Camels, fish and chips and giant bees

I know I don't have a hard life, but just recently I've been feeling a bit like I need a holiday. Work has been very busy and at times has left me feeling a bit frazzled. I just notice I'm doing things like misreading instructions, missing obvious things, forgetting things, and having poor concentration. It's been manic. Or perhaps I am just getting old.

You may have heard me refer to my friend in the Lake District. She is an example of how good things can happen to good people. She has a magnificent house in the Lakes where she currently lives and works - her job basically involves walking around the Lake District all day (nice in summer, not so great in Jan/Feb). Many years ago whilst a farm worker, she purchased a dilapidated barn which she gradually built in to her home whilst living in a caravan in the garden. Of course with property prices being as they are up there, this house has become more and more valuable over the years, and sometimes her work colleagues visit and in a slightly looking down their nose tone ask "how have *you* managed to get a house like this?". Her reply simply is: "I BUILT IT MYSELF". Part of her plan in life was always to move to Cornwall where she goes on holiday a lot already (there are a lot of dog friendly places for her 3 dogs there). The past few years whilst down in the area she has been actively looking for her dream house, and in 2012 she found it - with it being "the one" she had to move quick - with some financial wizarding, she managed to buy it but is not moving in full time for a couple of years. Of course the move from up "there" to down "here" is a big one, and as friends and family and her go down to stay in the Cornwall house, they take bits and pieces with them - saves a bit on moving costs and hassle.

So this week it has been my turn. I've wanted to do the Duchy 20 for a while but it was logistics that stopped me with it being so far away, so I arranged to go down to the new house for this weekend and a few days either side. I was about to type I've never been to Cornwall. I have, but not in a leisure capacity; I spent the 10th and 11th September there 2001 when I was working for the South West RDA. Why do I remember this, well obviously that was *the* September 11th - my boss and I were driving back from the Truro SWRDA office to Birmingham and had been chatting all the way until one of the chaps in our team rung me at about 5pm when we were still only as far as Taunton. That is my memory of Sept 11th - being oblivious in the bubble of the car, then turning the radio on to listen to the events of the day as they had unfolded, open mouthed, speechless and close to tears at the sheer horribleness of it all.

Wednesday I was working in Bristol, and I had packed up the car at 6am that morning so I could carry on the trip from there after work. I did a bit of lunch time speed work on Weds, a 6 mile run that included 4 miles at Half Marathon Pace effort (since I've got a Half in just over a week I thought I'd better see what was what). After getting a virtual ticking off by Gobi for not being arsed to get a new Heart Rate Monitor for 9 months I've also started wearing one again. Well it went ok - I managed a faster pace than I thought for what I *think* is HMP (according to HR is was HMP). We will see. My attitude has changed. I think I can do the pace I want to do at a half, and I'm prepared to die trying. Go hard or go home. I've changed as a runner - it catches me unawares sometimes but mentally I have a really different attitude to a couple of years ago.

V's instructions were perfect and I managed to get to her house and in to the house with no issues by 7pm, unloaded the stuff and I was sat down relaxing by 8.30. I'm a bit sad but part of the fun for me of going somewhere new is planning different places to go and do my runs and what to do and see. It sounds terribly toursity, I opted to go to Padstow and run some of the Camel trail (along the river Camel) because of easy navigation and a town at halfway. So that was decided Weds night. I switched off the lights to see lights twinkling on the horizon from the kitchen windows and went to bed.

When I got up in the morning, the following sight greeted me:

Rooms with a view

Magnificent. This house is the wrong way round, bedrooms downstairs and kitchen / sitting rooms upstairs, but you can see why. All the living area looks out over the estuary to Falmouth.

I got to Padstow and parked up, and started running along the trail. To anyone local I suppose it might not be very special, and it's probably not the most spectacular scenery that Cornwall has to offer, but looking at the sand, the seaweed covered rocks, the little birds with long legs and long bills probing around in the mud for their lunch is really different for me and it was very relaxing running. I ran over bridges, past massive piles of what looked like slate (?) and towards and through the little town of Wadebridge. Then, simply put I turned round and ran back. If there had been any sort of reliable bus / train service I might have carried on to Bodmin and done the whole thing one way, but hey I can save the Bodmin bit for another day I guess. This run was going to be 12 miles in total, by 10 miles it was lunchtime and I could hear the sound of my own stomach growling for the last 2 miles, so popped some warm clothes on and went in search of food. Camel trail half run, I saw no camels.

I don't know what Padstow used to be like, I'm guessing Mr Rick Stein has put it on "the map" and it has probably changed a lot. As far as I could see it is full of gift and tourist shops selling sweets / shells / surf clothing and then a few bistros. Being a low maintenance girl, I homed in on a chippy. I knew it was going to be nice when I walked in the door and fish lady asked me for my order so they could cook it fresh rather than taking a piece of dry fish from under the heat lamps. Yes I was hungry, but it really was lovely. Then it started to rain, so I stood in the chippy eating this gorgeous grub listening to the owner talk to some of the locals about this and that, so-and so's-pneumonia and tutting at the stupid tourists trying to drive down a one way street. As the rain died off, I did have a little wander around. Probably not the best place to do any shopping, but I got a few bits for presents etc and I have to say in Padstow it is really easy to blow an enormous amount of money on rubbish if you are not careful. And you can't sit down on a bench or anything without being harassed by birds!

Cue Jaws music

Walking round the quay, I managed to find an ice cream parlour, so that was pudding sorted. As I was asking for my double chocolate cone, the same locals who had been in the chip shop came in. I just looked at them ice cream in hand, and said "I'm having a healthy day today". I explained (I desperately volunteered the information trying to justify why they had seen me in both of those establishments) that I'd just run 12 miles, and I was doing the Duchy 20 at the weekend. The old man said he did that every week. I told him I'd see him on Sunday then ;)

This run incidentally was the first proper test of my HRM - I have to say I was pleasantly surprised at the HR vs the pace, e.g. I seem to have a much lower HR for a given pace than I used to.

