Tag Archives: marathon

Q: What do Gyms and Puppies Have in Common?

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A: Like puppies, gyms should be for life – not just for Christmas (or, for the purposes of this blog post, January).

Over the Christmas holidays, as I was midway through my second helping of bubble and squeak (whilst simultaneously eyeing up the chocolate log and mince pies) my mother unsubtly dropped into conversation – with a meaningful stare – that her diary for that same day the previous year documented that I had completed an 11 mile run. I lowered my fork momentarily and glared at her over the mound of food between us, feeling thoroughly hard done by – I had, after all, had to pull out of the marathon I’d been training for with nine days to go, after suffering a prolapsed disc, so it was hardly appropriate to make me feel bad about it, especially at Christmas. Honestly.

But, much as I hate to admit it, Mum was right to bring my lack of exercise up. True, I did have a nasty injury that required several months of physiotherapy (although if I’m honest I can only blame myself, seeing as it was the result of overtraining – a concept that right now seems entirely alien), but the physio ended with the summer, and even my physiotherapist told me I was ready to get back to exercising – so why didn’t I? Because I was afraid – of how much I had lost my fitness, and of how much work I would have to do to get even a fraction of it back again.

Fortunately the new year has, for me as well as thousands of others, brought with it fresh resolve. No more the upward creeping of the scales, whilst my blind eye is turned the other way. It’s time to face my fears and get my thigh gap back. It is also, I have decided, the year I manage to prove my abdominal muscles really do exist – no small goal. There shall be no excuses, just regular exercise and a predominantly healthy eating regime. If I can train up to 17 miles for a marathon I can surely claw back some of that enthusiasm now?

So, I’ve joined a gym, which is conveniently located about a minute’s walk from my front door (greatly helping with the ‘no excuses’ side of things). And so far this year (today being the 12th of January) I’ve been a whopping SEVEN times (never mind that two of those times involved the sum total of about 30 minutes of cardiovascular exercise – everyone has to start somewhere, right?) But this post is not intended as a gloat-fest, I actually wanted to discuss something that has been amusing me no end since I joined, and that is ll the New Year Resolution gym goers (I realise I could well be placed into that category given my recent hiatus, but trust me, I know I’m in this for the long haul).

I’d genuinely forgotten how hilarious these people are. The other day, for example, I saw a man on the step machine who, instead of using the machine correctly and stepping as if stepping on air, was just standing on the floor and lifting each step up in turn beneath his feet. Not far away another man was using a weight machine on the lowest possible weight setting (which would barely develop muscles in an ant), and another still (this one VERY overweight after the festive season’s over-indulgence) was cycling at the most leisurely pace possible on the sit-down bike – whilst reading his book.

My favourite new-year-resolutioner of all was the girl who came to the gym in full make up and an outfit that would have been more appropriate in a bar, and proceeded to spend ten minutes pulling the bar of the rowing machine with as much gusto as a weak fart, before getting up and leaving. It really is no wonder these transitional folk don’t last beyond the first couple of months of the year – with such minimal exertion they can’t possibly see any results. Maybe they’d have more luck with a puppy…

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Woe is Me / Fat Arses and Cake

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I’ll admit it: I’m fed up. It’s been three weeks exactly since my last run – you know, the one that put me firmly out of action for the Rome Marathon 12 days later, and also catalysed the depressing spiral of back-related issues which, over the course of the past 21 days, have included – but not been limited to – the following: General/dull lower back pain/stiffness; acute lower back pain; acute pain in right buttock (particularly uncomfortable when sitting down); shooting pain in right shin (particularly uncomfortable when walking); numbness in lower right leg (problematic when attempting to walk due to tripping over of self); tingling in toes of right foot, inability to walk without being in excruciating pain (especially when involving stairs).

For the past five months I’ve been an exercising powerhouse. Now, all of a sudden, it’s a struggle just to walk around the block (and when I say walk I mean hobble at a woeful pace – put it this way, in a sports day full of geriatrics right now I’m pretty sure I’d come last). The worst thing is not knowing what the problem is – well, I have a fairly good idea it’s something disc-related, but have to wait another fortnight for an NHS physio appointment to establish the root cause of the injury, and thus begin the arduous process of trying to fix it. In the meantime I’m floating on a sea of unease, unsure whether to rest, to exercise, to use heat, to use ice, to take this painkiller or that one – or just to drink copious amounts of wine (always the preferable option). And, as is always the case in these situations, everyone’s an expert, so I’ve been inundated with (mostly very helpful) suggestions about what I should and shouldn’t be doing – my concern being that surely every back injury is different, to some extent, so what works for one person might not work for another (in trying someone’s suggested exercises, therefore, might I not be doing myself more harm than good?).

