Britain - AnnaTheApple

October 14, 2013October 14, 2013

Delicious treats in Brighton

Hey hey hey. Welcome back Monday, what a joy you are…

This weekend has been exhausting to say the least. I am shattered. But it was great!

Saturday Ben and me had to sadly miss Parkrun as we were heading to Brighton around 9ish. We both got up early to head out for a run though. Ben ran with his friend and I ran solo listening to a podcast. I love running on my own as long as I have something to listen to. The white noise in my head is not very entertaining.

I’d planned a tempo run so aimed to do at least three of the middle miles speedy (somewhere around 7.20-7.30mins/mile). I set off at a nice warm-up pace and then found the speed came quite easily and I just tried to hold on to it for the entire run.

Then lots of foam rolling and stretching before racing around to get ready. This might have involved eating a bowl of porridge (oatmeal) in the car as we set off!

Brighton is beautiful. After catching up over coffee, my friends and me set out for a lovely long walk along the Brighton promenade to the famous Palace (Brighton) Pier.

I didn’t actually get a good photo of the pier but I did get lots of photo of tasty snacks we had (pier or snacks…hmm I know what I’d choose!!).

I got some extortionately priced frozen yogurt with fruit salad in it. Heavenly. But bloody freezing!!! My friends chose chips (fries to you Americans out there ) but my heart was set on fro-yo and I had seen something else that I instantly knew I wanted.

CHURROS!! It was a serious mental battle though because I also wanted a toffee apple but I knew I’d feel incredibly sick if I got both #firstworldproblems

So Ben and me shared a bag of FOUR churros. Two each and I could have gone back for more. We also got melted chocolate to dip them in. That, my friends, is heaven right there.

We larked about a bit and enjoyed the arcade, a few of my friends tried the bucking bronco (hilarious) and, dodging the seagulls, we headed into town with one important mission. Find the Choccywoccydoodah shop. This is possibly the best chocolate shop ever. They make chocolate everything. The level of carving and sculpting skills is phenomenal. They even have a TV programme about this shop. So I was excited to say the least.

We first found the Choccywoccydoodah cafe where they sell chocolate-related drinks, coffees and cakes.

I all but threw myself at the cakes. Ben went for a hot chocolate (made with melted chocolate) and (still feeling a little full from churros and fro-yo) I decided to buy two slices of cake ~~to gobble up immediately~~ for Sunday after our half marathon.

The pieces the lady cut I can only describe as monsters. They were HUGE. She advised that we microwave them, add a dollop of ice cream, put our jogging bottoms on, close the curtains and enjoy That’s my kind of advice!

Ben very much enjoyed his hot chocolate. I enjoyed stealing a (full-sized!) marshmallow or two off him

We found the actual shop close by. They had all their Halloween displays out. They always have a theme. This year it was pet cemetery. So there were lots of carved chocolate animals about!

Once inside the shop you just didn’t know where to look. So many decadent delights. Skulls carved from white chocolate. Chocolate tombstones. Chocolate cakes. Rocky road slabs.

Amazingly I didn’t buy a thing. Maybe this was because I had two very weighty slices of cake with me

We enjoyed a late lunch at a lovely little pub near to my friend’s flat. I had the chicken Caesar salad.

It was amazing. Good amount of parmesan and anchovies. Crunchy croutons. Spot on.

Then it was time to say goodbye to Brighton and head home for an early night before the Solent Half Marathon the next day…

I’ll leave you with this photo. Sunday’s post-race dinner.

Sicilian lemon cake and chocolate icing, with strawberry sauce and melted chocolate all over it (because why not!!). I don’t even need to tell you how good this was.

What did you get up to this weekend?

Have you ever been to Brighton? What are your highlights? I wish we could have seen more but we were only there for the day and it was more important to catch up with my friends.

Have you heard of Choccywoccydoodah? It’s amazing. That is all.

October 11, 2013October 11, 2013

Time For Marathon Training

How quickly a holiday fades from your memory and real life takes over…I am fully back into the swing of life. And jeeze how cold does it suddenly feel UK people? My tan is being replaced by goose bumps.

I’m going to save my second part of my Mexico recap till next week if you don’t mind (check out my recap HERE and the amazing food I enjoyed HERE). I thought instead I’d catch you up with what I’ve been up to post-holiday.

