Cycling - AnnaTheApple

June 16, 2014June 16, 2014

Week #1 Marathon Training

Morning all. Don’t worry, I’m not planning on documenting every single week of marathon training (assuming I do manage to complete all the training without getting injured…there’s confidence for you). But as it’s the first week, why not.

My marathon training plan is HERE. Alongside this I’m also doing the ‘Ab Challenge’ which I started on the 1st June. This includes, every day (except for a few rest days), sit ups, crunches, leg raises and a plank. Each day the number increases (for the plank, the length of time increases). It’s no joke now having done Day 15.

Monday – no running, but I did a 45 minute strength workout after work.

This included:
– 100 weighted squats
– 3x 10 weighted calf raises
– 3mins toe lifts
– 2x 20 of kick-backs, leg swings and hydrant lifts

Tuesday – 3 miles easy run in the morning. For my easy runs I’m trying to keep to around 8.30mins/mile which is a comfortable speed. I also did another strength workout after work.

This included:
– 3mins calf raises (no weight)
– 3mins toe lifts
– 3x 1min side planks
– 2x 1min plank with leg touches to the side
– 3x 30 Russian twists

Wednesday – We had the RR10 that evening. This was an off-road 4.5mile race (the RR10 is a set of league races with all the clubs in our area).

I really wasn’t feeling motivated. I was in a bit of a bad mood anyway. Then they delayed the start by 15 minutes and that just furthered by lack of motivation. I ummed and arred about whether to run with Ben or on my own and push it. I decided to push it. Within the first mile I knew it wasn’t a good run. My hip was niggling (possibly because of the unstable terrain?) and I just felt tired.

One of my team mates who wasn’t running cheered me on but at this point (maybe mile 2) I was considering dropping out. She shouted “just enjoy it!” when she realised I wasn’t feeling it. This really helped. Suddenly I realised, “hey, yeah I can just run this as slowly as I want and it doesn’t matter. Just get the miles in.”. My whole mood changed and I dropped the speed and just ran comfortably. Loads of people overtook me but I didn’t care. Eventually my friend Matt caught up (I was hoping Ben would catch up and I could run with him but he was having a rubbish run as he was exhausted (*cough* and hungover *cough*) after getting back from Bucharest earlier that day). So I ran with Matt instead and helped push him along (well sort of, I’m not sure who was pushing who!)

I finished 39th or 38th position (can’t remember) out of the females. Previously I’ve been 10th and 11th but I actually didn’t mind. I’ve also come to realise I don’t like the RR10s one bit. They’re heavily competitive (you aim for position not time), they’re in the evening, they’re always a very short distance and they’re off-road so there’s a big chance of turning your ankle (which a guy at our club did). To me it’s not worth it during my marathon training. Sure it’s a good speed session but I’d rather do that with the club Tuesday night on road or on my own where the pressure (that I put on myself I hasten to add) is less. I know I sound extremely ‘sour grapes’ but the relief and weight off my shoulders felt when I decided not to do anymore was huge. I felt so much better.

Thursday – another after work strength session:

– 2x 1 min side planks
– 3x 30 heel taps
– 3mins toe lifts
– 3mins calf raises
– 3min bridge
– 10x 3 bridge leg lifts

[I’m focusing on areas that I know I’m weak and also making sue I have strong shins and calves as I’m terrified about getting shin splints – because let’s be honest, that’s the next thing I’m bound to get]

Friday – another easy 3 mile run in the morning.

Saturday – I didn’t get to Parkrun because my uni friends were down so I went for an earlier 3 mile speed run. I was chuffed with this. Not my fastest but on my own not too shabby!

Sunday – 5 mile ‘long’ run (fairly amusing but it will get longer later) I really enjoyed this.

I ran very comfortably, rarely looking at my watch and was happy to see my paces were around 8 minutes. Bodes well!

Total run miles: 18

After getting back from my run and Ben returning from his, we had breakfast and then (without showering – yep we’re that gross) we headed out for a 15 mile bike ride with our friend, Nathan. It was fairly hilly and we didn’t blast the speed so it was quite nice.

I was fairly shattered for the rest of the day. Onwards to Week 2!

Do you put pressure on yourself to the point you stop enjoying something?

What workouts have you enjoyed this week?

What workouts have you hated?

