12 weeks to go! and so to Week 5's Plan

Tomorrow is supposed to be a rest day, but depending on how my legs feel from the 2 hard runs this weekend I might be tempted to do a run with the running club tomorrow and take Tuesday as the rest day.  I should be able do Wednesday's run as planned, but Thursday's run will depend on timings, as I have to go to take Sarah to York University for her interview and open day.  Fingers crossed for her x   I'll probably do an easy run rather than the Parkrun on Saturday as I'm doing the Watford Half Marathon on Sunday.  It's a little ahead of the plan, but I've already managed to get an 11 mile run in last week, so hopefully will be okay.  The Watford Half is quite hilly (gaaagh!! Those dreaded hills again! :-/  ) so I'm not expecting a good time, but I've got another Half,  4 weeks later and hopefully by then I'll be getting up to speed (pardon the pun) 

29 Jan - 10km fast run from Trent Bridge

Today's run was supposed to be a 10K race, but I couldn't find one locally to fit around the rest of the day so I improvised and ran a route around the River Trent and Nottingham & Beeston Canal.  
My friend Dennis ran with me (for him it was a slow run) and he was great at pushing me all the way around (not literally unfortunately) and it took 57min 40 sec and although I was aiming for a 9 minute mile, ended up with 9:10 but was still very happy with that.  My fastest 10K ever was 55 minutes and that was nearly 2 years ago, but it'd be nice to think that by the end of this training I could beat that. 

28 Jan - Colwick Park Run - 5K

Officially today was an easy 3 miles, but 5 km is only a smidgen more so i did the Parkrun again (Ok not quite an easy pace though)


I got there on time this week hooray!!!  The weather was a lot better than before  hooray hooray !!!  :)  and I've got an official time:  27 minutes 50 seconds which works out at a 8:49 minute mile.  So now I have a target to aim for in future.  
There were 140 runners today and I was 72nd, but if I ever want to make myself feel a little better, I tweek the figures a little bit to see how I did for my age and sex.
I was 15th out of 62 women
and    6th out of 40 women over 35
and    2nd out of 24 women over 45   -  that sounds better doesn't it ;o)  sometimes it's good to be older!


So let's see how the fitness goes and see if I can inch myself further up the list 

26 Jan OMG - Hills!!!! The things I do to raise a few £££s

The worst aspect about running for me is hills!  I'd do anything to avoid them.   They hurt and they're painful.  Almost all of my running to date has been carefully chosen to run on flat routes, but I've realised recently that I really don't want to be out there running hard for 5 or 6 hours so I need to make this marathon as short as possible.  And to do that I'm going to have to increase the pace I run at.  If I can get even a little bit used to running hills it's going to make it easier for me to run faster when running on the flat.
Well I bit the bullet tonight and did one of the running club's Hill Sessions in place of the 4 mile run I was scheduled to do.  There were probably about 30 other runners from the club of all different levels of fitness  and we were all running up and down this hill a couple of miles from the club.  A little further each time.  Not surprisingly I was last but one, but I guess I've got to start somewhere.  We must have done this at least 10 times and I was absolutely shattered.  A good job tomorrow's a rest day!  


Relaxing now with my reward, a large glass of Shiraz - Cheers! 

25 Jan - A slow 7 miles (oops a little bit too slow)

I was looking forward to doing a slow run and being able to take it easy for once, so just set off with my ipod playing and didn't really bother about the pace.  As it was a slow-paced run, I took a slightly different route than I would normally have taken, and unusually for me it had a few hills.  Even though I hate them I thought I'd better get a bit of practice in as I've signed up for the Watford Half Marathon  as a training run in a couple of weeks and I hear that's a bit hilly.  Needless to say I got carried away with my music and ended up running slower than intended :(

24 Jan - Cold, wet, tired and feeling rough, really not in a mood for a run

but I did!!!    and that's because the whole aim of this is to raise as much money as possible for this really deserving cause and as much as I'd like to take a rest, why should anyone sponsor somebody that doesn't give their best effort and try their hardest.  


