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Couch to 5k day 12

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tired

Another week completed and I am now as my Californian Motivational Lady (henceforth known as CML) tells me I am “Half way to 5k – Yeaaa”. I did another pre-breakfast run partly because I was awake and partly because heavy showers were forecast for later on in the day Today’s effort consisted of a three-minute run followed by a two-minute walk, then two five-minute  runs with two minute walks, and another three minute run to finish the session off. As you can see the recovery walks are getting shorter. It gets worse next week.

In other news I have bought myself a Garmin Forerunner 15 watch. forerunner 15My excuse being that my old Polar Heart Rate Monitor had packed up and the Garmin also works as a HRM.. I think the battery in the chest strap had gone, and it isn’t possible to change the battery yourself. It has to go back to the manufacturer and it costs a small fortune. Though I must admit probably less than the Garmin watch cost. The main reason I bought it was that I am a bloke and I like gadgets.

As well as acting as a HRM it also records your runs. You can then download the data to your computer which then syncs it with Strava. Todays run is here if you are interested.
It also records you total steps for the day and tells you how far you have walked.

I almost forgot I am Halfway to 5K and have a badge to prove it.

1_2WayTo5K

 

Coping with loss, Running?

Couch to 5k Day 11

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tiredThere is a little bit more to today’s Couch to 5K post than just a record of my run. Today has been a hard day. I miss Grace every day, but today I seemed to be missing her even more than usual.

I have mentioned previously how grief or aspects of it sneaks up on you. Today was like that. I didn’t sleep particularly well last night, but that in itself isn’t that unusual. I haven’t slept well since Grace died. Also I have been told by others who have lost partners that it is common either to have difficulty in getting to sleep or as is normally my case, waking up in the middle of the night and not being able to get back to sleep.

I lay in bed about four in the morning wide awake and all I wanted was a cuddle. Not a hug, I needed a cuddle. Don’t get me wrong, hugs are great and you can give me as many as you want. Hugs are what you get from friends and family, but only your lover can give you a cuddle. That was how my day started.

One of my jobs this morning was to inspect the boilers in a nursery school. Walking in there with a load of bouncing four-year olds asking me who I was and what I was doing took me back to the days when Grace was still teaching. The only person more enthusiastic than her kids was her. She would be reading stories, showing them how to play tunes on old pots and pans and always encouraging them to work together and share. It wasn’t the school she worked at, but she would have loved the place. It was a happy memory, but still one that I needed five minutes on my own in the car to get over, before I could move on to the next customer.

Eating my lunchtime sandwiches in the park helped lift me slightly. After visiting the final client for the day, I thought it might be good to go and visit Grace’s grave. When I arrived at the cemetery there was a rather large funeral taking place in the same section that Grace is buried in. It just didn’t seem appropriate to go and have a talk to her. So I came home not feeling too great.

What I want to talk about though is the uplifting effect of running and talking to people. Just as I was about to set off my next door neighbour, Jackie, spotted me going out ( it wasn’t difficult I was wearing a fluorescent orange running top). So we talked for about half an hour before I set off on the latest run/walk/shuffle.

The programme has stepped up another gear. It now consists of a three-minute run followed by a two-minute walk, then two five-minute runs with three minute walks, finishing off with another three minute run. I am managing it so I guess that it proves yet again that the gradual increase in intensity is about right.

As I was finishing the run I was going past an older gentleman (probably not much older than me to be honest) taking a pre-dinner walk when my Californian Motivational Lady said something like “Awesome!!! You’ve done it!!! Cooldown walk for five minutes then Strreeeettcch!!!!” . Which caused him to look across in my direction. I explained what was going on and he nodded. His walk was taking him in the same direction as me, so we had a pleasant chat until we arrived at our house.

I arrived back home in a much better frame of mind than I had left. Running and interacting with people it’s worth remembering.

Running?

Couch to 5k Day 10

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tired

Into double figures and also into the fourth week. Again I woke up early, so I decided to do a pre-breakfast run. There is something enjoyable about being up early on a sunny summer Sunday morning and being out doing something before most people are awake.