May 27, 2014

I’m not training for a triathlon but…

I’ve been doing some swimming and cycling recently. But not a lot of running. My hip is still sadly niggling me.

I saw my physio last Friday just to check it wasn’t anything serious as I was going into an Anna Panic (as Ben says, Pannakin mode). Ideas of arthritis and stress fractures were floating around my mind. Yes, seriously over-reacting I know. But I do have arthritis in my family…And an over-active brain when it comes to injuries and niggles.

Anyway the physio said I’d just tweaked my groin/hip flexor area and running Netley had aggravated it further and caused my back to tighten up to compensate (I get an ache in the top of my glute/lower back as well). Panic over. He said it really depends on me when I can get back to running – as long as the pain isn’t unbearable I can run. But I’m still taking it very cautiously and not running for the time being.

My lovely friend at my running club gave me a three day free pass to her AMAZING gym which is just around the corner from me so I thought I’d put that to good use over the weekend. The gym has two pools: one inside and one outdoors (yes, in Britain).

On Saturday morning I got up early and headed there for a swim. Bear in mind I haven’t swum in years (ignoring holidays). I rocked up to the pool in my bikini (I have no actual swimsuit), no goggles and no clue. I got into the Medium Lane (there was no slow lane) and started breast stroking. But I worried this might niggle the groin/hip so changed to front crawl. I wear contact lenses so I had to keep my head out of the water. This is not an easy feat when doing front crawl.

Now no disrespect to them, but there were a lot of older, shall we say senior, ladies there in their swim caps, goggles and proper swimsuits. I did feel slightly judged by them and also hugely inferior (if looks could kill…). Evidently, these ladies go every single day and I was encroaching on their territory. The Medium Lane was becoming ridiculous with people walking up and down the lane so I switched to the Fast Lane and was quickly overtaken a lot by some speedy ladies. Oh my poor ego…

I enjoyed about 15 minutes of swimming until I became bored. Up and down. Up and down. But I stuck it out for 50 minutes. The next day I managed 45 minutes – and even ventured into the outdoor pool (now that gets you moving!) and felt my front crawl improve a lot (it helped bringing goggles). I then treated myself to a good 10 mins soak in the Jacuzzi.

After my swim on Saturday I realised I could get to parkrun to see Ben run.

I got there just before 9am and loved the look on Ben’s face as I cheered him and he realised I was there. It was nice to still make parkrun to support – though I looked a little like a drowned rat with my wet hair.

Ben did a good run, just under 22 minutes. We had a nice cup of tea and chat with some running friends and Ben got on top of his football sticker swapping…

Yes, he is 26 years old.

Monday morning Ben and me got up at 6.10am (ON A BANK HOLIDAY MONDAY – sorry for the caps, but that is early, am I right?) to go for a 30 mile bike ride with a fair number of guys from the running club (or ‘injured’ club as some said as a lot of the people there currently couldn’t run because of injury, myself sadly included I guess).

Photo credit – Kelly

Well as you can see I’m one of the few not wearing a jacket. In my running-focused brain I thought I’d get warm on the cycle, even if it rained.

Well the heavens opened up and I was FREEZING. Ben, my loving husband, gave me his jacket though and cycled in just a running t-shirt. Honestly, I don’t know how he survived in the absolute freezing and wet conditions as I was still so cold despite the jacket. He has definitely earnt a few Husband Points!

Just a little bit hilly…

By about 20 miles though I wanted to be home. I was so cold and wet it just became very difficult to enjoy. Don’t get me wrong, if the weather had been better I’d have loved it. The route was scenic, the hills were tough but satisfying…but being so cold for so long is just not fun. Total time cycling: 2:19:12 though we stopped a few times to regroup.

As soon as we got home I was in the bath with a coffee (again, lovingly made by my husband after he’d had a shower). I just couldn’t get warm. I was also starving. I didn’t have anything before cycling and nothing on route (this is the same for running) but on the last stretch of the ride I started to feel dizzy and weak. Not good at all. Need to be more sensible next time. This is a whole different thing to running!

After a big bowl of porridge and then a proper shower I felt more human. Thankfully we were going to Nando’s later as well with a friend so I could eat my body weight in chicken. The calorie in-out balance was definitely returned to normal by the end of the day 😉

Running, cycling or swimming – which do you prefer? I think we know my answer to this 😉

Are you a fair weather exerciser? I don’t mind running in the rain at all. No problem. But cycling…well not only is it cold but I felt a lot more cautious going downhill as I was scared to slip.