Todays run was 4 x 1/2 mile fast interval runs - These are second only to hill runs in being my most difficult training sessions.  I've never been any good at running fast and although I can fake some kind of composure when I run slow, style goes completely out the window when I run fast -  but needs must, these runs are supposedly good at helping me to develop fitness and speed.  I managed to keep my first and third runs to the target pace, but just fell short on the second and fourth intervals -  oh well maybe next time

3 weeks down 13 to go - Week 4 ahead

3 weeks done and dusted - 74 miles ran so far!
and here's the coming Week 4 plan:

22 Jan - 11 mile treadmill run along the River Trent

OMG how windy was it out there today!  

This is the forecast before I went out for my run:
and with a westerly wind most of the run was going to be into wind or a crosswind, but as I set off it felt like i was literally on a treadmill getting nowhere.  With hindsight, it would have been better to have run all the way out to Langar Airfield (south-east of Nottingham)and try and catch a lift or bus back, then the wind would have been behind me and I'd have breezed it :) Oh well I've never been much of a lateral thinker, maybe next time.  As it was even with the wind, I still managed to run the 11 miles in 1hr 48 minutes, which makes that a 9:54 minute mile, so quite pleased with that.


What I'm not so pleased at is my efforts to lose the pounds since enjoying the pre, during and post Christmas season and putting on 13lb over Nov/Dec.  Since starting the training I've managed to lose 3lb, it seems really slow, considering how much I'm running and I don't think I'm eating excessively, but I suppose it is coming off slowly.  What was really annoying though was that I weighed myself before my run and then again after the 11 miles and I was a 1lb heavier!!!  According to the Garmin, I'd burned off 1200 calories, but have actually put on weight.  Now where's the logic in that?  Grrrrrrr!!!

21 Jan - Park Run Virginity taken

Todays run was down as a 3 mile easy run/Park Run and I opted to do my first Park Run.  These are free 5K timed runs and are open to anyone.  They take place all over the country and my local one is at Colwick Park .


I know my timekeeping is really rubbish, so I made a real effort to get there early and was 10 minutes early to the Park entrance, but I hadn't taken into account that there was an automatic barrier with a £1 fee into the park and I didn't have any change on me :(  I was about to turn back for home when another new runner kindly offered me the £1.  
By the time we got to the start the rest were out of sight, but the stewards said we could carry on and catch up. As I was there I thought I might as well do the run anyway.  So I'm not sure how long the official start was before we started.  It took a while to catch up with the back runners and I didn't take my watch with me so although the official time has now come through as 31:46 I've no idea how many minutes (or seconds) the start was before I set off.  
A lot of the Saturday runs on the training plan can be taken as Park runs, so at least I've done one now, know how they work and can be a bit better prepared for next time.

20 Jan - 5 miles in the drizzle

Just woke after my 3 night shifts and looked out of the window to see a very grey sky and some horrible drizzle.  So I wasn't really looking forward to getting out in it, but surprisingly motivated to run, by a lot of e-mails I've received from other people running the London Marathon to raise money for the Epilepsy Society.  Everyone of them have been personally affected by epilepsy, with either themselves, relatives or friends suffering from it.  Another great reminder of why I put myself through this.  

If you are interested in finding out more of the work of the Epilepsy Society follow this link The Epilepsy Society

Today's run was a 3 mile steady run with a mile warm up beforehand and a mile cool down at the end.  It's easy to be fooled by the title of some of the runs and think it's just x-miles or y- interval runs, but it's always important to do a gentle run before and after to warm up the muscles and avoid  injuries, so the 3 mile run here is actually a 5 mile run, sneaky heh?!?   

The good thing about using the Garmin runs from Runners World is that  all the distances, times and paces for the runs are downloaded from the internet onto my Garmin GPS watch and the watch starts alarming at me when my pace is too slow or (not very often) too fast.  I've just uploaded the results from todays run back on to the Garmin site and it looks like I managed to keep the pace up spot on, so that's good news!  

Weather looking a little better for tomorrows run though :o)

17 Jan - 3 x 1mile interval sessions

A fairly nice, but chilly afternoon with a good interval session.  3 individual miles at <8:40 minute/miles, hard work, but I kept the pace up better than last weeks session.

Anyway, I'm signing off now for 3 nights at work, be back on Friday for my steady 3 miler.  Byeee!

