My last week training before Tough Mudder



A great place to run!
 

I’ve had a rather varied and interesting training week so far. An unexpected day off on Sunday saw me making an appearance at the Parkour Generations weekend wake up class held in Elephant and Castle. The class size was absolutely bloody enormous, twenty people in total! Thrown by the absence of a large, white, woolly hat, I managed to start proceedings well by politely introducing myself to someone that I have actually met and trained with three times (sorry Kevin!). I only realised about halfway through the class why he seemed familiar! I haven’t trained at Elephant and Castle very much at all, so was chuffed that we were taken to an area that I had never seen before. It was a sort of long section of disused flats, full of wall, rails and flat space for sprinting and quadrepedal movement. As we discovered, this area was also full of graffiti and litter, making footing a little precarious!

After some variations on running (forwards, backwards, sidesteps, etc.), designed to warm us up, the first challenge was climbups onto a wall. Pretty chuffed that I can now pull myself into the wall without my feet sliding down whilst in a cat position, although by the end of this section I was struggling a little. At some points we had to hold ourselves at waist level on the wall, and then remove first our left and then our right hands. I just had to hold myself at waist without moving for this part! Don’t have the strength yet, I don’t think, but actually not sure how it’s even possible without face planting! Next, we all lined up, and had to get across obstacles to the wall, then turn round and go back as fast as we could. As there were twenty people in the class, we had to do this twenty times in a row. The only rest we had was when you were at the end, you would shout out your name then run along the front of the line. Each person would start the route as you passed them, and then you got to rest for that one (aren’t they kind!). When doing the route there was definitely an aspect of not wanting to be the last one back! So I found myself sort of clumsily clambering over things rather than trying to Parkour over. When I did try to step vault over the rail, I slipped and smacked my knee. Bah! After we had done twenty of these, we were told we needed to do the whole route in twenty seconds or less. And if we didn’t manage it, we would do it again until we did manage it! Instantly, every person in the line was standing to attention with one foot forward, ready to go. We had all already run through the route twenty times each, so we weren’t keen to do many more reps than necessary! It took the group two times, and then once to go through the route twice in under a minute.

After this, instructor Andy set up a miniature version of what he called ‘The Morzine mega-route’, including gate climbs, wall runs, monkey walk, and incorporating in some rather unusual graffiti at the top of the slope before turning round. People were split into expert/amateur pairs (guess which one I was?). I managed to smack my shin about one minute into the demo, and with a small squeak I slid down and staggered over to the nearest grassy knoll. Then I had to sit and pretend my whole leg hadn’t gone dead to every second person who passed me asking if I was alright. I could see in the distance that instructor Chris was making his way over, and I tried my best to get up before he got there. However, my leg didn’t feel like cooperating at that moment, so instead I managed an awkward bum shuffle along the grass.

“You alright?” He called.

“Yup, absolutely fine!” I said through gritted teeth. I could see everyone else disappearing into the distance, and I was annoyed at falling back. Ever hit yourself in the shin? Well until have you have, dear reader, don’t judge the wimpiness! After a minute, I managed to get myself up and hobble after the tailwind of the main group. Another member of the group, a man in a red t-shirt, actually came back and ran with me at this point, which was very nice!

Then ‘The Megaroute’ was started in earnest, and I think I did pretty well overall (many thanks to my expert partner Juad, who was very patient with me). The highlight was doing the wall run at a fairly decent height for me, and the low point was having to be given a knee/shoulder boost because I couldn’t lift my own weight up one section. After some work on precisions, we did some killer core strength conditioning in which we held our legs out and straight off the floor, leaning back but not resting shoulders or head, for about five bloody minutes! I am definitely looking forward to ‘The Morzine Megaroute’, which is apparently about 2km long!

 

After smacking myself once in each leg during Parkour class, I was a little worried about my planned run on Monday morning. I was going to one of my favourite places to run, in Alexandra Park. This has a great flat section to start on, and then goes into hilly woods which provide a little challenge to navigate around. It’s also so beautiful there, dappled sunlight through the trees in one section and an amazing high view in another. I needn’t have worried about my knee, as I shot round at a great pace, my fastest mile completed in about 6.15 minutes! I even went down the big, steep hill, then turned straight back round and went back up it! I managed to do this by sort of pretending that I wasn’t really going up a hill at all, acting and breathing completely normally until I couldn’t fool myself anymore! I’ve found that this is a great running Jedi  mind trick. My other trick for the difficult top section of a hill is to do a finger count of three or five as you climb it. In this way ‘I’ve got to get to the top’ becomes ‘I’ve got to run for five more seconds’, which is much more feasible.

I was astounded and amazed when I stopped and checked my workout, as this is the fastest pace i’ve ever done, including my brief spate of road running! After running, I did three circuits of arm and core conditioning. I was planning to do four, but my form began to suffer. I used the two arm conditioning Park Gym machines, then did assisted press-ups, planks, sit ups and stomach crunches.

 

After all this, I was feeling great, but very achy! So I was looking forward to the evening, when I had made plans with friends to go swimming in the still rather chilly Hampstead Heath ponds. Although it isn’t as bad as the Baltic conditions I experienced in December and January, eleven degrees Celsius is still pretty damn cold as we all discovered! I was hoping it would act as a sort of ice bath for my muscles. I realised that I was the wimp of the bunch when I came out of the changing cubicle in full Skins to find my friends wearing only skimpy swimsuits! This choice meant that they ushered me into the water first. I gingerly stepped down the ladder and cast off with a gasp. Brr! But the good thing about this temperature is that it’s cold enough to test you, but not so cold as to completely incapacitate you, and make you want to exit the water straight away. I was blessing my Skins, as even with a hole in them they protected me from the ‘burning’ feeling of cold water for quite a long time, whilst my friends were lamenting! We all did three laps of the pond, and then the lifeguard came out and told us that she thought we had been in long enough and that we should probably get out soon. Perhaps the cries of “Jesus Christ!” and “It burns!!!” were a little too loud! However, writing this from the perspective of the next day, I do feel that it helped my muscle recovery a lot, especially my arms. They were literally tremoring after my arm circuits, which normally means ache city the next day. But they feel pretty okay!

