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The madness of a looming marathon

There’s nothing like an impending marathon to get you going. Even when it’s chucking it down with snow…

I must have been the only person in the UK who was unaware it was supposed to snow on Thursday evening. Sure I’d heard about the “thundersnow storm” but I hadn’t really connected it with reality – I mean surely that’s just in Scotland, right? So when I packed my gym bag in the morning to take to work I merrily threw in my usual pair of shorts and didn’t think twice. I normally wear shorts, I normally warm up. Totally fine.

Then I got to work and everyone was talking about how at 4pm snow was going to start. Er, what? And lo and behold, as 4pm hit so did buckets of snow. But when you have a marathon very soon (February) and you’re hugely under-trained (longest run 6 miles at this point) and you need adequate spacing of runs to not re-niggle the injury you’re only just getting over…well, you have little choice but to put those tiny shorts on and get out there and run.

It was fully throwing it down as I headed out, to the point I couldn’t really see as I had to blink so much due to the big fluffy snowflakes hitting my eyes. And the floor was already coated in a a thick dusting of snow. So foot placing was precarious, as were corners. I was soaked and cold very quickly and this encouraged me to run a bit faster, but not too fast to risk falling over.

I got several odd looks from people sheltering under bus stops waiting for their bus and commuters in their cars. But I strangely quite enjoyed it. I felt like a warrior. My legs were freezing, which is never happens to me, but it wasn’t terrible. I was only going three miles so I knew it would be over soon.When I finished and walked the last bit to get to my office, a guy sheltering near the door stared at me incredulously and said, “you’re absolutely mental”. I pretty much agreed.
People left in the office laughed at me when I said it was a bit nippy out. My legs were so pink and I was drenched! It took pretty much my entire commute home (an hour’s journey) to warm up again. I stood in my shower on full blast and full heat basically searing off a layer of my skin to get warm again. But I’m glad I went out. It was a good run. I felt strong, my shin felt good and it’s all miles towards Tokyo (albeit only three but hey it’s all relative here for me!).

There’s nothing like a big goal or deadline to get you motivated and focused. And I’m being really sensible (I think!). I’m only running three times a week, and two of those runs are three miles. I might bump one of those up to four (ooh go crazy, eh!). And then I have a longer run at the weekend, and no consecutive running days. It seems to be working.

I go to Florida with friends in two weeks and I really have no idea how the running will go but I’m going to aim to do two big runs out there. I say “big” runs but we’re talking 13-16 miles, though it could all change. Basically I’m fully winging it. I hope to do the parkrun in Orlando again as well. The two friends I’m going with are the friends who have just got into running and parkrun. And incidentally they are the friends that laughed at me for doing the Orlando parkrun the last time we went. Ha! How the tables have turned now 😉

But I’m still feeling positive – if not maybe in denial? Either way it’s all good. At least when I’m running Tokyo I can look back fondly on this 3 mile snowy run and remember what I warrior I am 😉

Have you ever run in snow?

What’s the worst weather you’ve ever run in?

What do you wear during winter exercise?

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But I’m still a runner

I’m in a quite frustrating position. I’m still not running. And I’m not hugely bothered.

Who even am I? I feel like I’m in a really odd place. Normally when I’m injured I feel really down, really frustrated and angry.

Not running, just volunteering at parkrun

Normally going to parkrun and volunteering every week would be hard; watching runners get their parkrun mojo on. I would feel a huge leap of jealously at any runners I drive past. I’d wonder if today is “the day” I’ll try running again before I’ve even gotten out of bed.

But…I’m actually not thinking those things. I mean, it obviously helps that the weather is pretty gnarly. It’s dark, cold, wet and unappealing to be outside. During the warmer months I find it hard because I just want to be outside in the fresh air. But right now all I want to do is hibernate away in fluffy socks and Christmas jumpers.

Don’t get me wrong. I’ve not suddenly become a couch potato and happy to lapse into inactivity for days at an end. Quite the opposite. I’m loving the time I spend at the gym right now. I can lift heavy weights without wondering how it will affect my running the next day. I can push my limits of my strength and reach new PBs. I can work on non-running-focused strength training without feeling guilty.

And my gym is lovely and bright, cool not cold and it’s full of other like-minded people. Rather than the dark, lonely streets at ridiculously o’clock in the morning or straight after work, I can skip into the gym at 5.30am and it’s full of people. I don’t converse with these people, good God no! I’m there to workout and my social switch is firmly in the OFF position until I get to work, but I’m around other people and don’t feel like I’m the only person in the world working out.

