So it’s been a long time since I’ve posted and updated where I’m at with my running.
My last couple posts were about the Asics 26.2 competition to win training for the Paris marathon, sadly I didn’t get through to the next stage 😦 I kind of felt straight after my session on the track that because I had messed up my timings I wouldn’t be getting through. I can’t be sure that was the reason but I didn’t feel that confident about it all so it was a huge surprise when I got the call telling me I was unsuccessful in going forward. Since then I have been following the lucky 5 runners on Twitter and checking their Runners World forum posts about their training, sounds like they are having some really great training advice and help from the pros! I’ve not decided to run another marathon yet so not feeling as jealous as I might have been if I had 16+ weeks of marathon training to do! I’m quite glad I’m not marathon training, it’s nice not to have so much pressure to get in lots of miles and to spend all my mornings and weekends over winter battling the elements. Saying that, I am however half marathon training so I am spending some of my weekends out running but it’s nice to be a bit more relaxed about when I fit in my long runs and not worrying about missing a run.
My first race of 2015 is next weekend when I take part in my first officially trail race – the Brighton Longman! There’s varying distances you can run for this and I opted for the 10 mile distance. A good distance to run before the Brighton half marathon on Feb 22nd. I’ve also got a couple other half marathon races planned over the spring and will hopefully be posting more about my training and recaps for these.
I guess a reason I haven’t posted so much recently is because my head has been a little bit all over the place in regards to my health and fitness. Since my marathon back in October I’ve been out of routine. I moved house the weekend after the marathon and moved to a town 5 miles away. It meant that I had a busy few weeks packing and unpacking trying to find my feet in the new place. I also had to find a new routine and running routes. It took a while to do but after quite a few little running adventures I’ve found some really good routes and an awesome trail to run. In the mornings I’ve found it really hard to get up and run, and the area I live in involves me running in much quiet place and to have to think about my route in the morning. I live on the beach and a loop of it is only about 3 miles so I have to run back on my self to do between 5-6 miles which I don’t really enjoy too much so I’m having to find ways to make it a bit more fun. I’m sure when it’s lighter in the mornings so I can run along less residential roads and feel safer.
I also quit my old gym and started at the gym in the lower floors of my building. I’m really liking it here as they do some awesome classes. I regularly go to Bodypump and spin before work, sometimes fitting in a circuit class. I’ve also started trying the less cardio based classes such as yoga and Pilates, I’ve only done a couple of these so far but I think the yoga ones will really help with my running as I’m really noticing having tight hamstrings.
I’ve always cycled to work but instead of 2 miles each way I’m now cycling 7, so 14 miles a day in total. I’ve upgraded my bike to a nice Norco Threshold cyclocross one. It’s making the commute a lot easier and slightly quicker. I’m still getting used to it, having drop handle bars and clip in pedals take a bit of used to! It was the most scared I’ve ever been cycling home for the first time, I really felt vulnerable on my bike as if I feel, I couldn’t just put my foot down to help, I’d fall straight to the floor. I’ve actually fallen a couple times but thankfully nothing serious and not been in any danger but I’m getting more confident on my bike now. I’ve signed up to do the London to Brighton bike ride again this year and there is discussions at work about cycling from Brighton to Paris so that will be exciting if it happens!
The other thing that has hindered my health and fitness level is my relationship with food and issues with my weight. I’ve really struggled over the past 7/8 months with it and over the last few months put on quite a lot of the weight I’ve lost. It’s quite heartbreaking to know I’m back where I started yet I’ve got more issues with food this time around. A lot of stuff I haven’t really spoken to anyone about apart from mentioning a few small things to some friends. I will have to right a separate blog post about it as it there’s a lot to explain, well, try to explain but I am trying really hard to resolve some of the issues in my head about it all. Hopefully I can get back on track and finally get to my goal weight and fitness level.
Anyway, I’ve got a long run planned tomorrow so I shall try to blog about it and start to get back in to posting regularly again. I will also try to build up to write the blog post about my issues with food and how it’s affected my weight, it should at least help me and if there are other people going through the same things maybe it will help them too, or prevent others from having to go through the same issues
I’d like to end on a positive note so I’ll just let you know that I’m going to be researching running watches tonight and hopefully purchase one, something that I’ve been wanting to do for a long time, quite exciting!
Run LJ, Run! 