16 Jan - 6 miles with HPRC

6 miles at a slowish pace as planned with Holme Pierrepont Runnimg Club.  
It's good to run with a group, it can be a bit lonely running by myself and when the weather isn't great it's easier to get motivated when you know you have someone else to run with.  It was pretty cold out tonight and there didn't appear to be a cloud in the sky, judging by the amount of stars out.  My car said it was 2°C on arrival, but I wouldn't be surprised if it was closer to freezing, but we soon warmed up with a run from the National Watersports Centre to Ladybay Bridge and along the Trent

15 Jan - Thank you Dennis :D - 5% of target reached

Thanks for your sponsorship Dennis and helping motivate me to keep up with the runs when I'd be inclined to weasel out of them.   I'm not holding out much hope for keeping up with your pace though.  


Week 3

This is the official plan for the week, but I've had to have a bit of a re-jig to fit in with my night-shifts and also get a run in with the running club I joined at the end of last year.  As I ran my long run yesterday, I've used today as my rest day, so I've planned on doing something along the lines of Wednesday's run with the running club tomorrow, Monday and will keep Tuesday's run as it is.  Then when I've finished my night shifts I'll do Thursday's run on Friday.  Saturday and Sunday runs will stay the same.  Confused??? It's not easy fitting it all in with my shifts 

14 Jan - My Nan the marathon runner

Just got a new donation, from my Nan (aged 92).  Apparently she tried to get a place for the marathon too, but was unsuccessful ;o)


Thanks Nan
xxxx

14 Jan - The gloves are on!

A very cold, ie. freezing 9 mile slow run done this morning. 
The first time I've had to wear gloves running for about 9 months, so mild has this winter been so far (that and the fact that I've probably chickened out of running in bad weather before this training plan started ;o)  The good thing about having a target to go for is that it motivates you to get out there and get the job done whatever the weather.  The plan was to do 8 miles, but as I'd had to miss out one of my runs this week, a thought I'd put in the extra mile.
A slightly different offering on the ipod today though, listening to some old Stephen Fry pod-casts - a little different and not as funny as I'd expected or even motivational, but interesting  enough to take my mind off 9 miles running.

13 Jan - Yay! A brisk run at a brisk pace :D

Today's run was a 2 mile brisk run (a brisk pace being 8:57 - 8:37 minute miles) with a warm up mile beforehand and a cool down mile at the end.  The idea being to increase my speed overall for the marathon.  This is the part of running that I find the most difficult as I've never been able to run fast, let alone sprint, so always find these runs difficult.  These training runs will build up to 4 mile brisk runs.
Anyway checking on my GPS, it looks like I managed 8:50 miles so very pleased with that.

13 Jan - Coldplay keeping me at a slow pace

I think I've found the trick to keeping me slow.  I did my 5 slow miles yesterday listening to my ipod shuffle and  a playlist of songs that Coldplay sang at their concert that we went to last month.  It was just the right pace and with listening to the music I was a bit more relaxed.  It'll be interesting to see if I can make it work later today when I do a mile's slow jog either side of a brisk 2 miler.

11 Jan - Long interval run

Yay!!!I've found my Garmin GPS watch.  No wonder I couldn't find it though, it had fallen into my pile of ironing which is usually avoided for as long as possible ;o)


It was left till today to get my first run of the week in, because just as I thought, I didn't get away from work till late yesterday and it was a tough shift anyway.  But fortunately today it was nice and mild out, so pretty much ideal conditions I guess.  It started with a gentle warm up mile but I ran that a little faster than I should have. It sounds strange but I find it really hard to run very slow. Anyway that's probably partly why the 1 1/2 mile intervals at a fast pace were a little bit slow.  
I might not have quite got the pacing quite right, but all in all, not a bad run considering I'm still trying to get up to speed after 6 weeks or so of taking it easy.  


