Tag: Running

Day 24/30 – On the last minute from start to finish

1 Comment

This morning has to be a new record – an hour and a quarter between alarm going off and me going out. I’m going to blam pre-holiday giddiness for this (rather than downright reluctance to go out). No matter what happens over the next six days, today was my last morning Juneathon run round the village.

Tomorrow we venture south. Potentially, this is when the wheels will fall off my Juneathon bus as the idea of running during six days of my holiday is a bit grim (I forgot about the holiday when I signed up). However, having reached this point, I’m buggered if I’m going to give up now (also Ginge is proving to be a hard taskmaster and will not let me give up now) and the idea of running in new places is quite exciting. The running may also help to offset my camping sweet tooth and bombay mix habit a bit. Incidentally, I peered into the basket of a thin woman in her gym kit while we were just in tesco – it contained skimmed milk, yoghurt and bananas. I had just hurled my bombay mix and a bottle of vimto into the trolley – I suspect that this may be where I’m going wrong with the diet. On the other hand, I looked a lot smilier than she did.

Half the camping stuff is in the car, I need to pack all of my stuff and it’s just been pointed out that a Juneathon fail at this point would be very embarassing….

PS. I did 3 miles this morning.

Day 23/30 – recovery v2.0

Leave a comment

As yesterday, this wasn’t a recovery run in the training regime sense, but neither was it a recovery run in the sitting outside drinking beer all afternoon recovery. Today was a recovery from going to see The Bamboos at Band on the Wall in Manchester. This was very much a night out with the cool kids – lots of Interesting Hair and clothes that you can can only carry off if you’re very young and/or very thin. I am neither, but this didn’t put me off dancing like a loon. I say dancing, it was more of an erratic jig – the heavily pregnant lady at the front (and I mean space hopper up the jumper heavily pregnant) was putting me to shame with her moves. Added to mutton curry and warm chocolate tart, it was a rather awesome night out, especially for a Tuesday, and well worth the achy legs this morning.

I did have the time to go out for a longer run this morning, but was enjoying bed too much so I just did the standard 3 miles. Morning run again tomorrow – the evening will be taken up with doing a big shop for camping and getting the car packed up for our early start on Friday morning. I’m childishly excited!

Day 21/30 – late

Leave a comment

The week has not started well. Despite setting my alarm five minutes earlier than usual, it either didn’t go off or or I slept through it. The upshot was that I woke up at half six and eventually dragged myself out at nearly seven.

Two miles, neither fast nor slow.

This week’s Juneathon
Count: 7 Activities
Distance: 26.02 mi
Time: 04:41:09 h:m:s
Elevation Gain: 956 ft
Avg Speed: 5.6 mph
Calories: 3,251 C

And Juneathon all together…
Count: 21 Activities
Distance: 71.06 mi
Time: 12:54:51 h:m:s
Elevation Gain: 3,392 ft
Avg Speed: 5.5 mph
Calories: 8,893 C

Day 20/30 – abandoned in a layby

Leave a comment

Very odd running day for me today and another one that wouldn’t have been an actual running day if it wasn’t for Juneathon.

Enjoyed a lie in til 8 and then a leisurely breakfast outside in the sunshine while I waited for my mate to surface (an epic Xbox session for himself and Ginge did not make for an early start). After a bit of basking and minimal amount of housework, he appeared, blinking in the daylight, so we spent a lovely few hours carrying on with the basking, drinking tea and talking about running.

The main result of this was an amazing triangular patch of sunburn on my shin.

I finally went out for my run at about 8.30 when I was thrown out of the car on the way home from some maternal plant watering duties. Three miles from home, it was the return leg of one of my regular there and back agains and it felt very strange setting off from there. I decided to have a better go at some fartlek.

The main result of this was an average pace of 9.44min/miles.

Other good things about this:

  1. This is my fastest ever 3 miles
  2. I saw a Reliant Robin pulling a trailer containing 4 mountain bikes – an awesome sight if ever I saw one
  3. One of my fartlek points was a Reduce Speed Now sign (only following orders guv)
  4. I saw 3 bald sheep whose fleeces had been offered on our local freecycle-type thing. I so wanted those fleeces even though I have no skills or facilities to treat or spin them.

Morning run again tomorrow – a lazy two miles.

Day 19/30 – this is not the route I was looking for

1 Comment

Yup. I got lost again.

It was the same as last time, I got inquisitive about a footpath and before you know it, I’m in the middle of a wood trying to follow what are either designated footpaths or paths of desire created by local scallies drinking white cider in the shrubbery. My original plan was to follow the road that I drive along twice a day, every day on my way to and from work. I’ve always spotted people using the footpath which runs high up along the side of the road and always thought that it looked lovely. Today it offered a bit more shade and greenery so I thought, right now’s the time to give it a try. So off I went. Within yards I was over taken by a mad spaniel – his tail whiring round like a propellor, and was getting a different perspective on my daily commute. Then I reached the end of the path. Once again, there was a gate and, faced with the prospect of turning round and looking like an arse in front of the spaniel and his owner, I went through the gate. This is where it all went a bit awry.

The footpath was really obvious for a bit, then went down some steps and a big slope (given how gingerly I went down them, it’s safe to say I’m not cut out for trail running), before disappearing. I spotted a bridge and using my razor sharp logic, figured that if there was a proper bridge, there must be a proper path. So down and up a big ditch, across the bridge and up a big slope. Picnic tables were my next clue that I wasn’t going to come out in someone’s garden or the middle of the golf course and along I went.

It turns out that there’s a big park around the municipal golf course and my route did eventually bring me out where I intended to end up (eventually). I then learned that a 1 mile gradient is much nicer run down than up (part of the route was my hellish birthday run of last year, but backwards).

The outcome of all this was a slow but enjoyable 7 miles, my pace was scuppered by a couple of minutes walking and my wandering round the woods like Hansel and Gretal. At the end of the day, I don’t really care because I mostly felt ok and it was a lovely route to plod.

I’m now avoiding housework.