Have you ever felt dizzy when exercising?

May 19, 2014

I think we can agree I’m fragile…

Hello sunshine! Down South we had a gorgeous weekend of beautiful sunshine and warm weather – I hope it was just as nice where you were.

Last week was a bit of a downer for me. After the Alton 10 miler (OK, let’s be completely honest here, after Parkrun on the Saturday) my hip was niggling. God I never, never learn. I shouldn’t have run Alton. It only aggravated it further and made walking afterwards uncomfortable and a little painful. What an idiot. The Alton race wasn’t important at all and yet I thought if I ran it rather than race it I’d be OK. And it niggled the entire race. I really only have myself to blame. Especially because our running club championships were the following Sunday (Netley 10k). Yeah, so really stupid.

I took the rest of the week off running in the hopes that I could run the race. I had a deep tissue massage from a great local sports masseuse, Kyle, who’s basically become our club’s favourite masseuse and he’s doing the rounds on everyone. He comes to your house as well which is just so handy for me with my stupid commute. If you’re local to Southampton, look him up he’s great –> http://www.hackettmassage.co.uk/ He’s also a nice guy who’s an amazing runner (we’re talking 5 minute miles and winning races).

But unfortunately the hip niggle was still there. On Saturday I cycled down to Parkrun on my new road bike and met Ben there to set up in the morning.

It felt dreadful and I became Grumpy Anna in my dark and shady place. I marshalled and cheered on the runners. Still fun, but not as fun as running obviously. Ben did great pacing one of our running club friends and helped him PB.

After that we headed quickly to see Kyle (as I’d panicked text him that morning after thinking my cycle had made things worse) so he could help set my bike up correctly so not to aggravate things any further and have a quick look at my hip. Very helpful and nice considering it was the weekend.

Then we rushed back to shower and then pick up my new car, which obviously turned Dark and Shady Anna into very happy Anna.

A lovely shiny red Fiat 500…sport turbo something-or-other (Ben spec’d it – I know nothing about cars). It drives like a dream, very speedy despite it only being a 0.9 (hello no road tax!). It’s like a go-kart, so light and zippy. And the interior is all lovely and black and red.

New car selfie – self-indulgent I know, but I just couldn’t help it

After that Ben and me went out for a little cycle on our road bikes with our friend who’s also bought a new road bike. In true Anna style though after about 5 miles I panicked it would make my hip hurt and decided to turn back home (around 10 miles in total – not a huge distance I know).

The rest of the day was me moping about umming and arring about the next day’s race and generally being quite annoying to be around. Ben is quite the saint to live with me when I’m suffering from a niggle!

Speaking of Ben, we went out for dinner with previously mentioned amazing sports masseuse and his wife on Friday night and Ben did the most amazing parking.

Our car is on the left. There was perhaps a little bit more space on the other side but it was so tight. I am hugely impressed! He had his proper Serious Parking Face on and I was just stood there biting my nails. Stupid Mini driver though, learn to park!

Sunday was our Netley 10k…more on that in my next post!

(Spoiler alert: I did indeed run it)

Do you have sports massages regularly? I would have them every week if I could.

Are you good at parking? I think I’m OK at parking… it’s just general driving I struggle with 😉

Do you get grumpy when you can’t run/work out?

May 12, 2014

Another wedding and yet more cake

I’ve had four days off and yet I feel like I’m even more tired. We’ve just been crazy busy. But in a nice way.

Ben and me had Thursday and Friday off as we had a wedding Thursday afternoon and were staying the night in the hotel where the reception was being held. On Thursday morning we tried to get some boring house jobs done and also sort my new car out (very exciting!) Then we headed to the wedding, which was being held in the Spinnaker Tower in Portsmouth.

Basically it’s this huge tower-like structure where you can go up in a lift and see amazing views. Well, I say amazing…it’s about as amazing as it can get in Portsmouth 😉 Because we got there about 40 minutes before the wedding began we waited in the cafe and had a sneaky bit of cake.

We had a slice of carrot cake and millionaire shortbread and had half each of both. This is big news as I never normally share cake!

Despite the weather being less than stellar, the views were fantastic. It was really quite a unique and lovely ceremony.