After my gastronomic blow out, I decided to have a little walk around, and came across "The national lobster hatchery" which thought I'd have a look at whilst I was there (thank god they weren't selling lobsters I'd have probably eaten one of those too). Quite interesting learning about all the beasties and how they are looked after. "Goliath" was quite impressive, as were the teeny little baby lobsters. I also love the way they are trying to make lobsters cool - "Adopt a lobster for your wedding guests" etc and surprise gift ideas. Careful opening your mail folks - if I send you a rubber lobster it means I like you :)

Surprise!

Today I ran from the house towards the King Harry ferry and back, it was a question of time. Places in Cornwall seem to be not many miles away, but a long time away. Not that it bothers me I'm in no real hurry, but I wanted to make the most of the planned visit to the Eden project. Another very low HR run.

I wasn't sure what to expect of the Eden project. My degree was in biology, and I definitely had a leaning towards the plant/biochemistry/microbiology side. The only animals I was interested in were insects largely because of their relationship with plants. The place is amazing. It seems so well structured and thought out, and interesting at every turn. They say it is all environmentally friendly and organic and stuff but the insects seem to appear to be genetically modified:

Pass the Jungle Formula

Tomorrow, if I can get out of bed at an ungodly hour for a Saturday, I plan to drive to the nearest park run  which is a long way away. I'm not going to say how far because it is insanity to go that for a 5K, but there you go, I've never claimed to be normal.

Love is in the air and the hills are alive

I didn't make it to the Cheltenham XC, so my continuous XC race streak for this season is broken. Boo.

What on earth would make me miss this I hear you ask? Well, I went to assist with some pedigree dog breeding, which basically involves:

• Getting up hideously early for a Saturday morning meeting my friend and her er.. bitch (innit) at a motorway services
• Lots of caffienated drinks (for us)
• Lots of dog treats (not for us)
• Driving to Huntingdon racecourse through the bucketing sleet and snow to meet up with "the stud" (who had travelled from Norfolk especially)
• Rampant outdoor humping (not for us)

At this point I suppose I should explain that my friend lives in Kendal - Cumbria - and this was a long drive in a day for her, so I rode passenger on my bit of the M6/A14. This was partly for extra company and undoubtedly for my navigational skills (in this modern age rather than the ability to hold a map the right way up it simply means I have a TomTom). I don't have the lifestyle to have pets, but I adore my friend and her dogs, so she and they are one of a small subset of people / four legged friends I would drop everything for. We got to Huntingdon racecourse in plenty of time and another car drew up in the parking area.... *gasp* It was the Stud and his lady owner - he looked just as handsome in real life as his photos. Phwoar!

*swoon* :)

The owner of the stud informed us that he didn't usually like blue bitches such as my friend owns (that's a term for their colour not personality) preferring the orange ladies (e.g. blond - bloody superficial men) so we were a bit worried he wouldn't be up to the job; but like a true man as soon as we got our lovely girl out of the car he went ballistic and started panting so the signs were good. In true ladylike style she sensed this over keen vibe and seemed petrified - I've heard of playing hard to get but this was something else. We walked them along a little bit by the privacy of a particularly cosy looking hedge, and just as they were about to get better acquainted, a random man appeared out of nowhere with a car and launched about 8 Springer Spaniels out of it muttering something about "I'll walk my dogs where I like" - what?! we never said anything!. The most deserted spot in Cambridgeshire and we get the cast of a Disney movie running past in a comedy style-ee.

Things got a bit more relaxed once the stampede had run off over the horizon, and the magic happened (with me feeling like I should be averting my eyes). I've seen plenty of nature documentaries but I didn't quite realise that pet dogs locked together for that long, hence I played the important role of being lookout for "grumpy springer man" whilst my friend and the studs owner held the dogs in position. These dogs (English Setters) are not massively intelligent when it comes to furthering their breed and need a bit of extra help. Hopefully in mid April there will be the pitter patter of lots of tiny puppy feet and I can make everyone vomit with sickeningly cute photos on Facebook and the like.


My start on that Saturday was too early for even a parkrun, so after I got home I ran to the parkrun course near me and back home in a progressive style. I'd been feeling a bit tired all week, but what happened that evening was weird. Got back, had a shower and thought "I'll just have a nap for an hour" at 5pm. Woke up at 9.30pm thinking "Must eat for tomorrows 20 miler". Managed to shovel down some "Breakfast Biscuits" to fill me up and then back to bed and asleep again by 10pm. Up at 8am on the Sunday. So that's about 14.5 hours sleep. It worries me slightly, I think and hope it was just the combination of some decent mileage weeks, some late nights and early starts. I did feel better for the sleep-a-thon though.


Long runs have been going well, it might seem early but for me the more 20 milers in a marathon campaign the better and I am well in to them already. The Sunday after my half day sleep I was raring to go, despite it being chucking it down and a howling gale - I messed up my route planning (probably too busy daydreaming / listening to the radio but in a long distance runner I think sometimes this detachment is a good thing) and ended up clocking 22 miles. C'est la vie, it was at an easy pace and I don't think the extra running did me any harm, I'd have done more harm if I'd walked back to the car or phoned someone (who I would dare to disturb from the Coronation Street Omnibus I don't really know) to be rescued and spent half an hour getting cold.

This weekend just gone, I visited the Newbury Parkrun again, it was lovely to see so many friends. Not racing this week I ran with Jayne, and we went for an easy start, inadvertently doing quite a good progressive run. And the cake. Well, the cake...

£10 model's own to give a sense of scale

I did share it though. It also looked like it was made with wholemeal flour, so with the addition of some dried fruit that constitutes "health food" right? And here's a nice thing, it appears an actual running club has been born out of the ParkRun community at Newbury. Seems like quite a cool thing to have happened.

Landed at my Mum and Dads Saturday after Newbury. They have purchased a tank and some tropical fish. An afternoon of "ooh the fish has swum in to the log" "now he's swum out of the log". Love them :-)

Last Sunday was the Stamford Valentines 30K, one of my favourite races, and in longer distance terms one of the ones that I've done the most times, I think this is the fourth outing here for me. First things first, despite doing parkruns and things, it seems like about a year since I've actually had to do any marathon paced running. Might not be true but it's just how it feels. Stamford is a hilly course, and despite having done some far more tricky routes I felt really nervous about my mission. Why?? I think it was fear of not being able to do it, fear of blowing up, fear of putting the effort in expecting say 9.00mm and getting 10.00mm but I've learnt if you don't try you'll never know. So I promise myself I will always try - always when it comes to running, I try to apply this rule to general life with mixed success.