I wasn’t up quite as early on this particular Sunday morning as I would have been a few years ago when my friend Mike and I used to take part in the London to Brighton Cycle Ride. That involved getting up around four in the morning in order to be up at Clapham Common in time for a six o’clock start. I used to enjoy the ride up. Apart from others making their way to the start the streets were normally deserted apart from the occasional survivor of a heavy night clubbing trying to find their way home. The fifty-eight miles down the Brighton usually took between four and a half and five and a half hours, depending on how often we stopped for a cup of tea and how enthusiastic we were. We would then find somewhere for lunch. I would normally cycle back, Mike usually got the bus back. It was a good day out but we haven’t done it for a few years. Maybe next year.

That hasn’t actually got a lot to do with my Couch to 5k progress. It’s getting serious. The runs are now distinctly longer than the walks. A three-minute run with only a two-minute walk, followed by two, four-minute runs with a three minute walk then another three minute run to finish. I am managing it, and I think I am getting faster. I overtook a seventy something lady and her West Highland Terrier yesterday – going uphill.

Running?

Couch to 5k Day 9

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tired

I have now completed week three of the programme. Like the days at the moment( until the 21st) the runs are getting longer and the walks are getting shorter. I am now doing three of three minute runs with two minute recover walks, bookended by a two, two minute runs.

I started on this programme for many reasons;

  • My mate Lord Wallington has been trying to get me to do the Roundshaw Downs Parkrun for ages and I thought that it might be an idea to be able to actually complete it.
  • I am a bit over weight and as my G.P. tells me “losing 10kg won’t do you any harm Mr Manderson”. Yes Dr Malik, I wish it was that easy.
  • Regular exercise (and hopefully losing a kilogram or two) helps with my diabetic control.
  • It takes less time than going for a cycle ride. Not that I am planning on giving up cycling, it’s just that I can change into my running gear, do the run and be back home and showered in less than an hour.
  • It also gives me a focus and a target, which helps a bit in coping with losing Grace.

What I am finding though is that it is harder on a sixty year old body than cycling. I get little niggly pains here and there that I don’t get from cycling. Possibly I am not running properly, or need different equipment. I do know that if your bike isn’t properly set up that you can get all sorts of problems stemming from that. I also know that with a properly set up bike you can do a long ride that leaves you so knackered that you can hardly get up off the sofa, but have absolutely no pain at all.

I am now as you can see officially a Rising Star and have a badge to prove it.

RisingStar

Running?

COUCH TO 5K DAY 8

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tired

I‘m back home again after a wonderful long weekend up in the Scottish Borders with my brother and sister (and their families). So no run up and around the Dunglass Estate today. Beddington park isn’t too shabby a substitute, but it’s not quite the same. I had the same routine as last Friday. That is two and a half minute runs with two and a half minute recovery walks.

Today is what should have been Sunday’s run. I skipped it because on Saturday I went up to the Hawick Common Riding for the first time in at least thirty years. I used to live in Hawick and the Common Riding is the main event of the year. I always involves a reasonable consumption of alcohol and probably a little more so when you meet with friends that you haven’t seen  for thirty years. Consequently I was feeling slightly fragile on Sunday morning and decided to skip the run. Monday was spent travelling back down to Wallington. Today was the first chance I got  to go for a run.

Strava again failed to record my run so there is no evidence. It is probably my fault but I will blame the app and/or my phone. I’m sure you will take my word for it though..

Running?

Couch to 5k Day 6

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tired
Well that is the second week of the project completed. I am now doing  1.5 minute runs followed by a two minute walk, six times. That is a little bit more than last time but it didn’t feel any harder, so I guess that it proves that the programme is working. I am gradually increasing my running fitness to the point where a 5k run will be a doddle (or a run in the park.)