And there was a glass floor you could stand on (without shoes) and look straight down. Very cool.

After the ceremony we headed back to the hotel for the reception. Despite my previous cake, I was getting hungry. The meal was a buffet and in true Anna fashion I started getting antsy. I hate buffets. I’m always scared they’ll not be enough food – and consequently eat way too much. When will I ever learn? Ben said he thinks it’s hilarious, but I tried to make him understand by saying imagine that the bar was a buffet format and there were only so many drinks available. His eyes lit up in panic. Exactly!

I ate quite a lot of sweets from the sweet buffet too…and three *little* pieces of wedding cake. I felt quite full by the end. And rather rough. It was a good evening though with lots of great company and banter.

The sign reads: “I’m here for the cake”

I woke up feeling a little delicate and quite bloated. Not good!

Then we had a mad whirl-wind of a day where we had to dash back home to Southampton to pick up my paper bit of my driving licence to then drive back to Portsmouth to sort my new car out. We’ve officially bought a new Fiat 500!

And amazingly it’ll be ready this week as they had one in stock to the spec we wanted. How lucky is that??

Then from there we had to go home, do the food shop, go to the post office and pick up our road bikes from Halfords. And I wanted to do a bit of baking for a party I was going to the next day. Whew.

As we don’t have a bike rack we could only get one bike safely in our car so I cycled mine home (it was only 4 miles). It was great to get a proper feel for the bike. It felt really good. It fit well, I felt very comfortable and it was light and speedy – from my limited experience!

Unfortunately we don’t have anywhere to put them yet as our shed is rather full. So they’re in the living room for the moment.

Looks fine, right…? Alfie doesn’t even care.

After Parkrun on Saturday morning I headed to a surprise party for our lovely previous ladies’ captain who’s currently pregnant. A fair few of us made cakes and it was all very lovely. She was very surprised and chuffed (I think!) I brought cupcakes but forgot to take a photo. They looked liked cupcakes… 😉

Obviously I was in my element with the cake…

Which was well documented by our current ladies captain (I’ve stolen the photos from her – thank you, Kelly!)

But this was the best part:

Photo credit – stolen from Karen (thank you!)

Now, I’m not a baby person but that is just adorable! Mini Hedge End Running Club gear. Karen’s baby will be the best dressed baby in town 🙂

On Sunday we went to the Alton 10 mile race where Ben aimed to beat his PB (around 1:26 I think) and I planned to just run with him and help push him along and keep him company. I’ll do a recap of my latest runnings in another post. Spoiler alert: Ben got his PB 🙂

Whew. Lots going on!!

Next weekend is the Netley 10k which is our running club championships (lots of medals up for grabs for different achievements). I’ve eaten so much rubbish the past few days (yep, I include cake in that) that I’ve decided to go on a bit of a ‘detox’ this week. I say detox but what I mean is a ‘cake and rubbish free zone’. No cake, chocolate or ‘big’ treats until I finish the race. I feel like I went overboard the past couple of days and I want to get back to feeling good and in race shape!

How was your weekend?

What’s the best part of a wedding for you? I’d be lying if I said the cake was one of my favourite parts…

What’s your car like? I’ve never had a new car so this is very exciting. I will be cleaning it every weekend…maybe.

How do you deal with a weekend or few days of eating rubbish?

May 6, 2014November 8, 2018

Cars, bikes and a snowman

Oh man what a weekend. There were a fair few ups and downs I have to say!

Friday ended appallingly. I was driving home from work and just before getting on the motorway and I was stuck in the usual stop-start traffic. The roads were wet and the car in front put its breaks on a little sooner than I was expecting. I slammed my foot fully to the floor and watched as my car slid forward and knocked into the back of the car in front. My poor little Corsa didn’t stand a chance.

The other person’s car was fine – no superficial damage anyway. He was a nice guy but I felt terrible. So embarrassing and stressful 🙁

But anyway, I was fine, he was fine. The only thing not fine was my car. The damage isn’t too bad but I’m pretty sure it’ll be a write-off as it’s such an old banger. Ironically, I had spent some time looking at car insurance reviews on Consumers Advocate not too long before this happened. Ben and me came to the decision that a brand new car would probably be better for me considering my mileage to work everyday. I need something a bit more reliable, safe and economic. Every silver lining, eh? Fairly rubbish way to start the bank holiday weekend though.