I lurked at about 10.15 easy pace for the first 6 miles, and felt comfortable. It was an absolutely beautiful day - all of the other times I've run there it has been grey and freezing with patches of snow on the ground, it's amazing how the conditions can change your perception of the same route. It felt good to be alive. So, the six mile mark approached, and ding ding, I started off on the MP effort (my MP is about 9.00mm) and realise I'm doing 8.00mm down a hill. Gasps of shock from the people who I was behind up to this point as I started running past them like a lunatic. I soon calmed it down, but it felt like every time I got in to something approaching a rhythm a large incline would appear and slow me down, or a large downhill where I would end up going faster for the same effort and wonder if that was "too fast".

I caught up Becca just before 8 miles, and said something like  "I feel like I'm finding this too hard", I think it was just nerves and over enthusiasm and I had to accept that on this course mile splits are going to be up and down; once I had got my head around that (and focused on not losing Becca's red and yellow shirt bobbing along in the distance) I felt a lot better. The good thing about starting slow is that if you do put any faster work in then it becomes an overtaking-fest, which I'm sorry to say is good for my state of mind but probably not those I'm overtaking. Sorry everyone.

The other thing I have to to remember is that this was a training run. My MP efforts were all in the right zone so still decent splits according to the amount of uphill/downhill on a given mile. The point of training is that it is a building block and come the marathon day it all comes together - so for the first attempt at MP in a while I think that was a pretty good session. When I got to 15.5 miles I wound down, and then very ironically found it hard to come down off of the marathon pace. I stopped for a few seconds at the 5K from home water station to get my water bottle completely refilled, in relative terms it was quite warm at Stamford and I don't think I needed the thermal top. As I approached the school I couldn't help but speed up a little to make sure I didn't have any embarrassing being overtaken moments at the finish.... 2.57. In itself not a bad time, good when you consider 9 miles of it were run very slowly.

So I grabbed my goodie bag, headed quickly to the car, took my number off etc and ran 0.6 miles back up the course and back home as a warm down. Always, despite not having a number on, some twit will be shouting "you're running the wrong way" *sigh* I warm down along the course to be encouraging to people coming in and all I get is smart-arses. The extra mile or so made it up to 20, job done and I felt fine.

I must admit when I saw the club speed work schedule this week I groaned at the thought of a hill session, but maybe Stamford has acclimatised me or something because on our 9 hill loops last night I felt like I was flying. My general form moving along and overtaking power showed I probably was flying - good news.

Another set? Don't mind if I do. Raargh!

I think I forgot to say in the last blog, I've entered the 100K in Stockholm (early August) I'm quite excited, it looks like it will be a nice course and a nice break either side. I'll be happy to get through it, and having watched the 'team USA' Spartathlon video (made by a chap with very white teeth who runs insane distances and eats just fruit and veg(!)) I think if I managed to go under the qualifying time I would have to give entry some consideration, - it would be one of those amazing and life changing experiences. But all that is a bit too scary to think about at the moment so I won't. My head is firmly in the sand on that one.

National XC on Saturday in Sunderland, looking forward to it, last outing of the XC season and it looks like it's going to be proper cold and miserable, in the words of Mrs Doyle I want a good miserable time!

January....

January....

Ok, so if we're all waving our mileage todgers around chaps, 227 miles in Jan. Mine is probably bigger than yours. Not a target, just doin' what I need to do.

I think anyone did well to run in the snow. Thank goodness for Gore-Tex Innov8s. The Tuesday after "snowmageddon weekend" was lovely underfoot, and that whole week I managed some quite decent med/long runs by choosing mixed road / off road routes with a majority of un-trodden snow and sensible pavements. I know there is 100 miles in between, but the difference between Wolverhampton and Bristol was amazing - drove to work in Bristol on the Wednesday to find NO SNOW to be seen, that didn't stop everyone else from Birmingham phoning in saying they were unable to get the car off the drive *sigh*. I'm either foolish or just hardened to the elements.

By Friday the Wolverhampton "winter wonderland" had turned in to a skating rink, so sensible head on I ran down the road to a small park and ran laps round and round like a hamster on a (snowy) wheel to get my run in. Where there is a will there is a way. That same evening I went to the Burns night celebration at the running / cricket club - I've decided to get out more. The forecast for that Friday was 4" of snow, but I decided to go anyway. Not been to a Burns night before, but it seemed to involve people dressed in full Scottish gear, reading out some poems, piping in the haggis with bagpipes, a nice haggis meal (I'll eat pretty much anything I'm afraid) and after dinner whisky sampling (I hate whisky and was driving anyway). The highlight of the evening had to be the Scottish dancing. It started, and the caller (man who tells everyone what to do) was asking for victims for the first dance; I got persuaded by the lovely Ged to go up and have a go. My thinking was that a) It would get the humiliation over with early  and b) The first dances would be "easy". It was great fun galloping, twirling and spinning around and due to all of our collective dancing incompetencies I haven't laughed so much in a long time. The firework night at the cricket club was excellent too, I shall be going to more of their things I think.

On the Saturday a small contingent of us went to the Midlands are XC at Stafford Common, you may recall a picture from a previous blog where I have a leg with one brown sock on from misjudging "the ditch". We tend to run Stafford common at least twice a season, if unlucky 3 times, I understand why people don't want to do it.. again... but it was a different course! On a dry day I've run 8.20 pace there, however towards the end of last year as the photo showed it was very boggy and slower going. Well 2013 brought a new element: snow! It had dumped a load more on the Friday night (in fact a few miles up the road in Manchester people had been stranded in their cars on the M6). The main roads were clear, and I was so pleased this was still on, as they cancelled the Southerns at the beginning of that week. Stafford Harriers did well in hosting the event. It was odd running in the type of slushy snow they had there, if I didn't know better I would say the insides of my shoes were getting wet and then the water was starting to freeze inside my shoes. We heard a worrying conversation before the start which involved a boy in a junior race losing both shoes, running the rest of the race in his socks and then being carted to the medical tent because his socks had frozen to his feet!