There was a while this afternoon that I thought that I might have to revise my plans and do a swim instead. About two this afternoon we had the most amazing thunderstorm and downpour. I am probably exaggerating when I say that a months rain fell in ten minutes, but not by much. I was sitting in my office, writing my reports, when I became aware that water was cascading down outside my window. I thought that there was something wrong with the guttering, but the realised that it was caused by the fact that there was more water falling on the roof than the guttering could deal with. I looked out the front of the house and our street had turned into a river. There was, at that moment, just too much rain for the drains to cope with. Ten minutes later the rain had eased off and after half an hour the sun was back out and you wouldn’t have known that anything had happened.

The scenes about 500 metres from my house.

The technology is back up and jogging again so here is the Strava report on today’s run.

Running?

Couch to 5k Day 5

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tired

This post is a day late because a friend from way back is home from the United States for a holiday. He wanted to go out for a curry (apparently you can’t get a decent curry in the United States, or at least not in Ohio) so about a dozen of us did just that. Consequently I didn’t get round to posting last night.

Day 5: I was up and out bright and early this morning. I woke up a bit before six and lay and listened to the radio for a while. After about half an hour I decided that I might as well get up. Looking out of the window the sun was shining and the little birdies were singing so I decided that I would do todays run before breakfast. I did have a cup of coffee and a slice of toast, so I suppose that the run took place before second breakfast© JRR Tolkien

My technology failed me a bit, for some reason Strava only recorded the second part of my run. It lost the part up to the point where I stopped to take this photo. Perhaps it was trying to tell me that I am supposed to be running and not stopping to admire the view, but you must admit Beddington Park was looking particularly fine.

Beddington Park20160605

I think that the programme steps up a bit tomorrow. It either increases the number of segments or reduces the recovery times – or both. I’ll tell you about it if I survive.

Running?

Couch to 5K Day 3

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tired

Another walk/run/shuffle successfully completed. The format was the same as last time; a five minute warmup walk, then eight one minute runs with one and a half minute recovery walks. then a five minute warm down walk. It felt a bit harder today for some reason. I could be that it is colder and generally more miserable than it has been. Because of that I put a pair of long (cycling) tights on as well as an extra layer on top. Also I went out after I came home from work rather than going out first thing in the morning as I did the previous two times. It could also be that I was running faster. Strava tells me that I covered an extra 150m compared to Monday. So that quite possibly explains it. It felt harder because I was working harder.
DeterminationI also earned myself a determination badge. I suppose that it means that I didn’t give up after the first run.

The run also induced the beginnings of runner’s paranoia. This I believe, can be a very expensive disease to treat.

As I was running I was feeling a slight pain in my shins. This lead to thoughts along the lines of;
“Are my £50 Adidas cross-trainers providing adequate cushioning when I am running on the road?”
“Should I go out and buy myself a pair of proper running shoes?
“How much should I pay £100 – £150 – £200?”
“What is the best make?”
“I’ll Google it when I get home”
By the time I got home the paranoia had calmed down a bit, so I think I’ll stick with the £50  cross-trainers, at least for the time being.

Running?

Couch to 5K Day 2

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tired

Today was day two of my Couch to 5K adventure. Actually it was day three, but the app gives you a day off between runs (walk/run/walks) to get over the delayed onset muscle soreness, usually referred to as DOMS. This is necessary.

It upped the ante today. Day one was a five minute brisk walk as a warm up followed by six run/walk intervals consisting of a sixty second run followed by a ninety second recovery walk. The programme ended with a five minute warm down walk and stretches. Today they slipped in an extra couple of intervals. Other than having to extend my loop in the park to accommodate the extra distance I didn’t notice much difference, which is probably the idea.

So far the programme has been pretty good. The only thing I would like to change is the female voice prompt, who tells me when to start and stop running, which is fine. She unfortunately also says things in what I think is a Californian motivational accent, like “Keep going awesome runner!!!”, “You’re doing grrreat!!!” and “You’ve reached the halfway point fantastic!!!!!”. For me, it would probably work better if they had recruited an ex-sergeant-major to say thing like “Get your a*se into gear start running”, “I suppose your doing a little bit better than last time, but not much” or “OK you can have a rest – WALK – don’t just stop you lazy sod”.  From my perspective much more motivational.

Evidence if required is available on Strava.