Big miles milestone

It is easy to fall back on cliches when I am writing about my adventures in marathon training. Saying that you are on a journey is an oft used phrase these days and by folk embarking on all manner of personal changes or goals. And maybe because we hear it so frequently stated – the meaning of the phrase has become devalued.

But cliches aside, this does feel like a journey for me – it is certainly a road less travelled. My journey so far I might describe as following a winding path encountering small victories and a few setbacks on the way, and then, as happened this week, a sense that progress is being made.

A milestone

In reverse order the biggest milestone was me managing to run further than I have ever done before in one session. 15 miles !! That felt good, even if I did almost spook myself by overthinking it.

I completed the run feeling OK and if I had paid proper attention to Sally’s fuelling instructions I could maybe have managed a mile more – who knows? I planned the run to include the ‘harder to me’ extra 4 miles at the beginning – uphill into a headwind and on my own. I then continued for 4 more downhill with a nice tailwind – then I met my good running buddy Alison who ran with me for the remaining 7.5 miles. She kept me company, motivated and pacing sensibly for the rest of the distance.

Yes, my legs felt heavy from about mile 13 onwards – but I reckon that was a combination of not taking the extra gel and giving myself a fright about how far I was running. There is so much head stuff going on in this marathon malarkey, I have to keep reminding myself that if all else fails I can stop, or walk.

While reaching the longest distance is the most obvious milestone on this marathon path- cautiously I am beginning to believe I am making progress. And even better I this week I enjoyed what I got out of each of my runs. There were just 3 sessions but in each, I felt I had ticked the boxes.

The paced run while not quite ‘a walk in the park’ – is beginning to feel a bit more natural. And the hill session I did on Thursday was hard but exhilarating. After finishing my last rep and running home my legs felt so good I was sure I was speeding along ‘gazelle-like’ ( this is of course what happens when you run on the flat after 10 reps of a long hard hill ).

The week started with 2 rest days – and while this did feel a bit odd, I reckon the rest helped me to get the most out of the other training sessions, and it also meant I was able to fit in some non-running sightseeing to the National Wallace Monument and a visit to the Joan Eardley exhibition at the National Gallery of Modern Art in Edinburgh.

Notes

I am taking part in Stirling Scottish Marathon on May 21st and it will be my first marathon. To get me ready for this challenge I am following a marathon training plan provide by Sally at fitnaturally.

fitnaturally offers a range of healthy eating plans that can help with weight loss and sports nutrition. They provide bespoke training and nutrition for people taking part in sport at any level. I have been following fitnaturally plans for over a year and I have become leaner and fitter, losing more than 20lbs in weight and a reduction in body fat% in a gradual and sustainable way and by eating normal and enjoyable food !

Fundraising

Through my marathon efforts, I am hoping to raise funds for two charities – Scottish Womens’s Aid and Smalls for All both of these charities work to help women in different ways. If you would like to support either of these charities, please consider making a donation, however modest by following the link to my Justgiving page ( Scottish Women’s Aid ) and Mydonate ( Smalls for All ) pages.

Thank you

by marob23
Posted on February 12, 2017February 12, 2017
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Pondering and Procrastination- what’s my motivation ?

Six weeks into a new year, with the weather being pretty dismal, days still short and grey and training getting harder, it is maybe no surprise that I sensed amongst fellow runners a pondering over the question:

“what is my motivation? “

Everyone will have their own answer to this question, but for me the motivation to run has been quite easy up till now.

It is very simple and selfish. I run because I know I know it makes me feel good.

And as I often run with friends, I don’t just feel good due to cranking up the old exercise endorphins, but because I will have laughed and shared conversations that help to put life’s troubles into perspective.

Not to mention getting outside. I was born with a high ‘cabin fever’ sensitivity and feel a bit weird if I don’t get outdoors on a daily basis.

That’s not to say I am sitting in my shiny lycra counting the minutes until I can take to the streets and run – sometimes it is tough to get out particularly at this time of year. Taking the first step can be hard, so procrastinating by checking the weather apps, faffing on Facebook, or folding my socks over getting out the door is pretty normal.

Right now my running is going through a new stage and feels a bit more grown up. Committing to a marathon is a serious undertaking and so I understand the need to train properly – fear if nothing else is a great motivator and I am slowly readjusting to this new way of exercising.

It is a new experience for me to be told what kind of running to do and when, and for how long – and while I know it is for the best it can bring out the tiny rebel in me and it is forcing me to reset my compass around motivation.

But now five weeks into my training, instead of seeing my training plan as a restriction to my inner free spirit – I am trying to embrace my creativity and view training sessions differently. As long as I achieve the desired outcome of each session, I reckon I can put my own twist on how I get there.

This twist might be weaving a run with friends into a prescribed long run – or scheduling my paced run to finish up at a cafe in town for breakfast, or it can be just using the session to find hills close to home that means I can slot a hill sesh into a lunch hour break.