Since my lowest ebb last Friday I have at least managed to keep away from the Tramadol – a last resort in pain relief (though really floaty light) – although the diazepam’s been making reappearances from time to time when the pain wakes me in the night (as it did last night). In my more positive moments I think it’s getting better and chide myself for being a big baby, but in the lower ones when I’m writhing on the floor with pain or unable to climb the stairs without feeling I might pass out I just want to give in and cry. I’ve been signed off work but my conscience won’t allow me not to work from home, so to add to the frustration there have been repeated attempts to access emails remotely and locate files from the server that I’m sure I’ve sent myself in the event of this eventuality but which seem to have deleted themselves spontaneously upon sending.

Put simply, having a bad back sucks. This experience has been exhausting and depressing in the extreme, and has made me feel enormously sympathetic towards all who suffer chronic back pain every day of their lives. I can at least be fairly confident that with time and patience (the latter sadly not being one of my strong points) I will heal, and that one day (soon? Please God, let it be soon) I’ll be back in the gym and training for my next big challenge, whatever that may be – but not everyone has that luxury. So I will close on a positive note: Normal service will resume shortly. In the meantime I’ll be sitting on my increasingly fat arse eating cake.

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What I may look like soon if I can’t start exercising…

Preparing to Log Off….

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This Sunday I will be embarking upon a 26.2 day sponsored social media silence*, as part of my Rome Marathon fundraising effort (for which you can sponsor me here, should you so desire). Those of you who know me will know that the social media element of this challenge is arguably going to be harder for me to endure than the marathon itself. It’s no secret (how could it be?) that I’m rather fond of Facebooking and prone to the occasional tweet and Instagram photo opportunity. Indeed it could reasonably be posited that I’m one of those annoying people who live out their lives in the public domain, as if my life offline would simply not be worth living. Well, I’m about to find out if that’s the case.

Whilst every passing second bringing me closer to the moment I go offline is raising my blood pressure and anxiety levels, I am also intrigued and even a tad excited to see how I fare without the crutch of online interaction upon which I have come to rely. Will I, for example, see a sharp increase in creative thinking and productivity that will lead to my writing my very own Magnum Opus? Or will I (more likely) end up rocking in the corner by the end of day one, repeating 140 character tweets to myself on a loop and driving myself mad because there is NOBODY TO SHARE THEM WITH? One thing I’m sure of is that I’ll quickly feel annoyed by everyone around me who is engrossed in their smartphone, just as when I gave up smoking I found being in the company of smokers intolerable. So that will be fun for my boyfriend, friends and colleagues (and will, quite frankly, serve the bastards right for forcing me to do this in the first place).

To surmise: There may be tears. There may be withdrawal. There may be shattered relationships. But by God will there be some good writing material**

*which means no engagement with Facebook, Twitter, Instagram or this blog (waaaah)

**either that or (most likely) some dangerous new TV series addictions

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A Bridget Jones Post

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Talk about going from yin to yang in one weekend. Whereas Friday saw me leaving my coat and house keys in an unknown location in Clapham at 4am after an impromptu night out with friends, Sunday has seen me complete an 11 mile run (in a very respectable hour and forty eight minutes I’ll have you know – if I run at that speed for the whole marathon I’ll complete it in under my target time of four and a half hours. Though I’ll admit that is a BIG IF), make some headway with planning the marathon fundraiser in February and cook a lasagne. Tomorrow needs to be more productive still if I’m to catch up with myself before going on holiday two weeks today (whoopee!), although annoyingly I now have ‘buy new coat’ and ‘get new set of house keys cut’ as unwelcome additional items on the to do list.

On another note entirely, when I started this blog on the first of January I wasn’t sure I would be able to fulfil the commitment to post something every day. Now, as I sit here writing the post for December 15th I can hardly believe there are only 16 posts left to write before the end of the year. What I’ll do beyond that I haven’t yet decided, but whilst it’s unlikely I’ll continue posting every single day, I’ll definitely continue to keep a regular blog. The ‘Bridget Jones’ posts (as my Dad not-so-affectionately refers to them – and, given this weekend’s antics and posts that description’s not all that wide of the mark…) are always cathartic to write, the fiction posts entirely different and yet arguably more important where the future direction of my writing is concerned. In February I plan to dig out this year’s NaNo novel, dust it off and start the ‘real’ work of editing. Because, I’ve decided: 2014 is going to be my year. And, like Bridget, I won’t let anything or anyone stand in my way.