Snow joke

Unfortunately they had cut the course and "the ditch" was left out. Probably just as well I may have lost a leg to frostbite.

So that weekend I got up to an 18 mile Long Run, and this past week has been quite a big one too. Due to it being the club's annual 10 mile race I had to do a bit of chopping and changing of long run day, I got all my work done early on Friday and headed out on the later part of Friday afternoon for the first 20 miler of the campaign. I ran to West park to have a look in preparation for the Saturday ParkRun, and then round to the Aldersley (atheletics) stadium, and found myself overly excited by the fact they have re-surfaced the canal between Aldersley and Tettenhall. *sigh* I guess there are worse things to get excited about. I usally start my long runs with the club and carry on, or do a 20 mile race as an LSR, so I was a bit worried how I would fare doing the whole thing on my own (more mentally than physically) but choosing the route, constantly checking my pace, breaking it down in to chunks and having a Sainsburys on the route to stop for extra water gave me small things to focus on and it went really quickly. 

So long run complete I wanted to go to the first Wolves ParkRun on Saturday. I had thought about enquiring about starting one a while back, but perhaps somewhat selfishly decided it would take more commitment than I had (or more precisely was ABLE to give) so put it to the back of my mind. I was pleased to see it was starting, and now it is here I want to help out / run as much as I can and I am over the moon that it is a perfect WU / WD distance from where I live. My legs were fine after the Friday run, and I didn't have a problem getting out of bed and warming up on a glorious morning, jogging along looking a the blue sky and waving at some of the folks from the club going past me in the car down the Penn road. It was nice to see so many familiar faces there, both from afar and local. My strategy if you can call it that was to forget about having done a 20 not much more than 12h before and run it blind but to give it 5K effort for a long as I could. The Wolves course is relatively flat, good underfoot (a few icy patches) and 3 laps starting and finishing near the bandstand / tea rooms. I felt quite good, and in the 2nd and 3rd laps was picking people off. As I got close to the finish I was wondering what time I had done, I thought maybe 25:30. I looked at my watch and with not that far to go I was on the low 24:xx so I picked it up and the last .15 miles was doing 7.00mm with a strange expression on my face (I think it's called "effort"). I couldn't quite believe I'd clocked 24:49. Cool! I also feel at these events it is important to support the local cafe that has bothered to open so went and had a bit of cake and some diet coke and a nice chat with some of the other runners before heading off 2 miles home. I can see myself going to this more and more.

Get that camera OUT OF MY FACE!! :)

Today was Stourbridge Running Clubs annual 10 mile race the Stourbridge Stagger. This is hard off road race, and it was nice to see the club pull together and make another successful event. I'm a bit tired from an early start - spent between 07.30-09.30 putting stakes in the ground to have them moved 3cm along by Roy :-p, then directing folks in to the car park then recording the numbers at the finish. Respect to all the runners and very proud of the club folk once again.

So in Feb, if I make the Cheltenham XC and the National I will have done EVERY XC race that the club has entered. That would be good going. I've also got some 18/20 mile races in the mix, not that I intend to race them but it makes for different scenery and I can match it up with visiting friends / parents. Looking forward to Feb!

Base building and Marathon Training

Haven't blogged for a while have I?

Manchester is only about 14 weeks away now.

I think I left the last blog having had an unfortunate mild hypothermia incident. I survived, but I make damn sure these days that I put proper clothes on as soon as I've finished running. It was a bit frightening. Still, you live and learn.

So it seems my "thing" this year/season is to compete in and complete every available XC. It has been more by accident than any actual plan, but now I am most of the way there it seems silly not to keep it up. XC Relays, leagues, Championships - I'm in. After Nuneaton we had Leek, the last of the North Staffs League. I'm sure I've blogged about this course, safe to say some things never change and despite it not being a particularly cold day, standing watching the kids races showed them to be struggling up the hill crying as usual, with some actually on their hands and knees. I don't know why more clubs from near us don't go in for this league (!!?) Too far to travel I suppose, but these courses are certainly character building. Was pleasantly surprised to be 5th FV35 overall for the 2012 season (it's a small league!) just pipping my rival by coming in a few places ahead at Leek and leapfrogging her to grab the 5th place by a single point. High drama indeed.

Got invited to a few Christmas "do's" in the run up to Xmas, all of which were lovely and I felt full of festive cheer, but I have to say I particularly enjoyed the work one where we went out for a curry with my team at work. All being home based and dispersed over the country these days I do sometimes miss the good old days where we all used to have desks next to each other in Bournville, and I spent some time at the do talking to people who I had literally not spoken to properly for years and some I'd never really spoken to at all - because I get too shy to march up to them and go "aren't you in my team" etc.... It was a lovely evening, and made me realize I miss the lads (I'm the only girl geek in a team of IT consultants) I think for me working from an office of some sort is still the way forward or I'd go a bit bonkers. My current company are selling our team off to another company. No idea what this means apart from the fact I will be TUPE'd so no change in T&Cs and basically they can't get rid of me for at least 2 years so it may all stay the same just a different name on my pay slip.

Change isn't always a bad thing.

Part of my Xmas visiting included going to Newbury to have a trot round the ParkRun there. It was really nice to catch up with the Gobster and talk running for an hour or so, I shall go back and try and have a better run in Feb - I was a bit disappointed to only clock 25 and a bit minutes on what should be a fast course, but the fact is that sometimes we have an off day and there is no rhyme or reason for it. I used to get terribly hung up about this sort of thing, automatically assuming a slower time than before was some sort of step backwards, but of late I've learned to relax a bit about it. There are lots of reasons and factors that have an impact, and mine was the fact that the Thursday before the Saturday the network cabinet that was "the world" at work had blown up (in a virtual sense) and therefore I'd had some busy days / late nights at work. It took me a while to catch up on sleep. Before Xmas myself and J went to do our final ParkRun of the year at Walsall. We both sat in our respective beds that morning listening to the elements outside willing the other to text and say "sod this the rain is too heavy", but neither of us did and we ended up shivering and cold on the start line. This always seems to happen when she and I turn up to a ParkRun together. I don't know if it was just the fact I wanted it to be over, but I managed quite a solid 24.46 and felt OK in the process. 45 odd seconds quicker than the week before on a supposedly slower course, so it just goes to show what a bit of proper sleep can do and I was pleased to be on the right side of 25 mins before Xmas. On the way back in the car with it hammering down cold rain, we saw a posse of little men at the traffic lights standing in flimsy macs with sandwich boards on advertising some shop or other, yup - my job could be worse, sold out or not.

