OKish

OKish by leecolgate at Garmin Connect - Details

Went out this morning for today's 40-minuter, all full of hope if not yet expectation.  And probably a good thing too, because I am still far from being great at this running thing.

Icing the achilles is most definitely making a difference, but it does still get quite painful at anything over a half hour.  Add to that this morning's stunning heat levels and absence of breeze and it was a bit of an uncomfortable experience, with underwhelming results.

I am making a concerted effort to consume more 'proper' carbs regularly, but I still ran out of energy about 25 minutes into today's session.  I'm hoping that is symptomatic of the sapping quality of the humid heat and nothing else.  Limping home on final reserves of almost zero was a tiring and humiliating experience, compounded by the group of young men I almost ran into at the end with not-wearing-a-shirt-without-making-people-ill physiques.  I have been avoiding the seafront so far, but am fairly sure it will be covered with men who should never be allowed to remove their tops, who nevertheless have.  Men, in fact, with bodies like mine (or worse) who don't understand the profound physical and mental effects on other people of having to look at a state like that.

In other news, we had a lovely time at a garden centre this afternoon, where we purchased more plants for the herb garden and Colin got a folding bike.  Exciting side effect of this is that I have permission to go ahead and get the motorbike I need to be independently mobile and travel further afield in search of freelance work, which I'm very excited about.

Feet up, ice packs at the ready this evening, hoping to be recovered for Tuesday's session.  I have loads of recorded sport to watch this evening (caught the GP in full - damn FB and all my friends for  their spoilers - missed quite a bit of the athletics), but can afford a bit of a lie in with working from home tomorrow.  Am also hoping to make a date to catch up with my old team next week at some point.  Plenty to look forward to!

If you are enjoying these blog posts, please consider sponsoring me in support of Diabetes UK at JustGiving. Many thanks.

Niggles under control

Niggles under control by leecolgate at Garmin Connect - Details

When I got up yesterday, my ankle was far too sore, so I gave up on the idea of a run before work.  Within half an hour (typical!) it was feeling much better and I realised I could have done one.  It was far too late by then, though.

So I made a fixed plan to do that session today.  Again, when I woke up, I was in some pain, but it eased significantly by the time I was dressed and caffeinated and off I trotted.  All went pretty well, considering.  It's not the best half hour I've done, but it's far from the worst and I'm in no significant discomfort achilles-wise afterwards.

I'm still finding my breathing generally more of a problem than my muscles, but this will continue to improve the longer I can remain smokeless.  The planned session for today is just 10 minutes of easy running, which hardly seems worth bothering with and is the reason I did yesterday's instead.  I might go out and do it later, if I feel like it.

My weight has fallen sightly since last time I bothered checking and I'm about to take my body measurements again to see if there's any change going on.  I hope there will be, come the big day.  I'm more confident now about making to the start line, if not about flying around the course in an impressive fashion.

If you are enjoying these blog posts, please consider sponsoring me in support of Diabetes UK at JustGiving. Many thanks.

Robbed. But not of anything much.

I may have mentioned during my last post that my achilles was playing up a tad.  Well, it got worse.  I could hardly walk when I woke up on Monday after last Sunday's hideousness and, having researched the problem, I believe I have whatever they call tendinitis now they've stopped calling it tendinitis.  (Incidentally, why 'tendinitis' in 'tendons'?  Also, why do so many spellcheckers appear not to know what apostrophes or quotation marks are?  Or, indeed, spellcheckers.)

And all the guidance is to massage (doing it), use ibuprofen (doing it, but why if there's no inflammation and hence no tendinitis), ice (started doing it) and, ahem, rest for 12 weeks.  Well, I'm sorry, but the sodding event is in 12 weeks.  So I took a week off and am happy to report that things are much improved.  I can walk like a normal person.

And I did a sodding run this morning, but my GPS appears to be having a mid-life crisis or something and despite its telling me it uploaded the details of the session to Garmin, they are not there.  I know for a fact that on the brightest day, with the fewest clouds, for many a run day, it didn't pick up my location until 13 minutes in.  So it would have all been wrong anyway.  But it would be nice to have a link to the map to prove I'd done it, nonetheless.  It was hard work and I didn't cover all that much distance, but it would be nice to know, you know?

During the run, the achilles was more of a niggle than the crippling monster I have been contending with.  Afterwards, it did get a bit worse for a while, but the stretching, massage, ibuprofen and ice have apparently sorted that out for the most part.  I'll try again Thursday (will have to be very early morning, I'm working again) and see how it goes.  Getting very nervous about being even slightly ready for the big day right now.

If you are enjoying these blog posts, please consider sponsoring me in support of Diabetes UK at JustGiving. Many thanks.

Owwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww!

Owwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww! by leecolgate at Garmin Connect - Details

Nuf said?  As well as the achilles pain that never really goes away, I got horrendous cramp in my right calf today.  I stopped twice to stretch, but after the third time I simply couldn't get moving again.  Colin and car to the rescue.

I still have 3 months to get this all sorted out, but today was painful and not enjoyable in any way.

If you are enjoying these blog posts, please consider sponsoring me in support of Diabetes UK at JustGiving. Many thanks.

Short sharp shock

Short sharp shock by leecolgate at Garmin Connect - Details

Just a little 20-minuter today.  Which was nice.  Given that I had to fit it in around getting the car some new shoes (£600!!! I might as well have a girlfriend, for god's sake!!!!!), the usual Saturday chores and generally feeling all old, tired and decrepit.

It went OK and I stuck to my stated aim of setting myself pace targets and keeping to them.  I'm really, really hoping to try to keep this pace up for a proper long run - tomorrow's is 90 minutes and we'll see how it goes.

