. I'd let it slip that I'd run marathons before. A little while later the Director mentions that the Museum is hoping to get 5 places in the VLM through Prince William and Prince Harry's Charities and would I be interested in joining the team...... the bid for places was successful and so I signed up.

I'm 55 now and the wrong side of 15 stone so I'm not finding the running easy.. I'm getting out on the road regularly, even in this bloody freezing weather, and doing the miles. My legs are feeing heavy when I'm running and motivation is hard to come by but I'm persisting s there it is.

We do of course have a Justgiving link and this is it www.justgiving.com/HMSALLIANCEandPete/
and folks can also donate by text by texting DUTW51 £xx to 70070. Just change the xx to the figure you'd like to donate..

Dang - this hurts

Hello Bleaders, as Andy Glasgow refers to his Blog Readers in the really clever radio sitcom 'On The Blog' on BBC Radio 2. Time for another entry from me.

I went out for an hour and half yesterday in some damp and chilly weather. I freely admit that I haven't done enough training yet but tappened before. For the first 3 miles felt like lead and that's not unusual for me. I'd be interested to know, from those that know of these things, what the cause is and how I can get around that - or at least ease it. I'm wondering how much effect my shoes have. Whilst my current pair of Asics have been a comfortable fit, I have felt as if I was running a bit flatfooted. Hmm. Notwithstanding, I'll be needing to pay a visit to Alexandra Sports soon, for a new pair.

I ran out to the seafront at Lee on the Solent and then back along Stokes Bay (here's the route). Both these areas are normally teeming with promenaders but the weather obviously had had an impact as I saw no more than half a dozen tightly wrapped people. And no dogs! There were some ducks but they had their minds on other duck-related matters.  It was actually quite a pleasant day - once I warmed up - for a run. There was hardly any wind and it rained lightly once for 10 minutes.



When I got home I looked at my shoes to see one had some red dye on it and for the life of me I couldn't recall running through any mud of that colour. It was only after taking my shoe off to see my very bloodstained sock, did I realise that a corner of a toenail must have been digging into its partner.

So there's the lesson - keep your toenails properly trimmed, folks!


I nearly forgot to add my sponsorship link!

10k On The Rower

Concept2, the makers of the famous, ubiquitous and eponymous rower are running a challenge series called the Challenge Series 7. Each month the entrants have to log their best effort at different events which have so far included 4 minutes, 1609 metres (a mile), 2000 metres (Olympic distance), 5000 metres and this month 10000 metres. Today was the last day to log results for the 10k and I scraped in at 4pm with a time of 48m 36.9s Such a long row was a bit tough on my girly soft hands, but I felt quite good after.

I really like the rower - it's such a good workout, working on all the major muscle groups as well as on the CV system. One year it helped me prepare for a marathon; I had a painless knee swelling which was worrying so I tried to keep off the high impact stuff and did a lot of training on the rower, doing one or two good runs a week.  When it came to running around London I was pleasantly surprised how good I felt, and how strong my knees felt.

I intend to make it a regular part of my training for this year's marathon, particularly as I'm overweight at the moment so if I can reduce some of the shock to my joints that's all to the good :)

Oh yes. Thankyou, Keris at LA Fitness Fareham for the loan of a pair of shorts. Clever clogs here forgot his

Last Sunday In January.....

...and there's about 83 days to go. Oo er! Went out today for a slightly longer run along the seafront. I was hoping to do 5 miles but miscalculated badly and only did about 4.3 miles in 49m 15s 11.45min/mile).

It was great for running - quite fresh and a very sight breeze coming off the Solent and few people out to trip over or avoid as they teach their children to ride bikes  Going to the gym tomorrow to use the rower - I want to see if i can knock off 10km without losing my breakfast...... I'll weigh myself too, as I need a baseline. Our Weight-watchers scales seem to work using a random number generator.

Today's run

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Here it goes again

I started running before Christmas - for a change. But then I got some snags with my neck. Then came Christmas. Then came the snow. Then came an ear infection. Then I started running again. Well, this week I did. I have a long way to go - no pun intended, as I'm doing 11.2 minute miles over 3 miles. I'm generally a one pace plodder but as I do more, lose some weight, and get some help in the gym that'll come down a bit. He says.....