This is obviously a problem though. I mean it would be a fantastic situation ordinarily…had I not got an impending marathon in February. Every time I think about the marathon I feel a bit stressed and a bit sick. Oh sure I could bin it, but I’d rather not waste the money I already spent on it (a fair chunk) and I do actually want to do it. I just don’t want to train for it.

I only have myself to blame for this situation. Too many marathons, too much running, stupid biomechanical faults, questionable training… Yes I know I’m an idiot when it comes to running in a variety of different ways. But marathons are not 5ks or 10ks, or even half marathons. You can’t decided one week to just enter one and run it in the near future. You don’t know what the situation is going to be like in the months ahead. And this marathon more than most is one you need to apply months and months away from the start date.

I’m just in a sticky situation of not being able to train for a marathon I’m not sure I want to train for. Problematic. I suppose it’s better that I’m feeling indifferent than to be feeling full of despair for not running. Mentally I’m in a good place (increasing nausea and panic attacks for impending marathon aside of course). I just need to hope that I can run soon so I can find the love again… Though I love the gym, I’ll always still be a runner first and foremost.

Have you ever felt demotivated for a race coming up?

What do you consider yourself – a runner, crossfitter, climber, cyclist, etc.?

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Injured but not down

So here I am again, the injured runner. Oh to be one of those hardy people who never gets injured. But such are the cards I’m dealt.

I did get a little angry (well, not angry just jokingly irate ;-)) at a guy at parkrun after he’d written a long-winded and moany post on Facebook about how annoyed and sad he was that he was facing a similar injury to one he’d had four years ago. Bare in mind he’s not been injured since then. AND HE WAS COMPLAINING. One injury every four years? I’ll take it!!! Damn it, I’d pay money for those sort of odds.

Anyway. Yes I’m injured. I’ve sort of been in denial about it but now as the marathon training is looming in front of me I need to be honest with myself. To be fair, the two runs I did the other week that I sung the praises for on my blog did go amazingly. I felt 100% fine during and after…and then parkrun happened and boom! Back to square one. It’s almost worse when that happens as you’re given a tiny bit of hope that everything’s OK and then it’s ripped away from you.

I’ve given up wondering why it’s happened because this is the part that frustrates me more than anything. This isn’t a new injury, it’s a reoccurring one. Nothing I seem to do helps. It just crops up every year, summer or winter. JUST GO AWAY. Give me a flipping chance.

It’s my shin/calf. I guess a shin splint? Just one leg. The particular area of niggliness and/or pain sort of moves up and down the area so *shrugs* I don’t know. It’s not excruciating pain though, just an occasional throb and general feeling of tightness and discomfort that gets worse running.

On Saturday when I did my doomed pre-parkrun running trial it went very badly. Straight off the bat the niggle was like “hey, Anna, how’s it going?”. So I obviously stopped straight away. I finished my walk with Alfie, my head spinning with what I should do. Luckily I was staying at my parents so I could have my pathetic little melt down with them, rather than on my own with just Alfie looking despairingly at me.

“That’s it! I’m cancelling Tokyo!” I sobbed to them (like I said, pathetic). It’s just too stressful. It’s just too hard. Running is my fun time, my de-stressor, my happy place. It shouldn’t make me feel this way (mentally and physically). My mum and dad calmed me down and we talked rationally about what to do about Tokyo. You know, that rather expensive holiday purely to do the marathon I had planned.

I checked the small print of the details (I booked through a tour company) and counted the days until I was to go. Unfortunately at this point I’ll only get 50% of my money back. Bollocks. Excuse my French. Had I made this decision 10 days ago I would have gotten significantly more money back.

Right, so Tokyo is STILL on. Even if I have to walk the whole damn thing I will bloody do it.

Realistically, I do have a fair bit of time (12 weeks) and I may have been somewhat over-dramatic in my reaction. I haven’t got an injury that is significantly world-ending. I can still successfully cross-train fairly easily by either bike or elliptical. And I can’t imagine I’m going to be out of the game until February (the marathon is at the end of Feb). I just won’t be able to get the proper marathon build-up or training I prefer.

But even if I only get up to 10 miles, I know I can do it. Yes it’ll be painful, my expectations amended accordingly and the recovery process post-marathon a bit of a bitch. But it’s a Marathon Major, it’s in Japan (I’ve never been) and I’m at a time of my life where I can do this without guilt.

