Post Christmas

Today's run: 9.24 km / 5.74 miles in 1:10:00.
Injury check: Slight knee twinge on the way around, slight ache this evening.
______

Still at home for Christmas so today I ran with my dad, who is roughly twice my age and can finish a 10k in roughly 50 minutes. Ergo, we did not run at his pace! 

Guess who got new running gear for Christmas?

That said, this was a slow run, even for me. I suspect the on-going festive period over-indulgence was slowing me down...

However, I didn't really stop at all on the way around and the total distance is only a smidgeon under 10k, so I'm still pretty happy with it. 

Next long run: the full 10k? Maybe. Watch this space.

My December

Today's run: 5.68 km / 3.53 miles in 40:35.
Injury check: All clear.
______

Now, I don't want to jinx anything by suggesting that this running malarkey is getting easier... so let's just say that I had a good day today. 

I am back with my family for Christmas so I ran along my old village high street (in the rain), down to the church, back past the cricket ground and up to the bridge - our bit of the Thames is running crazily high and fast at the moment - before turning back towards home. All in 40 mins, and I even had enough left in the tank for a sprint finish. 

I would have taken some picturesque photos for you, but my phone is currently on the blink - and since my phone does everything for me, today I had no running app and no camera (I resorted to my ipod for music, because that's an essential). 

Running somewhere different was nice and I quite enjoyed it all. I could even, possibly see me becoming a bit of a Proper Runner - if it wasn't a marathon at the end of all this training. That day will probably put me off running forever more. 

But for now, things are looking good.

60 minutes

Today's run: 8.59 km / 5.34 miles in 60:00.
Injury check: A few minor tweaks but not enough to stop me.
______

1 hour run: done! And I beat my goal of 8k! And I didn't break myself!

I ran with my friend Robert today, which was brilliant. Running with someone is much better than running alone - it makes it far less monotonous for one thing. And running with someone who has a much faster pace than you is even better. I still took a few, short, walking breaks, but I was able to push myself onwards through some of the wanting-to-stop moments and I walked a lot less than I might have otherwise. I don't know how much he got out of it, because we stayed to my pace which is definitely slow for him, but it helped me so much.

Lovely weather for ducks...

It was pouring with rain when we started (it slackened off a bit later) but it wasn't as cold as it has been this week and I think that helped too. Running in the rain isn't bad either, once you've warmed up a bit. 

The Knee coped pretty well, with only a few twinges and a slight post-run ache. I will ice it shortly, as a preventative measure. 

Basically today was an awesome run :-D

Frost and Ice

Today's run: 2.78 km / 1.73 miles in 20:00.
Injury check: Post-run twinges in The Knee.
______

Today I went for another run at lunchtime. 
There was still frost on the grass. 
I had to dodge patches of ice. 
There's a growing probability that all of my running posts through the next three months will have the 'cold' tag on them.
Sigh.

But anyway - I beat Monday's distance. And today did feel better - I kept a steadier pace and felt less haggard at the end as well. It wasn't quite as cold as Monday, which must have helped.

I felt a minor twinge from The Knee during the run but not enough to stop me (I paused, I re-arranged my knee support, I carried on). However, once I'd been back at my desk a while - sitting with my legs crossed - it did begin to ache. Could be because it was stiffening up a bit post-run, could be because I was sitting with my legs crossed. Could be because my knee hates me...

I am icing it tonight, we'll see if it bounces back to situation normal tomorrow.

Let's Do Lunch

Today's run: 2.67 km / 1.66 miles in 20:00.
Injury check: All clear.
______

It was actually quite warm in the sun today. Pity the wind was doing its best impression of a lively Arctic breeze. 

This was my first attempt at a lunchtime run, which means it was necessarily a short one (I managed the change-run-shower-change routine in exactly an hour), and not a fast one. My office is essentially on a hill - and a steep one at that - so whichever way I run it's going to involve a fair amount of gradient. 
I will not be breaking any records on my lunchtime runs; the best I can aim for is a slow, steady increase in the distance achieved. 

Plan: another lunch run on Weds and then a long run on Fri. 
Yay.

TEAM!

Today was our first Team Em And Me (a.k.a. TEAM!) meet-up. There are 15 of us in the team together but although we all knew Em we don't all know each other, so the TEAM instigators arranged a lunch gathering and even provided homemade cookies. 

Yes, potentially we could all have met up for a run - but there is a vast disparity of abilities across our group, and I'm not sure how successful a mass run would be! Maybe we'll try something along those lines closer to the Real Thing, once we've all got a bit more training under our belts. 

Anyway, we didn't get everyone there but it was good to put a few more faces to names and chat about the various trials and tribulations of long distance running. Several of the team have run marathons before as well, so they had some tips and tricks, and I will definitely be hitting them up for more advice in the future.

Also, it turns out that one of our TEAM members is a bit of a Master Baker - look at this:

Purple laces and everything! (Also, it's a healthy snack, so there's no guilt attached.)

Onwards, TEAM!

__________

P.S. In checking that the links in this post worked I discovered that our TEAM effort so far has raised nearly £4,000. That's one hell of a tribute to Em already - and we're nowhere near done yet. 

Winter Is Here

Today's run: 5.46 km (3.39 miles) in 40:00.
Injury check: All clear.
______

Cold. Really cold. It was sunny this morning, at least. But it was cold. 
I layered up and ran anyway, but I was cursing the cold most of the way round. 

I overheat like a [insert sweaty thing here] so I did warm up eventually, but when that icy wind picked up it was still so cold.

I ran the footpath again, which was actually a bit nicer than before because there weren't any damp leaves underfoot this time. I had to walk some of the way back today though, simply because the cold took so much out of me. 

I got a few stares from the cows in the field I run past, so I said hello to them (because I know that's what Em would have done). I also passed another runner going in the other direction, who looked like he wasn't even breaking a sweat. Hmph. 

Did I mention it was cold?