So it is approximately 11 weeks until Marathon Time. I am doing the Portsmouth Coastal marathon on December 22nd. I am getting my head and training into gear. I’ll share my plan with you guys once I’ve perfected it. I’m basing it on several different plans and moulding into what I think will work well for me.

It’s all trial and error really as I’m a marathon newbie. But I know what works well with half marathon training and hey they’re similar right? Can’t be that much different, right…? Ha. No seriously, I know myself and when I like to run, the types of runs that work well and also what races I have planned. I don’t like to rigidly stick to a generic plan. It would never work for me. I’m also fully preparing myself to change it as I go. Flexibility is key here I think!

I’ll go into more detail later, but it’s going to be a pretty standard plan!

In a nutshell: running 4-5 times a week, the long runs going no higher than 20 miles, I’ll be balancing things with spinning and will also always stretch and foam roll after running.

Last weekend I went to my first Parkrun (weekly local 5k timed run) since getting back. Wowza it was tough. Having done no speed work over my holiday I found it quite tough. I decided to run the 4 miles there at a casual pace (7.45mins/mile) as a warm-up. I know from experience that my body needs to have that warm-up before attempting any serious speed work or racing. Then when I get there I do a lot of dynamic stretches (see THIS video for some of the stuff I try to incorporate – not all of it as otherwise I look like a berk at home I do a lot of these though).

The Parkrun itself went well. I told myself just to go with however I felt when I started running. It was quite reassuring to look at my watch and see my pace considering the whole time in Mexico was like running through treacle. Mentally I needed that reassurance that I hadn’t fully lost it.

Though I will say that we were on the flat course (there’s a choice of two courses – one with a hill you do three times and then this one). So I know after a few more weeks back into normal running I could be faster on this course as this was only a few seconds from my PB from the hilly course. Well, fingers crossed anyway!

On a non-running related note, Saturday afternoon we watched Wreck-It Ralf. Watch immediately, it is hilarious.

As Ben is a keen gamer and I used to be, this really went down well with us. But I’d say it could appeal to the masses easily.

Sunday I decided to get stuck in and do my furthest mileage yet: 14 miles. I stuck a podcast in my ears and just went out at a nice and easy pace. I tried to make sure I stuck to around 8.30mins/mile as this is roughly where my longer runs should be sitting.

It was tough but not overly tough. In my head I said if at 11-12miles if I wasn’t feeling it or felt too tired I’d cut it short. But at 12 miles I was feeling very good and decided to go for it. Luckily I have a route where you can tag on extra miles or cut things short.

The rest of the day involves not much else! HOLD THE BOAT. I forgot to tell you. I am OBSESSED with the Great British Bake Off. For those who don’t live in Britain or, like me a few weeks ago, lived blissfully unaware of this TV programme, let me explain.

It’s a competition where 13 (very talented) contestants have a to bake an array of different cakes and show different baking skills (seriously tricky baking skills – when I say tricky I mean not tricky for me which is generally weighing ingredients out and mixing them). I’m not even doing it justice. It’s just so good. And also just emphasises how truly appalling my baking is!

Though I did attempt some baking the other day to take into work. Double chocolate chip and oat and raisins (I didn’t make a note of the recipes, I think I just googled them! Nothing hugely crazy or spectacular about them).

But they came out OK and that is a thumbs up in my eyes. And they were gone by the end of the day. Happy days.

This weekend I’m randomly running a half marathon. Ben and me signed up last minute as it’s a league race with our club and we thought “what the hell”. Though I will not be racing it, I will use it as a long run.

And I have some very exciting running-related news that I’ll share with you soon! I literally am so excited. It’s sad how excited I am but it’s true.

Have a great weekend everyone!

What are your plans this weekend?

The Great British Bake Off – do you watch it? What other food-related programmes do you indulge in? The Food Network is like my mecca.

Have you run a marathon? Do you have any wise tips and tricks to share?

What good films have you seen lately?

September 18, 2013October 28, 2016

Bristol Half Marathon (1:36:10)

Happy Wednesday! It’s very chilly here down the South of the UK. I imagine it’s a lot colder up north as well. Brrr.

So Sunday Ben and me ran the Bristol Half Marathon (which has been going for twenty-five years – wow). Like I said in my last post, we stayed with friends so we wouldn’t have to get up at ridiculous O’clock and drive an hour and a half to get there. And, more importantly, we got to see our friends which was lovely.