Right tomorrow it's back to slow for a 5 mile recovery run  :)

8 Jan - Week 2 coming up

One week down, 15 to go and this is the plan for the coming week.  Tomorrow is a rest day.  Normally the way the plan works is that after a particularly strenuous run there follows a rest day.  My long runs are usually on the Sunday, so most Mondays are rest days, this works well for me this week particularly as I'm at work tomorrow and won't be home till 8ish in the evening.  
Most of the plan is made up of 5 training runs a week, so with working 2 or 3 121/2 hr  shifts, I may well be skipping some of the runs.  It may get easier to do the runs once the days start getting longer.  This week I'm working Monday and Tuesday so will probably do the first run this week on Wednesday unless I come home from work on Tuesday feeling particularly perky.  

8 Jan - Weekend's running

2 runs this weekend!   Saturday's run was an easy 3 miler,  just as well, as I've been absolutely shattered after my latest two shifts at work.  


Todays run was better, the earlyish night must have helped and managed 7 miles.  A friend Ian (aka Dennis ran with me) so it was nice to have company.  We started running along the River Trent and followed that until we picked up the Nottingham & Beeston Canal, it's one of the nicer routes to run here in Nottingham.  It's probably been a couple of months since I've run this far, and have been finding even the smaller runs quite difficult, so with 5 runs under my belt this week, I'm hoping that I'm soon going to be feeling a little more comfortable

Thank you, Thank you Thank You!!!!!!

Thank you sooooo much Mum & Dad for being first to sponsor me. £50!!!!!  I am stunned - Love you loads :D xxx

5 Jan - 12 1/2 hr Shift followed by a 2 mile run

Feeling really chuffed with myself today :)  


After a long shift at work, I got home at 8pm and actually went out for my scheduled run.  It was a bit dark and blustery out there still - not very appealing, but I still managed to get out and do the steady 2 miles, not that far but a bit faster than yesterday.  Unfortunately I've 'misplaced', my Garmin GPS watch - misplacing being a common occurrence with me, (it's probably with other frequently 'misplaced items such as my my keys, purse or mobile).  The GPS helps me to run at the appropriate pace, but by timing it I think I pretty much kept up ith it.


A rest day tomorrow, well from running, but not from work ;o)

4 Jan - First 2 runs ticked off

After a slight late start to training, due to a belated New Year celebration (I was actually working New Years Eve)   First 2 runs now done and dusted.

I'm using the Runnersworld Garmin-Ready schedules for my runs and they are based on a target time of 4hrs.  I'm not sure I can make it around quite that fast, but I thought it would give me a good pace to aim for.  Thankfully it looks like it starts off nice and gently with a total of 19 miles for the first week

I've been a bit slacking with my running over the last month and that together with overindulging in one or 2 mince pies, means it's going to take a bit more running to work off those extra pounds.  

So 3 miles done yesterday and 4 miles today, and just like the description says, they were nice and slow :) .  The wind out there helped keep them slow, with a local wind speed of 19 knots, gusting to 39, yikes!  I hope it starts to die down soon.

Tomorrow I'm working a long day shift (7am till 7:30pm), so not looking forward to trying to fit in tomorrows run after work.  Thankfully, I've only got to do 2 miles though.

Alli & Tina's London Marathon blog to raise funds for the Epilepsy Society!!!!

Well this is my first ever attempt at blogging, so first of all please try and bear with me
.... and secondly this is a 'blog' related to my efforts at training to run the London Marathon,  so the objective is to hopefully give people a bit of an idea what I'm going through to raise funds for this very important cause.  Not only will I have to run 26.2 miles around London to complete the marathon on 22nd April, but I will have to run around another 560miles in the 16 weeks leading up to it!!!!


A lot of you may well think I'm mad (and you're probably right! ) but there is reason to my madness as I'm running it to raise funds for a very worthwhile charity, the Epilepsy Society! Charities raising funds for epilepsy are very important and personal to me since losing my very dear friend Tina Wiseman to this condition.  She was a vibrant energetic girl who tried hard not to let epilepsy get in the way of her quality of life.  She was very outgoing with a quirky sense of humour and took part in many different activities such as skydiving (where we met), skiing and potholing, however she was sadly taken away from us far too soon at the age of 37 by SUDEP (Sudden unexpected Death in Epilepsy).  


My mission is therefore to raise as much money as possible to help sufferers and their families through the Epilepsy Society's funding of programmes of awareness, research and caring.