Who cares if I get overtaken by a Pikachu or an oversized HelloKitty?

So there we go. My current status is not running at the moment but continued cross-training (I can barely contain my excitement) and a few trips to my physio. Mentally I’m OK. Yes it royally sucks, but I’ve been here before. I also have a lovely Florida holiday to cushion any January post-Christmas I WANT TO RUN blues sooo it can’t all be doom and gloom after all 😉

My one wish, though, is to be able to do Christmas parkrun…

What would you do if you were me?

How do you deal with injuries?

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Post Marathon: time off and what’s next

I’m still riding the happy wave of Chester Marathon. I’m so pleased with how it went and it’s given me a bit of a boost with what I could achieve going forward, which is of course onwards to another marathon.img_3207I’m not massively eager to bash out a ridiculously fast time or try and beat my PB (which was still around 4 minutes faster than Chester) but I’d quite like to do another really focused training segment where I include some actual workouts, like tempos, intervals and hill sessions, rather than the very relaxed running I was doing this time around. Though mentally it was nice to run without any real pace aims or targets, I really enjoy the process of seeing my paces get faster and just feeling more confident in my running.

My next marathon is Tokyo at the end of February [insert scared emoji]. I signed up with a tour company a while ago as I knew I wanted to do it at some point and I really have nothing stopping me doing it. Of course it’s ridiculously expensive to do it this way but I get a guaranteed entry (which is good because Tokyo is very, very hard to get into through the ballot, like London), flights, accommodation near the marathon start, transfer to and from the airport, some meals and I’m with other runners and a guide to help us get about. Seen as how I can get lost pretty much anywhere, I think this is probably the wisest approach in such a culturally different foreign country!

I think my parents (and my friends) are quite concerned about me getting lost there. Me too, me too. My dad jokingly said he’d put a tracker on my phone to make sure he knew where I was…though actually I don’t think he was joking. So being in a group of people and basically handheld through the process is perfect for me! Originally I was going to go with a fellow Marathon Major enthusiast but he selfishly bailed on me – apparently Boston is more important *cough cough* 😉

So Tokyo is the aim and, as ever, not a given because of my injury proneness. And unlike Boston, if I did get injured I wouldn’t still go as the trip is purely for the marathon with a bunch of other marathoners so how fun would that be if I couldn’t run? But anyway that’s a long way away at the moment.

For now I’m enjoying a bit of time off of running and gym-work. I don’t think I’ve had a week off from the gym for a long, long time so it was a nice reset for me during my week away. But don’t get me wrong though, I was looking forward to getting back into it! I do love going to the gym and having my normal routine.

In terms of running, I have no races in the plan apart from the Gosport Half Marathon (I sign up every year as it’s literally around where my parents live and the past three times I’ve been unable to do it due to injury. I almost didn’t sign up for fear of cursing myself), 10k near Christmas just for fun (I say “fun”, 10ks are never fun for me) and an obstacle course race thing with my friends in a few weeks but that’s not really running. I might take another week off of running or do the odd plodding about. I haven’t really made my mind up. My calf needed a bit of time post-marathon to feel happy again and it’s basically fine now but I don’t want to jump back into anything too soon. I’m also keen to address why I keep having this calf/shin issue. I’ve managed to get rid of all other issues (*touch wood*) but can never fully stop this when my mileage gets higher so I might have a gait analysis done.

But basically October is a chill month for me. November will ideally be when I’ll gradually build the mileage up again for Tokyo. Then it’ll be all go again! I also have a place at the London Marathon next year (Good For Age) but it’ll depend on Tokyo whether I do it or whether I defer.img_5915It’s all a bit fuzzy right now and nothing is ever set in stone for me.
But I feel very content and happy right now just bumbling along without a plan. This will change soon I’m sure as I start getting itchy feet…

What are your racing plans?

Do you like to follow a training plan or go off piste from time to time?

Have you had a gait analysis done before?

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Post Marathon

I’ve had such a blissful week off but now it’s back to reality. It was exactly what I needed. A whole week of no gym and no running post marathon.

After I finished the marathon I was walking along on cloud nine. I was just so flabbergasted at what I’d achieved. I genuinely hadn’t expected it to go as well as it did so I was fairly chuffed and surprised with myself.

As we headed out of the race village we spotted the area where the winners of the horse races go (the race village was situated in the Chester Racecourse). It did look cordoned off from the public…but the gate was slightly ajar and I couldn’t help but quickly grab a few amusing photos.chester-racecourseAs we snuck out of the area a few fellow runners noticed the ideal photo spot and trickled through. We felt a bit naughty but hey ho, it’s got to be done!