We got up at 6.30am, had breakfast and then drove to the park and ride. We got the bus into the race village and it was perfectly un-stressful.

The race village was set in the heart of this lovely area with lots of cafés and restaurants and cool water things.

The only annoying thing was that Ben was starting in a wave 30 minutes after me (10am) so he had a bit more hanging around to do than I did.

Bit of fun photo taking with the massive reflective sphere

We said our goodbyes and I headed to my wave 15 minutes before the start.

It was cold. I wore my capris rather than shorts but I was still only wearing a vest. I looked longingly at the bin bags some people has ingeniously thought to bring. The elites and white wave went off first and then we followed soon after.

Mile one (7.28): Always feels fine. The tide of people just keeps you sailing along. I was going a bit faster than I’d planned but I didn’t worry too much as it was by 10-15 seconds. However, I suddenly needed to pee.

Mile two (7.25): We were able to see Clifton Suspension Bridge in the distance, which we were heading under.

I had my phone in my arm band for music and just had to take a photo so this required a bit of jiggling about while running which is never easy. But I’m glad I got the photo! Annoyingly a few metres on was a much better photo in terms of scenery. Ah well.

Mile three (7.20): The feeling of needing to pee was still there. I had peed before the race so I tried to convince myself I didn’t need to go. I saw men dash off to the sides of the race to pee and looked at them enviously.

At this point I knew I couldn’t not go to the loo. The deciding factor was that I couldn’t think about needing to pee for next 10 miles. So I made a game plan. I could see way ahead a portable loo so I sprinted like a stupid person, peed in record breaking time and got back out there and sprinted a little to gain back time. I ended up back next to the same person I was running next to before. Hurrah. Anna 1 bladder 0.

Mile four (7.24): This was a turnaround point so we headed back along the same road but from the other side. I didn’t actually mind this as the scenery was nice and the road was so flat. It also meant I could amuse myself by looking at the runners on the other side. I was desperately scanning the crowds to see if I could find Ben.

Miles five (7.21) to six (7.25): I was now consistently running 10 seconds faster than I hoped and was feeling really good. It didn’t feel like too much of an effort so I held that pace. Around this point I was still scanning for Ben when I saw Mary on the other side. It was so quick but it was nice to see another blogger (she did 90 minutes of running before the half as preparation for her upcoming ultra <- epic).

Then just before going under the bridge again I saw Ben. He looked so happy and strong it really made me smile. I was just so chuffed! We shouted to each other and carried on.

When we went under a tunnel I found myself near the 1:40 pacers which panicked me a bit as I was aiming for a bit below that. As we went through the tunnel one of the pacers shouted “Oggie oggie oggie!” and everyone responded “Oi! oi! oi!”. It was brilliant.

Miles 8 (7.34) to 9 (7.20): Still feeling happy and enjoying it. I had picked up a gel from one of the stations a few miles ago (hello, freebie!) and it was nice to hold on to in a weird way. I picked up another one as we passed the next station as well. I thought to myself “I definitely want to take one of these home. But the other one will be if I feel I need it”. It was nice to have that safety net. It was also chilled which was a lovely touch from the marshals.

Mile 10 (7.10) to 11 (7.12): I took one of the gels as I wanted to increase my speed further and whether psychologically or physically, I needed to have that gel. It was a tasty one and a nice thin consistency – a High5 gel. I recommend!

Miles 12 (7.14) to 13 (6.56): I don’t remember mile 12 but mile 13 is where I picked it up as much as I could. This was the only part of the race I didn’t enjoy.

Last stretch I put my all in

It was painful and it felt like 5k effort.

My official time was 1:36:10. This is a five minute PB for me! I am SO pleased. And I loved the whole race (bar the last mile). It just felt comfortable and I felt in the zone.

As soon as I finished and picked up my goodie bag and medal. People were thrusting leaflets into my hands and then a lady told me there were free physio massages. I went straight there and got in the queue. Hell yes.

The physio said my hips were unbelievably tight and that no wonder I’d been having IT band issues and groin pain. Whoops. She gave me some great advice though while torturing the hell out of my lower back and upper bum (technical term).

Then I got our bag from the bagging area and a cup of tea and did some stretching while I waiting for Ben. When I saw him he had a big grin on his face. He’d smashed his ‘conservative’ target of 2:10 and pipped his ‘dream’ target of 1:57 and got 1:56:21. Nice work!

