Unintentional Ultra Runner

Plan, Train, Repeat...   Ran Sunday, Monday, Wednesday & Thursday last week and defo noticed it Friday morning! Thursday’s run felt like I was towing a small house. All said & done, I don’t know how, but the route was 7 mins quicker than the Wednesday run, although speed is NOT on my agenda. Weird how sometimes you can go for a “plod” and find times drop without additional effort.   Up until Friday morning I was planning a long one over last weekend but reconsidered it coz my left Achilles wasn’t feeling great but I’m putting that down to road running. Maybe I need to start getting more off-road?   Monday bank holiday was quiet, so decided to kick myself and run to the dojo and back on Tuesday & Wednesday (about ~10 miles total)   Long-range Jungle preparation this week has been researching foot taping/ strapping, which is more than inevitably going to happen.   The IoW ultra (66 miles) has always produced t...

It's been a good week...   Well, the hill running on Monday wasn’t as painful as I thought it’d be but still something I’ll need to get working on. It’s early days and loads planned for the winter with Butser Hill sessions thrown into the plan for sure. I don’t ever think I’ll ever enjoy the ups but that’s always going to be versus the preference of flats and downs – we all have preferences tho’ right? BIG thanks to Honor for inviting me and to Kim & Mick Carter (Alton Sports nee Absolute Running) for letting me join you all. Another comfortable 6 miles done yesterday with my eldest daughter. We’ve only ever run a couple of times together since she’s been an adult so spending a bit of time together before she heads back to Uni has been dead nice. Plan for this evening is to slot in another 6 esp as it looks like rain is on the cards and that'll be it until the longer one at the weekend. It’s weird how the blog has changed what I think about during...

Run for the hills....   Thursday’s run with my eldest wasn’t as wet as the forecast. To be fair, I was looking forward to the first soaked one but it held off and we were all good. Not a quick one but at least we were out and she’s a little trooper and all good prep for her ½ Marathon in Oct (when it’s more than likely to be wet and cold). Anyway another 6 in the “distance bank” and the weight doesn’t really bother me too much although the bag has started to rub quite a bit so I’m going to look into modifying it with some extra padding.   Saturday’s long one along the costal path went without drama but turned into a Sunday one instead. 10 ½ done with the modified pack to help the rubbing situation. I’ve stuffed a small towel at the bottom and it seems to have lifted the seam away from where it was making contact. Not sure how long it’ll last but for now, all’s good.   Out again tonight for a short(ish) hill run with the hill running group recommende...

Mind over Matter..   Having taught a few challenging classes this week, the plan for the remainder is to get out there and do a slow 6 miler on Thursday (with my eldest daughter) and a longer one on Saturday of around 10-12 miles.   Monday next week could be an interesting one too. A friend has told me about a local run group that holds a hill running session for all abilities that don’t like that kinda thing (that’s defo me!). It’s local and the distance is between 4 – 8 miles (depending on what you want to do) so it’ll fit nicely for me.   As I’ve said before, I detest going up but love coming down. The Amazon has some pretty tough ups apparently, so getting accustom to them and embracing them my “friend” is one of those components that needs to gets thrown into the flavor of the training mix.   One runner of this year’s event said that he’d wished he’d spent more time training for steep inclines. Power walking and jogging hills would’ve ...

Just when ya thought it couldn’t get any worse.. Didn’t run on Friday or Saturday but set time aside for core training instead. Nothing major Just planking, press-ups and crunches for 15 mins. Sunday, I’d decided would be the 10.5 miler I did the other day. Along the beach to Solent Breezes Caravan park & back. Up and outta the house fairly early Sunday morning. Slight drizzle and soft breeze. Temperature was down to a nice 16 degs so set off at a gentle pace. I keep reminding myeslf, it’s not about the duration and more about putting miles in the bank. Thing is, (and typical of me) ... I got to the fork in the road at about 5 miles in and rightly it wrongly took the longer route (which goes from the Haven back along the Stubbington 10k route). Planning in my head it’d have added about two miles to the planned 10.5 and feeling ok thought why not. After all I’d bumped into friends chillin' at the beach and had a 5 min natter so I was well r...

So much to learn & so many goals… Spurred on by the blog being posted by the charity I’ll be running for (Oakley Waterman Foundation) my last run held surprisingly less trepidation than I anticipated. Visualisation is undoubtedly the key for me and the planned training for yesterday’s ~6 miler was done pretty much without any drama and running with a friends absolutely took my mind away from the increased pack. I’m not denying it, the 8kg was horrendously heavy BUT all said and done, there’s no way I’d have completed it a couple of weeks ago. With the 1litre of water added to the kit we’re talking 9Kg in total. At least the UK temperature had dropped to something more tolerable and with a bit of a breeze it was a pretty nice run. The 2kg ramp-up was without a doubt the best way to go rather than simply loading it to the max from day 1. Legs still feel pretty good at this distance so now it’s a case of extending little by little. I still have...