My job could definitely be worse - I've had to work with a few though.

Then it was Christmas. First Christmas in my parents new house, slightly strange but in a good way. Just over a week there, and plenty of opportunity to do lots of good running, despite the weather being completely and utterly foul most of the time. Boxing day the heavens cleared and the sun came out, as it happened I had been invited to a 4 mile time trial run by Cambridge and Coleridge AC by the delightful Richard, I toddled along from my parents as a warm up and warm down and had a cracking run in the middle - one of those surprises - feeling a bit sluggish from some heavy festive eating and disrupted sleep and then I managed to crank out a run at 7.53 pace avg. Nice and good going for me. Sometimes relaxing and forgetting all about any pressure produces a corker of a run like that. During the festivities whilst my parents were watching Downton Abbey / Strictly I decided that I really ought to make the most of this time where I was literally doing nothing. Yeah it's a time for relaxing and stuff but our family is not that big so no real visiting or anything to do and to cut a long story short I decided to revise for my XenServer 6.0 exam (If you don't know what that is don't worry - its something I've been working with for over a year so I should know it by now especially as we've had loads of problems).

Quote from my workmate M "If things didn't go wrong we wouldn't learn anything".

Painful sometimes, but he's right. The way these exams work is you book and pay for them online, go to a special centre where you sit in front of a PC under school like exam conditions (high security I have to take my WATCH off!) and answer 60 or so multiple choice questions. Took and passed it on New Year's Eve - 98% - I got one question wrong. Pass mark was 64%. Not worth the paper it is written on if I can get that sort of score, but hey its something else for my CV.

Exams do not necessarily = intelligence

2013 came in and kicked off with some XC races, the first being the County Championships at Malvern Common. I ran here 4 years ago when the ground was frozen solid, it was a completely different course. This is one of the things that I love about XC - the same course can be completely different. Quite simply the course at Malvern was under about 2 inches of water. It was an enjoyable sloppy mudfest, and despite the conditions I liked it better this time around despite my thumbs down thumbs up thumbs not quite sure showboating to my clubmates :) . No county selection for me, the closest I get to the action is Marshaling at the Intercounties. It was disappointing to see only 48 runners in the ladies race. Seems very low, give it a few years and I might make the Intercounties by default. Next up was the 3rd Birmingham League race at Sandwell Valley, a course I'd not run before. I'd expected this course to be dull because it is with the D1 men and they are all namby pamby track runners so the D1 mens courses are usually loops of flat football pitches to keep them happy. This was actually quite a good course, despite it being bloody cold and snowing on the way there. Plenty of undulation, plenty of slop but it was runnable, and the downhills were great - for me, just the right incline where my confidence level would let me clatter down the hill at high speed. I adopted a new tactic of not going out quite as hard and staying behind the usual suspects who are around me, and tried to move through the field and have a stronger last part of the race. I felt stronger for the initial holding back. The girls I'd been having overtaking competitions with all the way I managed to lose on the last downhill and keep them at bay to the end. 3 more XCs to go, here's hoping that the powers don't wimp out and cancel the Midlands XC championships on Saturday. I do love Stafford Common - haven't been there for... Aaaaaaages. Well at least a month or so!

I still try - and struggle - to understand why people don't want to do XC. I suppose it's a long day if we have to travel, people have families and commitments, and and it is a completely different (and quite hard) type of running. But zooming down that hill at Sandwell Valley just re-enforced the fact that I'm still in love after these 4 years.

So at the moment in terms of Marathon training I'm keeping the speed in the mix and I'm on about 50-55 mpw. I love this mileage. Snow, bring it on I don't care, I've got a pair of trail shoes it's not a bother to me, in fact it's all good strength wise. I'll just slow down and be more careful, if needs be run to time rather than distance if the conditions are bad. I went to see my friend in the Lakes this weekend, managing to flee the Midlands on Thursday night when the snow hit, up to a Lake district that had some snow on the fields but the roads and paths were basically clear. I had some super runs around hers near Staveley / Kendal / out to Windemere and on Saturday I drove up to the first Carlisle ParkRun - regular readers will know every time I go to Barrow I seem to have a kid pass out / fall over in front of me so with it being approximately the same drive I thought I'd go for a change and a quiet life. Carlisle ParkRun is good, but I've been itching to have a proper blast on the tarmac and my heart sank a little bit when I saw the grass of the park marked out like an XC.

No snow to be seen in the frozen north...

It was about 50% grass 50% path - I gave it a good go, having done a 16 miler the day before I was pleased to do 26 and a bit mins on that course, next time I get to Walsall or even possibly Wolverhampton in a few weeks time watch out I'll be giving it some. Grrrr!

Still not decided which 100K to do. If anyone knows of any in Aug/Sept this year please let me know. At the moment Sweden is winning.

Other than that life is dull. Tell me something interesting.

Over and out.

Cross country tales, cautionary tales and tales from Wales

I'm a poet! :-p

I think the secret to feeling like you are getting better at XC is to just HTFU, get stuck in and do it consistently. It is my aim to run ALL the fixtures this year + the championship races. Go through the pain and the feeling rubbish, and emerge the other side a few fixtures later feeling stronger. The Leamington XC mentioned in the last blog felt like it had taken a bit out of my legs. I don't have very often have leg aches these days but I had a bit of delayed soreness from this one. Not really sure why, having notched up Winsford, the XC relays and Park Hall before it.

So we've had some more XC fixtures, the next up being the fairly uninspiring Stafford Common. It is a course we usually have to run 2, if not 3 times a year, but this was not the reason it gave me nightmares. By the Wednesday before the Saturday we had 2 confirmed runners, needing 4 to finish a team. Quite pathetic for a club of our size really. It wasn't for lack of trying on my part. In fact I think my epitaph should probably be "She really tried". In the end we had a lot of people step up, including 4 runners who had never done XC before, 10 out in total which was great.