Giving myself this freedom to interpret Sally’s instructions has helped me a lot with my own motivation. Instead of feeling restrained by training – I see it as a template and a challenge to do routes I might never have attempted.

And it is a testament to Sally’s ability to understand how to motivate people that she recognises I need this kind of freedom.

I have also cut myself some slack. Yes a marathon is a big deal and more so if like me you have never done it before. But while putting in the miles is essential, it is equally important to remember to have fun on the way and maybe this is the true secret sauce of success.

And to get some perspective – I am an amateur runner who has set a personal goal that many millions before me have accomplished, and as a fellow runner helpfully pointed out however things pan out come May 21st – I am guaranteed a PB !

Notes

Fundraising

Through my marathon efforts, I am hoping to raise funds for two charities – Scottish Womens’s Aid and Smalls for All both of these charities work to help women in different ways. If you would like to donate to either of these charities, please consider making a donation, however modest by following the link to my Justgiving page ( Scottish Women’s Aid ) and Mydonate ( Smalls for All ) pages.

Thank you

by marob23
Posted on February 5, 2017February 6, 2017
Gallery

pacing and parkrun

In my fourth week of marathon training, my true love gave to me a pacing session and a parkrun in a pear tree …

Like many novice runners, I am not very good at pacing and I have spoken before about how I fear speed. These are not good qualities in a would be marathon finisher, as whilst I am not planning on running very fast for the 26.2 mile distance, I need to understand what pace I am capable of running and be confident I can maintain some consistency. And I think the idea of a race pace session is that by making yourself run at what will be your race pace – it helps to imprint the feeling of running at that speed and gives you an understanding and memory for race day.

Anyhow – what pace I was to do my race pace training sessions has been a bit of a topic of discussion between me and coach Sal, with Sally ~~putting the fear of death in me~~ setting me what seemed like an impossible pace and for an inordinate length of time – e.g. run 75 minutes at 8.55/ 9 min mi pace – and me responding that there is no way I can run that fast for 15 never mind 75 minutes.

So this week – Sally put the ball back in my court and asked me what pace I thought I could manage to run at – well the truth is I don’t really know, but I reckoned probably slower than 8.55min mi !

But it turns out my lovely Garmin has a virtual pacing feature, so if I programme a set pace, as I run it tells me if I am ahead or behind that. I imagine any half serious runners, or lovers of sports watch technology reading this may at this point be saying – did she even read the manual before she bought the thing ? (answer no ).

On Tuesday I decided to try a run with the virtual pacer and in another quirk of kidology – I set it to 9.15 min mi pace, as was pretty sure I could maintain that.

I set off with my little pacing chum- on a rather grey and overcast day. The weather was a bit of an issue because in dim late January Edinburgh light there is not much contrast on the watch screen, so when glancing at the message I had to peer a bit to see if I was AHEAD OF PACE or BEHIND PACE and in scowling at the screen found myself REDUCING PACE. But after a wee while I got the hang of it, and soon did not have to slow down to read the message. I even began to understand how it felt to run at a particular pace – which was the point of the exercise.

And while it is early days, I think I kind of get it – when I think I can’t maintain a pace of say 9 min mi, it is because I am not running consistently at 9 min mi – but am shooting off too fast then of course as I can’t really run for any length of time at 7 min mi or whatever, I drop right back only to shoot off again and this is not really pacing, and more importantly not a very enjoyable or sustainable way to run for any duration. This coming week I am going to try it at 9 min mile and see how I get on.

Flushed with the success of beginning to understand pacing – I did my hill reps the day after and that was OK – although in an ongoing comedy of technology errors I forgot to hit the lap key at the top and the bottom so made it tricky for Sally to see what HR effort I was achieving going uphill.

One day I will master Mr Garmin

parkrun Saturday

parkrun is a free weekly timed 5k race /run held all over the country on a Saturday morning. It is a wonderful thing and has got lots of people enthused about running and is enjoyed by runners at all levels for different reasons. That said I have to admit that although I understand it is a good way to improve your performance and give yourself a regular test – I really don’t enjoy doing parkrun- and it has become one of my running ‘bogeys’, and something I find all sorts of reasons to avoid doing.

But parkrun was on the training plan, and when I mentioned my dread of it to my non-running husband, he asked “how far do you have to run – and I said 5k – to which he replied “that’s nothing to you why are you so bothered about it? ”

What he does not appreciate is how much I hate having to run fast, and when it is only 5k and it is a race – you really do have to run as fast as you can.

Or as Sal had helpfully said:

” run as fast as you can – it will feel horrible but it will soon be over”.

Anyway, I persuaded Alison to join me on a parkrun outing and it turned out to be not as bad as I was dreading. While I did not get a PB, my time was 26.05 and around 8.20 min mi pace, and during the run, I felt my pacing was a bit better ( hard when it is windy ) – so overall not so bad for a slowcoach and maybe a sign of some progress.