Then we headed back to the bus and car and did a quick ‘let’s get naked in the middle of car park in the freezing cold’ to get out of our sweaty stuff and into our spare clothes. We have all the fun.

We started our drive back with the intention of finding a restaurant mid-way home and found a lovely pub called the Bird in Hand.

I chose the Caesar salad and granary baguette with a side order of fresh veg. I just really fancied it.

That Caesar salad…oh it was HEAVENLY.

I inhaled it I was so hungry. Perfect post-race food.

I thoroughly enjoyed the Bristol Half Marathon. It’s probably my second favourite race. Cheddar Gorge half is still my top as it was such an adventure. But Bristol was brilliant as it was so flat, the crowds were great, I felt in the zone and Ben enjoyed it too.

From this experience I just know that half marathons are my favourite distance (so far). During a 5k and a 10k I am holding on and pushing the entire time. This didn’t feel painful. It felt refreshing and I loved it.

What’s your favourite race distance?

What’s the last race or next race you’re doing? Mine is the Great South Run in October.

Do you plan your pacing before the race? In my mind I wanted to run 7.30min/miles with a push at the end.

September 2, 2013

Weekly workout and weekend catch-up

Hello September! I think September is my favourite month. It’s the month where I feel everything is starting again. Does that sound weird? When I was at school, college and university the new year would begin in September. It was the month Ben and me got married (it’s almost our one year anniversary!) And it’s the month where you can see summer disappearing and the colder weather creeping it.

Don’t get me wrong, dark mornings and dark evenings can be so depressing. As can cold blustery winds and relentless rain…but there’s something so lovely about curling up in bed hearing the wind outside and being snug and warm inside. And runs that aren’t stupidly hot!

This weekend has been great. A nice quiet one, while also having dinner with friends and seeing my mum for a coffee and slice of cake. Unfortunately Ben has come down with a cold. SORRY – man flu. So I’ve been making him lots of hot lemon with honey drinks and giving him some TLC.

And I finally went for a run! Hurrah! This whole week has all been about avoiding running and mending myself. This is what my workouts this week have looked like:

Monday: LBT (due to spinning fail) and circuits

Tuesday: Spinning

Wednesday: Spinning

Thursday: Pump

Friday: Spinning

Saturday: 4 mile easy run

Sunday: 11 mile long easy run

Yeah I sort of went spinning crazy. I really enjoyed it. OK it wasn’t the same as running but it was still good to get that “oof that was tough” buzz afterwards and sense of accomplishment. Don’t get me wrong, I will always choose running over spinning though.

One thing that annoyed me about spinning was one of the instructors kept talking about weight-loss and fat-loss – “burning those calories”. That is not why I go to spin. I go to spin to help compliment and improve my running without actually running. Spinning is a tough workout and really works my legs and works muscles that I don’t use when I run so I become stronger overall.

It just annoys me when people can be so narrow-minded. The gym is not all about losing weight! I get a lot of judgements from people as well when I tell them I go to the gym. Comments like “you don’t need to go to the gym!”. It just irks me that that’s all people think I’m doing.

Moan over. So as you can see I did go running eventually. I decided not to do Parkrun because I couldn’t guarantee I wouldn’t go into ‘race mode’ and do something stupid and reignite my groin problem (hmm, maybe I should call it something different? That sounds weird haha). Instead I ran the 4 nice and easy miles to Parkrun (while Ben drove) and then marshalled. I love marshalling because it’s great to cheer people on and a few people afterwards said it really helped

Later Alfie and me had such a lovely long walk while I listened to an old MarathonTalk podcast (interview with Nell McAndrew one running a stupidly fast marathon – she is amazing and sounds lovely).

Then we had dinner at my friends house which was great. Felt like proper grown ups having a dinner party!

Then Sunday I tentatively went out for my long run. I was so worried it wouldn’t happen. That I’d aggravated things the day before…but it went fine! My groin didn’t hurt but it didn’t feel completely sorted, still an annoying niggle, so I kept things nice and easy.

I don’t think I’ve ever run at such a consistent pace! It didn’t hurt and it felt amazing to get out for a long run. It just cleared my mind wonderfully of any stress.

This week I’m still going to take it easy on the running front. Probably keep going to spin but see how I feel for the Thursday running club session and then maybe Parkrun Saturday.