I've also looked online to see what the advice is on the achilles pain I'm having.  Apparently, tendinitis is no longer accepted as a valid complaint, there often being no inflammation involved.  It's all about the stretching, some massaging and, if I'm feeling very brave, some icing.  So that's what I'm doing.  I cannot afford 12 weeks of rest for it to resolve itself at its own pace!!!!!!!!!!!  (This is the advice if what I'm doing doesn't work.)

Carbing up today in preparation and hoping, even if the sun doesn't come out, that the wind sods off.

If you are enjoying these blog posts, please consider sponsoring me in support of Diabetes UK at JustGiving. Many thanks.

Pace run done!

Pace run done! by leecolgate at Garmin Connect - Details

Finally, finally I have done a run that was about more than just plodding along for as long as possible!!! These are the essential sessions I really need to keep on top of, to improve my pace and not just my stamina in the build up to the big day.

It never used to be possible to upload pace goals from Garmin Connect to my pedometer, but this can now be done, and I have to say, it made an ENORMOUS difference to today's session.  Despite the blustery and generally foul conditions (it's June, for crying out loud), I sped up when I was told to and slowed down similarly. I am definitely going to do this on every session from now on.  It forces me to push myself and can only be good for me.

I also dropped below 12 stone today for the first time in many months and have started measuring various bits of what I laughably refer to as my body. I'll do this weekly on a Saturday and, even if my weight tends to plateau at various stages should therefore have some other way of measuring my progress to keep me on the straight and narrow.

Putting the finishing touches on another project deliverable today, with a visit from sister and nephew hopefully later on.  All in all, a goodish day. :-)

If you are enjoying these blog posts, please consider sponsoring me in support of Diabetes UK at JustGiving. Many thanks.

Ho hum

Ho hum by leecolgate at Garmin Connect - Details

So, fitting running around working so far has proved slightly problematic.  But I think I'm finally getting myself together.  At least, I'm going to bed and getting up at a sensible hour, regardless of whether I'm then heading into a client's office.

Today's schedule was further buggered by my printer's running out of 3 different colours of toner (typically, I had only bought the one at the weekend), necessitating a bus ride to get replacements and scuppering the plan of running before I did anything else today.  The sorted, however, I did finally get out for today's 40-minuter.  As is becoming normal, the pace was slightly short of blistering, but I am not getting any of the muscle twinges I have suffered with recently and my achilles are not feeling too bad, either.

All being well, I should get up and run again on Thursday morning. Watch this space.

If you are enjoying these blog posts, please consider sponsoring me in support of Diabetes UK at JustGiving. Many thanks.

Is that all?

Is that all? by leecolgate at Garmin Connect - Details

I probably could have managed this session yesterday morning as planned before work - YES, WORK! - but it would have been pushing it a bit and I erred on the side of caution.

I thought I'd timed it today to miss all the darling children being dropped off at school by very relieved parents, but actually ran into several blockages along the route.  I have to attribute the slight disappointingness of the distance and pace measures to this, because it felt rather good.  I have been suffering with really, really tight achilles tendons the past few weeks and they were making their presence felt again today, but I felt much more relaxed than the last half hour session, but did not cover as much distance.

I'm in a client sign-off phase of my current consultancy project and will spend the next few days finishing off outside - I need to re-stain the fence (5 years on, it's looking a bit patchy) and pressure wash the guttering and patio.  I'm also getting very excited as my roses ll get ready for their first blooms.  I had thought I'd have a few open by now, but checking this morning I found that the ones I thought were close appear instead to have been eaten from inside by some pest.  I have noticed some ichneumon wasp-looking things out there the past few days and wonder if they might be responsible?  Anyway, real flowers cannot be too far off and I'm hoping for another decent album of garden pics this year.

Off to the tip now and then it's manual labour time.  Loving this weather!

If you are enjoying these blog posts, please consider sponsoring me in support of Diabetes UK at JustGiving. Many thanks.

Catastrophically poor show

Catastrophically poor show by leecolgate at Garmin Connect - Details

What with one thing and another, this is the longest run I have so far achieved.  And, given that I stopped to chat during the 1-hour session a month ago, and skived last weeks's, it was optimistic at best to expect any kind of decent pace today.  But I had hoped at least to be able to complete the whole thing without walking.  Sadly not.

I have clearly reached a level of decrepitude and feebleness that requires a much more serious approach.  And, with Colin's having just started on the whole WeightWatchers kick, now would appear to be the right time.  So (and I know I've said this before, but there is now additional financial pressure coming into play here), it's definitely reduced alcohol for the foreseeable for me.  And I will be making a concerted effort to eat pasta the day before each run and more vegetables and salad and stuff like that generally.  I am still carrying around a load more weight than I am used to having to deal with, no matter how rude I've been about myself in this area in previous years.  I thought not smoking would make much more of a difference to my capabilities here, but by itself it's clearly not enough.

Adding into this picture the fact that I have, temporarily from tomorrow, some gainful employment and therefore a need to get up and get going in the morning, I'm hoping a significant lifestyle change is on the cards here.

If you are enjoying these blog posts, please consider sponsoring me in support of Diabetes UK at JustGiving. Many thanks.

Spring? This time?

Spring? This time? by leecolgate at Garmin Connect - Details

No long spiel today.  Can't be bothered.  First run of the week, went OK.  Spent the rest of the day putting finishing touches to outside spaces, which we'll rearrange for proper vegetating in the evenings to come, tomorrow.  Hurrah.

If you are enjoying these blog posts, please consider sponsoring me in support of Diabetes UK at JustGiving. Many thanks.