In convincing these people, I had explained how Stafford Common was one of the faster, more runnable courses. This is true - the ground is usually quite easy going, and the hills are drags rather than massive undulations. However, I hadn't factored in a fortnight of heavy rain and the fact there are junior races going on all morning, so we got there and found the warm up jog was a bit waterlogged and the course cut up by other peoples spikes. The ladies race started, and then I realised just how waterlogged the whole place was. The first drag up and down was OK  this descended in to mud. Not too bad, but then a few mins later the large sticky bit of mud known as "the ditch" proved why it is so notorious. I picked what I thought was a solid bit of mud, and my right leg sank in up to my knee. I felt my shoe coming off as I pulled up my leg, but thankfully it stayed put on my foot.

I think the ditch was about knee high.....

The climb up the back of the loop was pretty slippery as was the descent back down again, but you just kind of get on with it. I think I am good at just tanking through the mud. If you dither about and get too hung up on it you will lose time, yes pick a sensible path, but once committed  just go through it - it is quicker. It had dawned on my during part of the first and most of the second lap I was ahead of people I'm usually with. I overtook a woman who had pipped me on the line at Park Hall on the 2nd lap, and intended it to stay that way. I'm pleased to say it did.

So I actually got back in time to see the men start, some of the newbies wondered what they were getting in to seeing the state of our legs. It was great to see all the normal suspects, these people are the backbone of the team, but I did enjoy seeing the new folk enjoying themselves, smiling, high fiving and aeroplaning in to the finish. Two of the newbies didn't make it to the end, pulling out with injury but at least they gave it a go in the first place. I went and stood by the ditch on my warm down with a camera, so here is an example of the shoe eater of doom that we had to contend with:

He's not praying.....

So on to Conwy - the tale from Wales

The day after Stafford Common, I went and did the Conwy Half in Wales with my friend S. She has done a lot of Half Marathons this year, and I went with her for this one. I like races in Wales. The scenery, the atmosphere and the fact that mostly they are civilized in their start time. This one commenced at 12.00. She picked me up, we had a lovely drive there on a crisp sunny morning, plenty of time to find a McDonalds (not my cup of tea but they have decent toilets and do hot drinks). We got there in plenty of time, picked up our numbers and other assorted goodies. Conwy seems lovely, and it brought back happy memories of the Welsh Castles Relay as the start and finish was by the castle. We also had time to mosey around the town and do a bit of sightseeing, yes I took loads of photos.

Tourist alert!

It was so warm and sunny at 11.30, I was persuaded to wear short vest sleeves in November which is a first - after a bit of standing around we started off running by the castle to the sounds of Gangam style (if there was ever an incentive to speed up and get a move on this was it). The course goes over the bridge and around the quayside and some paths that have so much sand blown on to them it is almost like running on a beach. You then go in to the town of Llandudno, with its victorian style coloured houses and pier. At about 5 miles, you start to climb, and this is the start of the Great Orme. People had been trying to describe it, it sounded pretty horrible but in reality it wasn't that bad, and I figured before we got there after some of the 4 marathons hills in Donegal nothing could break me; I was right, it was a mere pimple in the scale of hills, that's not to say I would want to be trying to go up it at my actual half marathon pace though. Fear the worst and you will always be pleasantly surprised!! The up climb lasted for about 2.5 miles, and as we got to the top we saw proper mountain goats with massive curly horns - the big alpha male was standing on top of a rock looking down at all of us as the other little goats were all running about on the rocks. We then started the run down the other side which was nice, ending up back near Llandudno and going back in on the part of the course round the quay we had started on. It was a lovely relaxed easy run, and we still managed to beat the man in the panda suit. I have not been able to get this out of my head since, please don't psychoanalyze me!

Because we entered late, there weren't any medals for us, but that's not what its all about is it. We hit the road pretty soon, and about half way home the hunger struck. S has a weird Satnav in her BMW, which meant the only place I could program before we ate our own arms off was some Little Chef in Whitchurch. Praise be to the gods of junk food, it turned out the Little Chef had closed, and was now a proper sit down fish and chip restaurant. OH YEAH!!! It hit the spot, and 2 meals with multiple soft drinks and tea £17. Not bad at all.

Food of champions

The week after this, there was no club XC but a local XC race, the Suicide Six. I live near Baggeridge Country park, so with a rucksack heavy with dry clothes and rocky road on my back, I ran the 2.5 miles to get there as a warm up. Remind me not to put on any weight, it definitely made a difference with an extra stones worth of rubbish on my back. I got there, chucked my stuff in my friends car and got changed. Saw I from the club who was the race official, who told us that with all the rain, the "water feature" (the bit I'd been quite looking forward to) had been taken out of the course due to health and safety (we would have drowned / got swept away). I wasn't racing this one, I saw little point - mainly because there would be about 700 runners = congested course, and with the rain the terrain would be pretty hard going. I was right on both counts. People were falling over from the start. We ran up to the trig point, back down and turned in to what can only be described as a load of clay, que more falling over and shoe loss. There were quite a few points where the course narrowed and everything ground to a halt, and despite my relaxed attitude to this one, I did get slightly frustrated and I should have had the confidence to start a bit further forward. The Suicide Six has a sting in the tail, a set of 100+ steps towards the end. I thought my legs were OK  but after that and seeing my club mates at the top of the stairs all I could manage was a cheery set of expletives before smelling the finish and haring along overtaking people on the last bit. A most enjoyable experience.

So lastly I come to Burbage Common XC - the cautionary tale

We got there later than I would like, and being mens captain I went to get the mens and ladies numbers. Got the ladies, was told the men's numbers would not be available for another 40 mins. It was 1.10pm, we raced at 1.30pm and the men ran at 2.30. I could not physically get the numbers before I ran. I had to get back over to the start, wrote down our list of runners whilst taking my trousers off and putting Vaseline on my feet! ...and instructed the only man that was there to go back and get the numbers in a few mins when they were available.

I had a cracking run, very consistently paced splits over the 4.2 miles of semi-frozen boggy slop. I felt very strong, and again I had been waiting around at the finish for a good 3 mins before seeing ladies from other clubs I used to come in around the same time as. I'm definitely improving my XC pace, which hopefully means when I do a road 5K or similar I will fly.