It’s two weeks until my next half marathon (Bristol)!! So I’m glad things are getting back on plan…finger’s crossed!!

How was your weekend? What did you get up to?

What’s your next race or big event your planning for?

What’s your favourite time of year and why?

August 26, 2013August 26, 2013

Reality TV stars at their finest

Oh I do love having a Monday off! This weekend England (not Scotland unfortunately – boo!) had a Bank holiday. This, for non-UK readers, is basically just a public holiday on the Monday. Though I’m not sure why it’s called a ‘bank holiday’ (though I know the banks are closed). Yesterday we got back from Essex seeing Ben’s dad yesterday and so today (Monday) we’ve just been chilling and catching up with the housework. So here’s my weekend catch-up.

Friday I got up early and went to spin which was good but as always hard. I was chuffed for getting myself there for the early class and then having enough time when I got back to pack and get myself together without stressing. Then we drove to Essex…and obviously this involved lovely bank holiday weekend traffic. *sighs*

Though it was perfect timing to paint my toe nails! I was very appreciative of Ben’s smooth driving.

After having a nice evening on the Friday, we got up early and headed down to the Chelmsford Parkrun for a bit of Parkrun tourism! It was so great doing a different Parkrun. I had no idea about the course (though it’s always 5k).

It was located in a lovely park with a pond. The weather was a bit drizzly but a nice cool temperature.

The run went well. I felt speedy and strong and was grateful for a lovely flat course (there was a very small steep hill but nothing scary or hard).

My father-in-law cheered us on and took some photos and it was good fun. Though the girls were very speedy! There were at least three so far ahead of me that I had no chance to catch them.

But I was very chuffed with my time – about 10 seconds better than my Parkrun PB! But the course definitely helped I would say as my usual route has an annoying hill we have to do three times. I came 5th female which I was very pleased with considering all four females in front of me did it in sub-20s and sub-19s. Yikes!

Unfortunately – God I don’t even want to type this it’s so annoying and repetitive – I’ve twinged my groin. YES I KNOW. Another flipping running-related injury. Jeeeeeeze. But I’m not making a big thing about it. It’s fine. I’m just having a nice week break from running (well, I’ll see how it goes ). I’ve got my spinning and pump so it’s all fine. I’m not panicking as it feels like just a small twinge that just needs a little rest.

Moving on! For the rest of the day we did something hugely embarrassing that I can’t believe I’m admitting. We did the TOWIE tour. Now I will forgive you if you didn’t know TOWIE stood for The Only Way is Essex. And I will also forgive you for not knowing that that is a ridiculous reality TV show set in Essex… coining those elegant phrases such as “I’m well jel” (translation: “I’m very jealous”).

Well, we did the tour. As in we walked around Brentwood and went into all of the main cast’s shops (as they all now own their own shops for some strange reason). And lo and behold! They were actually in their shops. Now we are talking proper Z-list celebrities here, people. I know. Calm yourselves.

All good fun. I will say that the majority of them were really lovely and didn’t mind me cheekily asking them for a photo. Apart from one. I think the phrase she used was “this ain’t a museum – have a look at the merchandise if you want a photo”. To which I promptly apologised and left the shop. I’m sorry I’m not paying £10 for a notebook to justify having a photo taken with her. I think she realised I was a bit affronted and called me back. It was all very awkward and I just wanted to get away as quickly as I could.

Not to labour the point too much but I do think reality TV stars shouldn’t be too high and mighty about fans wanting photos taken with them…after all, without us they wouldn’t be where they are. It’s not like they have ‘real’ talent like, say, actors and singers. Sorry if that’s a bit catty!

We also mooched around a few shops and I bought this top and skirt.

I’m not sure if together they go well but I was originally wearing a dress so I had to try them on together! Dorothy Perkins…how I love that shop.

In the evening we had a nice easy take-away (I had an Indian while Ben and his dad had a pizza – Ben was in heaven). We watched What Women Want (love, love that film! Such a classic) and had an easy evening.

We had a great time in Essex and it was good fun

Right, now I’m off to do some ironing and watch some Friends. Rock ‘n’ roll lifestyle living over here!

How was your weekend?

Reality TV: do you love or hate? I’m terrible. I love all that rubbish; Keeping Up with the Kardashians, The Hills, Made in Chelsea… But not Big Brother. I have some standards

Have you met anyone famous?

What Parkruns have you done? Any ones to recommend?