As food is obviously a crucial factor in any post-marathon experience 😉 I’d previously hunted a good spot online for lunch earlier that week. This saved us having to walk around Chester hunting while I slowly become more and more hangry. We had a bit of time to kill as I’d sensibly booked the table for 2pm which would give me some time to feel a bit more normal post marathon. For me it goes something like this: ooof don’t show me any food… bleurgh food… can’t eat a single thing… I can’t even look at a cake right now… SHOW ME ALL THE FOOD… I NEED FEEDING. The switch-over happens very quickly 😉

The restaurant was a Turkish restaurant called Meze. It was an ideal spot for me because it was all about the meat but it was actually fairly healthy so it was ideal for my parents, who are trying to lose weight. It had lots of options like grilled meats, hummus, vegetarian plates, salads and rice so it was a good all-rounder. I went for the mixed grill and it was divine.img_5569Very handy that as I got a bit chilly I had this lovely long-sleeved technical t-shirt to put on! The restaurant was really nice and the service was fantastic. The chef even sent over a freebie little plate for us to try – it was some sort of Turkish-style salsa creation. Very tasty.
After eating, we wandered around Chester and had a look at the Cathedral. The bells were going and the sun was shining so it was perfect.chester-cathderalAfter we got back to the cottage and I’d showered, we headed to the hot tub. Honestly I had been dreaming about this moment. And it was FABULOUS.img_5595Well it would have been fabulous had I not dramatically face-planted into the to tub when I got in. I slipped, fell forwards and then knocked my shin on the side. It wasn’t quite the graceful dip I was hoping to achieve and it was rather painful. I now have the most ridiculous bruises on my shin *sighs*. But the bottle of Prosecco we shared helped!

If I could do this after every marathon I definitely would (sit in a hot tub, not the falling in part). Bruised shin aside, I didn’t actually ache that much. I remember after my first few marathons every step was tough, though my calf was definitely feeling unhappy and niggly.

The rest of the week was very low key and chilled. I woke naturally most mornings between 7am and 8am, had a leisurely breakfast in the cottage (the ease of having self-catering accommodation) and then we’d set off to explore nearby places, such as Ludlow.ludlowAnd Powis Castle, which was just beautiful.powis-castleIt was full of peacocks as well, wandering about all casually. The grounds were beautiful and we had a lovely cup of tea in the cafe (isn’t that what National Trust locations are all about??)img_0902Over the week I ate lots of good food of course. Nothing crazily outrageous. Just a few scones here or there, some hearty sandwiches and a few puddings.
post-marathon-foodI did lots of walking and it was just so blissful. We were very lucky with the weather we had as well. Lots of sunshine, albeit a chill in the air indicating that autumn is very much en route.img_5655One of my favourite days was going on a 5 mile hike with my granddad around Longnor.

longnor-hike

We did this on the Tuesday and it was a perfect way to stretch the legs a bit after the marathon. Though during the steepest sections I could definitely tell I’d run 26.2 miles!longnor-hike

It took just over three hours and was fairly hard going but we survived. Not too shabby for an almost 83 year old and a post-marathoner, eh? Both my grandparents are in fantastic shape – heading off for bike rides and long walks.

It was, as always, lovely spending time with my grandparents and my family. It was just nice to switch off, sleep lots and rest. I ate whatever I fancied and reset myself basically. On the last day we went back to Chester before heading to pick up the dogs from my other granddad who lives in Stoke and we had a lovely time shopping and then a gorgeous meal at The Botanist.the-botanistI had literally a basket of chicken wings which weren’t amazing but tasty nonetheless (bit too overdone) – though the presentation was amusing. But the showstoppers were the main and pudding. I had a deli board for my main which you could pick lots of different things to have. I went for a baked Camembert with fig syrup, rollmops, honey glazed ham hummus and a fougasse bread (yes, the same as in the Bake Off!). It was delicious.

But the pudding… oh the pudding. It was the perfect end to such a fantastic holiday. A baked cookie with toffee ice cream and salted caramel sauce.img_5843I died and went to heaven. GLORIOUSLY tasty.

Though it’s sad it’s over, I feel very happy and content now I’m back. Exactly how you should do after a good holiday 🙂

What do you like to do after a big race or marathon?

What’s your favourite type of bread?

Have you been hiking anywhere interesting?