I was finished by 2.10 and panicked about sorting out the f**king mess of getting the numbers. The men went off on time, thankfully with the things pinned to to their vests and I was left holding a pile of shite and jumpers because we had no club tent. One of the blokes forgot his vest so I had to take mine off for him to wear(!!) So I didn't warm down and was minus a layer.

I was collecting the finish discs, and after our man #6 out of #10 had come in, I started to shake almost uncontrollably, and developed the worlds worst stammer. I literally could not speak. The guys said it was like someone had shot me with a tranquilizer dart I just slowed down. I could feel this happening but couldn't do anything or get people to understand me which scared me so I started to cry which made me look even more of a weirdo. They tried to get me in to the cafe which was shut, no one could find Z who I came with as she was changing little P, they got the keys to her car and by that time I didn't really know what was going on, next thing I was in the car with the heaters full on and people telling me to put all my jumpers on. I decided I'd lost my phone, and even though I sort of knew it was in the glove box, it upset me I didn't have it and I was sobbing like a lunatic. That evening I googled mild hypothermia. Hmm. 20 mins of extreme car heater and being given fruit cake (feels apt given my bizarre mental state at the time) I felt better. I just thought being my frame / build (e.g. too much body fat) the cold wouldn't effect me. Thank god I wasn't driving or on my own. I'm NEVER getting in to that situation again.

Enough said

Need for speed

So what's new?

Not a lot. My overtime claims at work are looking healthy. Too healthy. That's the great thing about everything going wrong on a regular basis, you get to earn loads of money :-/

Since the month of November started, I've been allowed to do speed work again. It's like a lot of things - you take it for granted at the time, and when you're not doing it or not allowed any you realise how much you miss it.

I never used to be a massive fan of running fast - if it sort of happened then great, but it would seem whenever I attempted to run fast on demand, it would all go horribly wrong or I would find some excuse not to even try. When I joined SRC in late 2008 and started doing Marathon training for my first Marathon 2009 I started doing speed work sessions, as originally dreamed up by Joan and Ian.

As a club we don't have anything resembling a track, so we run to various areas of Stourbridge that have an appropriate sized housing estate / loop. Essentially we have 4 winter sessions:

Short Hills
Long Hills
Short Flats
Long Flats

...Which we do in rotation. Depending on the session we might do reps / sets with static recoveries, or more continuous running with a more moving recovery. Either way I do believe they are good for helping the quest in getting faster. After the summer ends, we commence them, starting small and building up to some monster sessions.

Reasons people don't do them from what I can gather:

"It's boring" - I think if you find it boring you are probably doing something wrong. You can think about your form, your breathing, your percieved effort, what lap you are on - there is plenty to concentrate on that means it is not boring.

"I want to get the miles in" - a 2 mile WU, 3.75 miles of effort and a 1.6 mile WD makes for quite a good Wednesday evening run. Do the Maths.

"I'm too slow" - The loops are designed so that no one falls off the back. Yes you are doing your reps for yourself, BUT you are all on the same loop or loops so you are passing or being passed like the wacky races and feel the same sort of safety as running in a group.

Come in Pussycat 5...

"They don't make me faster, just knackered" - That is because you do all your other runs too fast you donut. Also a lot of people turn up for one week, then for whatever reason disappear off again, you need consistency there. You get out what you put in. The first time you do each session loop it will be hard, I wouldn't say it gets easier it depends how you push yourself but experience helps you. I seem to have a knack of using perceived effort to do all of my reps, no looking at the Garmin - and when I get home and upload the stats I find that say, all 9 of my reps were within 3 seconds of each other. Strange how the body can do that.

It gives me the confidence to push push push. At yesterdays XC when I knew the end was in sight I felt like I had a different gear - on the run in from the main course to the finish I managed to pass two people and leave them for dust (mud)

I am I often find it hard to sleep on a Weds night because I'm still on some weird adrenaline high. I both like and dislike that. I do find now I train sensibly I'm champing at the bit to have a crack at a fast race whereas a few years ago I'd be dreading it.

At this time of year I traditionally sit and look at what races I want to do next year. Obviously I have a plan for the big ones, but I sort of mean in the build up to the main events, the 20 milers and the 30ks. I like mixing it up and having some different places to run. I suppose I'm lucky I can afford to do such things. A few things stick out, I want to do the Rhayader 20 / Ashby 20 back to back combo again, Oakley for the Hoodie and Stamford for the Love Hearts.

One of my best friends has recently brought a house in Cornwall, so I am going to do the Duchy 20 (pasty at the end!!) and possibly some other local races at times I'm down there. She can't actually move down to live in the house for a couple of years, so her friends / family are going down there in rotation to make sure it is lived in. So I'm doing a favour and getting some nice running in a different area in. Probably going to have a few days either side of the Duchy, and do some cool stuff:

Eden Project
Eat something fishy that was swimming about in the sea that morning
Learn to Surf - yes in March this may be insanity but I've always wanted to have a go and I'm game if I can get a lesson.

Pan fried please

Looking forward to having a proper relaxing holiday - yest I know there is a 20 miler in the middle but that's just me innit?

It said on the TV this afternoon 6 weeks till Xmas and then the build up starts again. I can't believe how quickly time goes.

Let's all meet up in the year...

...2000. Today I passed 2000 miles for the year and it is still early November. Yay!

Won't it be strange when we're all fully grown

I didn't have a mileage target for this year, it just sort of happened. I ran 1900-ish last year so I suspected there may be more miles this year with the various events I had planned and have now completed in 2012. Although I've been known to run around a car park or up the road and back to make run a nice round figure, I genuinely don't obsess about mileage totals - I love to get out for a daily run. It has become that much of a normal part of daily life it does however seem like a massive gap when not there. One rest day a week does me just fine thank you very much.

I've been thinking this afternoon what is "normal" and yep, 150 mile months for me are now 'ticking over' when I would once consider 100 miles a month a lot. How does someone manage high(er) mileage and why? What are the drivers? I suppose people have lots of different reasons for running. I wondered, and have tried to think of a few based on myself and other runners I have met.

