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I think I preferred Juneathon…

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After a short post-Juneathon break, I’m back from my jollies full of vim and vigour. Also full of sausages, beer and cake. It’s a scientific fact that calories consumed outside contain far less than those consumed on the sofa – it’s the fresh air that does it. Sadly that may not be as evidence-based as I’d like it to be and I’ve returned home feeling like the side of a house, but by heck it was worth it. We’ve noodled in Greenwich, scoffed Nepalese in Hythe, wolfed down Malaysian in London and barbecued at our tent.

It wasn’t just gorgeous food mind you… I was plonked on a bike for the first time in three years (I’m not a natural cyclist, I failed my Cycling Proficiency when I was 10 and there’s been 20 years of trauma since. I was “still wobbly on my bike” since you ask) and did a 25 mile ride. This was on day one of having the bikes and I’m still trying to work out if it was a good idea. I have quite a well upholstered bottom, but there was some definite saddle soreness on the morning after. Part of me thinks that if we’d done a shorter ride on day one, I’d still have had an achey rump and would not have agreed to the longer trip, so it was worth it. I think.

Since our return, I’ve been out a couple of times. Tuesday in the rain with the running group and my pal the running bully, and tonight after work with the running bully again. She’s lost her rhythm a bit at the mo, so it’s my turn to do a bit of motivational bullying at the moment. I don’t mind doing this because I definitely owe her for all the support she gave me when I started, but I appear to have agreed to do a half marathon in October while I wasn’t paying attention. I’ve been assured that doubling my distance and not making an arse of myself is quite realistic in the time available (I’m somewhat doubtful, but I’m using all my saved up Juneathoness to gee me on), I’ve also checked the times from last year and the last person to cross the line took about 4 hours, so hopefully I wouldn’t come last.

As well as the half, I’ve been railroaded into a 5k with other members of my team at work. The strange thing is that I’m more worried about the 5k than the half (It’s the fear of possible embarassment, as they seem to be under the impression that I can run. The fools.).

So it looks like I’ll be doing some slightly more focused training over the next couple of months. It starts with an hour’s run on Saturday and who knows where it will go from there. Any advice/suggestions/tips would be gratefully received as I’m a bit clueless and proper training schedules scare me silly.

Juneathon day 8: Bring on the plus fours…

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Yesterday I thought that I wouldn’t have chance to do anything new and exciting this week, but it turns out that husband (who needs a good, non-twee nickname for me to refer to him as. Oh, no,  apparently he’s happy being husband, the least I can do is upgrade him to being a proper noun) has an idea….

So after a quick forage around tesco, we’re off to the driving range. At first glance this plan seems flawed in so many ways. I have a slightly suspicious view of golf (the same way that other people see Morris dancing or late night text messaging services on Five). I have incredibly rubbish shoulders, no sense of balance and struggle to organise my limbs to do anything more than the most simple of tasks. I’m terrible at not being good at things and get very ratty with Husband when he tries to teach me stuff.

One hour, a basket of balls and a golf stick later… I’ve managed to find and lose my rhythm at whacking them down the grassy bit, narrowly avoided taking off the head of the bloke six booths down from me, chipped several so close that I can nip on and retrieve the ball without being shouted at, realised that golf is a lot harder than it looks and managed to confuse the automatic tee by my attempts at either belting a chunk out of the astroturf or gently wafting the club over the ball.

I hate to say it, but I quite enjoyed myself, though I suspect that my shoulders and back will be grizzly in the morning. They’re still recovering from Wii-fit boxing on Saturday night.

Juneathon’s really made me ponder on several things this week, but I should crack on with my presentation so I’ll have to keep pondering til another post. It’s certainly made me realise that Juneathon is wonderful for procastinating…

Juneathon Day 3 – On a promise…

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This is a bit of a preemptive post because I haven’t done any exercise yet. I’ll be off to yoga in half an hour and I know I’ll go because I like it and never weasel out of it like I do with running.

Bit strange this morning with not getting up for an early run, but crikey it was nice not having to move.

Pre-yoga washing up is calling …

Imparting my wisdom and signing my life away, well June anyway

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The morning runs are definitely the way forward at the moment, especially with the weather being so gorgeous. Thursday morning was swapped for Friday and I set off round the village with all the good intentions of a nice 30 minutes before work. What I learned on that run was that it’s all very well and good to go freestyling with a route, but it’s a daft idea at 6.30 in the morning. It started well, left at the front door, down the road, decide that big hill isn’t on the cards, so let’s turn right. Off I go, tra la la, faced with a crossroads idiot girl here thinks let’s not turn right back to the main road, let’s go straight on. Hmmm. As my watch beeps onto 30 minutes, I realise that I’m still a good mile and a half from home and there’s not really a possibility of a shortcut. So on I plod ending up with a 42 minute run, just shy of 4 miles and 10 minutes late for work.

Today’s effort was totally different. For starters I measured it before I set off… I ran with a mate from work who is running the Race for Life in a couple of weeks. She has a similar story to me, hated running at school, started gymming a while back and then decided to run. This was her chance to fit in a nice outside run (she’s a treadmill bunny at the moment) before  the big day. I have to admit that I was dreading it in case she was better than me – I had visions of me having offered to go out with her and then being left in a trail of her dust. As it was, it was rather lovely. It was really nice to be able to offer advice that people had given me (don’t set off too fast, it’s better to keep running at a steady pace than go belting off and have to stop, use nearer landmarks to break down the distance and keep you going, don’t use ducks as landmarks, those sorts of thing). And without coming over all C-list celebrity opening their old school fete, it was also nice to feel like I was giving something back. When I started out, my other half and my friend the bully slowed down and run-walked with me from doing a couple of minutes up to 3 miles  and now it’s my turn.

So today’s morals are:
1. Don’t invent runs when you’re supposed to be going to work because inevitably you will end up late.

2. Go out running with someone who’s just starting out if you get the chance because you’ll both get something out of it.

3. Don’t let your husband talk you into signing up for Juneathon III because potentially it will end in tears for one or both of you.

2 out of 2! (or, one step at a time…)

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After a slightly stressy day at work and finishing an hour late, I hightailed it 30 miles up the motorway to meet my running buddy (probably running bully would be more accurate cos she got me into this into this lark in the first place). Being organised, we looked up a route on walkjogrun. Being a bit crap round the edges, neither of us could remember where it when, so we set off  and clocked up a mildly grumpy half an hour.

However we did set most of the world to rights during that half hour, so that’s alright them.