Saturday we had a pacing event on at our local Parkrun. I had volunteered to run the 24 minute pace. I was quite excited about doing this as I’d never paced before. But I was very nervous as I was being relied upon!

My bib was huge. I looked sort of naked!!

As we headed to the start I was suddenly followed and surrounded by people hoping to achieve 24 minutes or there abouts. No pressure…

I had planned to run 7.50minute/miles as this would give a bit of lee-way for the ‘nubbin’ of 0.1 mile. I kept fairly consistent to that pace, though I slowed on the up-hills and then sped up on the down-hills to compensate. One guy ran up next to me and said “you do know you’re going slower than you should be for that target?” This hugely panicked me. I checked my watch. Nope, I had gone through the first mile in perfect time. I tried to say no I was fine but he didn’t believe me. He told me I should speed up. I didn’t, but I kept panicking.

My group dwindled a bit as the run continued and this made me panic a bit more but also feel bad because there was nothing really I could do for them. I had to stick to the plan whether they kept up or not.

I finished in 23.45 with a consistent pace. I got thanked by a fellow runner for helping him PB and other runners said they still kept me in their sights despite dropping off. This hugely boosted me. I was so chuffed! The man who had criticised my pace came up and apologised me afterwards as well, saying he misjudged my pace. Mmm, yes, thanks for stressing me out!

After Parkrun we got ready quickly and then headed out to find some road bikes with a friend. We went to quite a few different shops. Big ones, like Decathlon, and small local ones. We got some good information from the different salesmen (what gears were good, what frame sizes we should be looking at, price differences, etc.)

We tested a few out as well. In the end, the price was right and the spec looked good (from our limited knowledge!) for two Carreras from Halfords. We’re not after all singing and all dancing, or top of the range. We wanted something in our price range that fitted well and met our requirements. It had good reviews on the website so we bit the bullet!

TDF for Ben, Virtuoso for me. Maybe these aren’t the best bikes in the world, but for now they’ll be fine I’m sure. We’re hardly going to use them every day or rock out a 60 miler on them any time soon!

On Sunday we did the Dorset Marathon relay race. I was part of a team of four ladies and Ben was in a team of four men. In our running club I think we had four teams in total? And we had several guys running the whole marathon. I’ll do a recap in another post. It went well though and was such a fun day.

Monday was my first ever riding experience on a road bike. Though we’ve bought our new bikes, we haven’t collected them yet so I was borrowing a friend’s bike and shoes. I went out with three other guys from the club and it was good fun!

I was definitely the slowest by far and probably holding them up a fair bit. But it was a fun, sociable ride. The weather was lovely. But it was tough, don’t get me wrong. Jeeze, you think you’re fit until you try something new!

And quite hilly. But the down hills were so much fun! Wind in the hair, crazy speed (for me), exhilarating fun!

I don’t really know what’s fast or not at this stage, but what I do know is it felt more like a long run in terms of endurance rather than a speed session (which I guess you can see from my average speed). And I didn’t fall off once amazingly. I got used to the clip-on shoes and started getting the hang of gears and positioning on the bike.

I was shattered though afterwards. My bum hurt (despite wearing new padded shorts), my legs felt tired and my wrists actually ached a bit as well. Then it was off out to look for new cars.

After going round different car dealers I’m pretty much 100% decided on a Fiat 500. A very iconic and ‘girlie’ car perhaps, but small and dinky enough for me (and very safe, economical and eco-friendly). We’ve spec’ed up what we want so it’ll be a wait yet. Ho hum. Well, I say ‘we’ spec’ed up. Ben pretty much did this for me as I literally don’t know anything about cars. Ben had a lot of fun though as you can imagine 😉

We then went to Nando’s and had chicken. Perfect day, really! Topped off only with an evening of lolling on the couch in a chicken-induced coma watching Frozen. Ben’s face when the characters started singing was hilarious. He’s very much a Disney novice and didn’t quite expect how much singing there would be. He did enjoy it though and I heard him singing “Do you want to build a snowman?” while getting ready this morning. Excellent.

Have you ever paced a race before?

What car do you have? I’m such a car novice. Ben did all the talking in the dealership!

What’s your longest bike ride?

Have you seen Frozen? I loved it. Disney doing what Disney does best. And any film with a Princess Anna (though said ‘Arrrrnnna’) is fine by me.