Fitness/medical reasons
Weight loss
Endorphins - thrill!
Social aspects
Insanity
Something else..?

Yes I run to keep fit. I'd rather be healthy, and on the planet for as long as possible to see and experience as many things as I can. I would also say that running keeps me sane, I'm not prone to depression or anything like that, but I think I'd feel a lot less calm in the midst of life's stresses if I didn't run. This is a good part of the reason I run.

Weight loss. Hmmm. Running helped me shed a lot of weight, but most people underestimate the amount of calories they put in, and overestimate the amount of calories they burn on a run, so it has been known for folks to come out of marathon training far chunkier than when they started. I suppose running cancels out a little but of my baking obsession, weight control is a smaller part of the reason I run. More miles = bigger cake allowance.

Endorphins and thrills. There something about slogging your way to somewhere, looking out at the view and thinking "wow, this was DEFINITELY worth it" or getting somewhere thinking "I wonder if anyone has actually been here for years". There is something about battling the elements, it is a very satisfying feeling getting in from the wind and rain to a steaming bath, a hot chocolatey drink and some toast. There is something about realising you are about to run a distance or a time that you never thought possible, and I mean that in a relative way - we all remember when we could barely get to 3 miles, and the feeling at 2.8 miles when you knew you were going to do it. More recently I've been at XC races, bombing it down a hill thinking "I feel absolutely f**king great, things don't get much better" - this lasts for about as long as the downhill and is replaced by the opposite feeling going back up the hill, but it is really nice when that happens and whilst it lasts. It is also a good feeling when you start overtaking the people who you are usually around in XC races, I'm not sure I have a real killer instinct but I think it is a measure of self improvement, and knowing I've improved a bit makes me feel good. I like to see what I can do, which leads to pushing and pushing that little bit further. We live in a great country and most of the public never see the beautiful countryside we have. So these feelings are quite a big part of the reason I run.

Nice.

Social aspects. I started my running with a club and I still run with that club, but I joined SRC to help me get faster, for different training routes and different running opportunities. In reality it means I know and have run with quite a lot of different people, some of whom I'd probably never have talked to otherwise, it's always nice at most races round the midlands I always see someone I know and I've made what I believe will be lifelong friends through running. If you play football or something, it is very unlikely that your pub team would play against Real Madrid, however running is different. Sure you can start and be in the same race field as Haile or Paula, which is great, but actually there are ordinary people out there, friends and club mates who do things that inspire you, and you get to run with them week in week out. The social aspect is definitely a reason I run, I like having a laugh and a chat and putting the world to rights. Friends have got me out when I've felt less enthusiastic about things.

Insanity. Some people are obsessive or addicted, they may or may not realise this. "Running X miles means I will be thin". Nope. "Running X miles or X Marathons means I am better than everyone else". Nope. "I am nothing if I don't run at least 10 marathons a year - everyone else I know is". Nope. "People will respect me if I am fast or run stupidly long distances" Nope. "I want to impress X and he/she will like me if I run more or pretend to like running". Nope. I have met people who fit in to some or all of the above categories and I have a lot more respect for the slower runner that trains sensibly and consistently, gets quicker and runs longer if that is what they want, and who reaches their potential and enjoys the journey than the one that starves themselves, runs squillions of races and has a miserable time for the same perceived results. I may have something gone wrong in my head that means I can doggedly carry on endurance wise when other people would give up, but I am not enough of a mental to be motivated by other peoples opinions of me (although I have been known to use it in tough patches of a race e.g. "think of the people you would let down if you walked now/DNF" type of thing until the bad patch subsides. In reality I'd be letting down ME). Insanity and insecurities do not motivate me to run.

At the end of the day though, on top of some of these things there is just a pure love of it that keeps me wanting to put my trainers on.

Last week we had an XC race at Park Hall near the fragrant City of Stoke. After the last one I felt like I was getting my XC legs back a bit. Got picked up by the Chloe-mobile, all going well until we got stuck on the M6 due to an accident. As we approached the venue and in to the car park we started stripping down to our racing kit, warm up was a 4 minute brisk jog from the car park, lugging bags (and a tea loaf) which gave us a few minutes before the gun went off. Park Hall is quite an undulating course, the conditions underfoot are usually quite firm, but you have to be careful of loose rocks. I actually felt like I was having a good run in the first mile, and this gave me a boost in confidence to push on the 2nd and 3rd. In the end I came in 40 seconds quicker than last time I ran there, doesn't sound like a lot but over a 3.4 mile course that is quite a good improvement I'm told. There were even photos where I actually looked like I was running. Happy days.

Today due to a lack of XC I did a ParkRun, I wanted to do some speed work but I also wanted to give my XC shoes some extra time to dry out before next week. Myself, J and D had arranged to go to Walsall ParkRun on Saturday, having partied the night away at the SRC / Cricket club bonfire "do" on the Friday night (3 diet cokes, a jacket potato, some colored fizzling, some scary explosions dodging bits of rocket landing on our heads and in bed by 10). I forgot to set my alarm, and my body clock woke my up 2 mins before J texted me to say she would be with me in 20 mins. Eeeek! I was running around, getting dressed, no time for breakfast, necked a big glass of diet coke, she turned up and off we went. The weather was foul, it was freezing, breezy and drizzle and thank god we started on time. Not much to more say really, I started off at a decent pace, and managed to hold it all the way round, very consistent splits and 25 seconds quicker than Cambridge ParkRun a couple of weeks ago, so the speed confidence is coming back. I may try the dis-organised roll out of bed approach more often.It was a great celebration of my 2000 miles to have J and D there, and we went for a nice brekkie afterwards. Nom!

One runner, 2000 miles on the clock this year...

Next week Leamington XC, yeah!!! :) Quite a nice leafy course, small hill on each lap and also the first potential water feature of the season. This is a good place to watch the mens race from. There is always a range of crowd emotion:

Man goes for the jump: Yaaaaaaaay!
Man hesitates: Oooooooooooooohhhhhhhhh!
Man falls over, gets wet or loses shoe: Hahahahahahahaha!
Man goes round and avoids the ditch completely: Boooooooooo!

(Where are we in the league?) We're behind you!

Who needs pantomime when you have the Leamington XC :)