No Pressure

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It’s day 23 of National Novel Writing Month and, despite a flash stint this afternoon where I somehow managed to write two thousand words in about an hour, I’m still a rather woeful 5,165 words behind target. For some reason, however, I’m not feeling all that worried. I’ve got the best part of tomorrow and all of Monday to put the time in and, as I know from past experience, I work best under pressure so I’m confident I’ll manage to ‘win’ at NaNo once again and make it to 50,000 words before midnight on the 30th. The most encouraging thing is that despite struggling to find the time to get my word count up, I haven’t had a single moment of writer’s block since I started, which must surely be a good sign…?

In other news (yes, this is a boring update post – apologies to anyone who had grander designs in mind for today’s blog), the marathon training is coming on nicely. If – or should that be when – I complete tomorrow’s 105 minute run (gulp) I will have managed to tick off every session on this week’s plan, including a rather savage speed session on the treadmill this morning which I’m glad to have behind me. It’s still a long way off (this is only week three of a twenty week training plan) but my theory is if I put the ground work in now it’ll be a hell of a lot easier come the big day. Though something tells me when it comes to running a marathon there’s nothing ‘easy’ about it…

Friday? Sigh day…

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Oh Friday, how have I hated thee? Let me count the ways…

  1. Arrived in the office feeling slightly worse for wear (a rarity these days given my advancing years and rapidly declining tolerance for hangovers).
  2. Was then faced with a barrage of emails about a VIP visit on Tuesday for which I had to prepare a multitude of documents, press packs and such like – not to mention liaising with the officious folk at the Cabinet Office.
  3. Just as the above task was being addressed, spotted an error in the marketing materials that were on the verge of being printed: Cue panicked phone calls and emails to avoid 2,000 information packs being printed with incorrect information.
  4. Hangover worsened.
  5. Afternoon flooding of inbox with general urgent requests.
  6. Exhaustion set in.
  7. Received text from mother to inform me my marathon ballot application had been unsuccessful and I therefore have no space in next year’s London Marathon. SAD FACE.
  8. Was unable to join colleagues for post-work birthday/leaving drink celebrations due to necessity of finishing above tasks.

Fortunately, at 6.24pm, I have now finished all my work and am ready to head over to see two of my gorgeous girlie friends for an evening of food and loveliness. And wine. After the day I’ve had, there must definitely be wine…

The lapsed athlete

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Just when you think the Great British Summer is drawing to an end it pulls out all the stops for one last week to show you exactly what you’ll be missing for the next nine months. It’s somewhat appropriate, then, that I should today be attending a friend’s tropical-themed birthday party to make the most of this final hoorah. Without wanting to be selfish, however, I must admit I’d rather like the temperature to be a fraction on the cooler side for next Sunday’s half marathon. The closer the event has got the more my training seems to have tailed off, so I need all the help I can get to avoid keeling over half way through.

I was reminiscing yesterday (over my second pint of cider) about how seriously I took training for my first sprint distance triathlon in 2009. So terrified was I of being unable to complete the race that I went cold turkey for a month beforehand, giving up booze and fags (these were in the days of my being a dirty smoker) completely. With the second sprint I was a little more relaxed with my regime, though when the Olympic distance triathlon came around I really knuckled down with the training to avoid full scale cardiac arrest half way around the course.

My first long distance run was the Whole Foods Market run in Kingston in March this year. At sixteen miles it was a serious challenge for someone who had previously never run further than ten kilometres. I trained hard and, fortunately, it paid off, as I don’t think I would have managed to get around the course in the freak weather conditions (zero degrees and snowing at the end of March? Really?) had I not been at the peak of my physical fitness.

This time around, however, I seem to have adopted a rather more laissez faire attitude. I’ve put the time in and roughly followed the same schedule as for the March run, but if circumstances (read: social commitments / pub) have made it difficult to fulfil every running obligation then I (literally) haven’t sweated over it. The only big run I’ve missed to date is the nine miler I was planning for today (see previous comment about ciders in the pub to understand why that hasn’t happened), but there’s always tomorrow, right? Or maybe the day after…?

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