So all in all, a nice and varied start to this week’s training! Scarily, this is my last week of training before Tough Mudder! Next week will be a rest week, so i’d better make this one count! To this end, i’m planning one more run, one more swim (in an indoor pool) and two more Parkour sessions. I’m also counting the ice wall climb i’m doing (hey it’s a physical activity!). Come the weekend I will be stopping all exercise, crossing my fingers and trying not to freak out too much at the thought of the looming Tough Mudder. Wish me luck, guys!

 

Flatt7

Rambling thoughts on the run - A question of pace



Me out for a group jog last August (2cnd from right)

On Monday I went on a ten kilometre run. After about two weeks of doing only seven kilometre runs at slow pace (plus quite a lot of Parkour), I decided to take the start of my run pretty easy so that I didn’t run out of steam before the end. I did a bit of stretching, then walked for five minutes to get my limbs going. I had just stepped out onto the starting path of my run when the timer indicated that it was time to go! So I set off at my planned plodding pace, on a mostly flat but very slightly downhill path. After a couple of minutes I spied a swishing ponytail in the distance that indicated a fellow female runner, and I decided that I would keep this pace, her just in the distance, as a marker to ensure that I didn’t accidentally speed up. Except that didn’t quite happen. Concentrating on my breathing, I glanced ahead again to discover I had halved the distance between us.

Shit on it!

I didn’t think I had sped up! I tried pulling back, but she came nearer and nearer. Her movements looked like fast, active running, and I was bewildered as to how I was accidentally catching her up! I started running on the balls of my feet, pretty much on the spot. Still, before long I passed her, and she was watching my back disappearing. I’m so annoyed at myself! Pace control is an important skill for any runner, and I just had an epic fail.

Looking back over my Nike Plus, I first commented on my inability to consciously regulate my pace in August 2012. In August and September my fastest running pace was 7.24 min/mile, and my average was just over 8 min/mile. The jump was huge, just three months after I started running at 11.49 min/mile. As my pace increased, so too did the negativity of my training run comments. “Quite lethargic” said one, and even “What’s wrong with me?” I took on board the link between the increase and how I was beginning to feel during the runs. I know that increasing mileage by too much too quickly can lead to overtraining effects such as an increased risk of injury. So surely it was the same with pace of runs? I eased back to 8.40 min/mile, and as I began to train Parkour more regularly, 9 min/mile. Until I had accidentally upped my pace and couldn’t correct it, I thought I was spinning along at a nice, medium and most importantly, controlled pace.

Pacing back in August
 

All this thinking about pace took me back to when I was travelling to a race in Mid March, and my, let’s say sedate looking, taxi driver told me that any runner of value was doing at least 8.30 min/mile. Needless to say I took the utterance with a little pinch of salt, but his attitude definitely reflects that of many people – that a faster running pace should be more important than pace control or indeed your enjoyment of the run.

But, I wonder, am I immune to this kind of pace snobbery? Didn’t I in fact feel a tiny bit of one-upmanship as I passed the other runner on the trail? Well, maybe a little. Since my pace revelation began in August last year, I very rarely run faster than anyone else out on the trails. I almost couldn’t believe that I had passed her even though I was trying my hardest not to, and it did make me a little proud of myself despite the lack of pace control it demonstrated. This feeling also manifested itself when I saw a post on social media recently in which a runner with only one mile to go was told “Only another ten minutes.”, and they replied “Maybe on a bike!” I thought to myself: What pace are they running that they think a ten minute mile is only possible on a bike??

Then I have to catch myself, for it is the same mentality that leads people to mindlessly chase personal bests with no thought as to whether they are enjoying themselves, or even as to whether pounding out these 5 min/mile or 6 min/mile paces are even benefitting their health anymore. I wonder if people driven by this obsession are looking at me, judging me for plodding along ever so slowly in comparison to them, rather than examining their own running habits. I am determined that the feeling of running, the freedom and the fitness, should always overcome any arbitrary factors that anyone may judge my or their running by.

I am feeling quite pleased at this conclusion as I reach the end of the first path. I did a few loops around hilly woodland before beginning to run back along to my starting point. Joining back with the main path, I was astounded to see the other runner only just entering the woodland area. We passed each other with a nod and a smile.

Blimey! I thought. How slow was she running??

Oh bugger. I think the pace bug bit me. I never said my philosophy was perfect.

 

Flatt7, slowcoach extraordinaire.

Aqua Zumba

As many of you will know, the day job that I daren’t give up is as a trainee veterinary nurse. So this is why I know about the use of hydrotherapy water treadmills, usually in dogs with arthritis (just you try doing that to a cat!). The idea behind this is that the slight water resistance as the dog keeps its feet on the floor and yet has to push against the water to walk will help to strengthen the muscles in the limbs and eventually reduce pain. Now you may be wondering whether on earth you’ve stumbled into the wrong blog here! But the reason that I am explaining all this is that I think I have just experienced the human equivalent – Aqua Zumba!

When I first saw the advert for the class, I knew I had to try it out! But I also thought it would probably be really easy. After all, I do a lot of fitness stuff – how hard can splashing about in the water be? Well, when you’re stomach deep and trying to drag your unwilling limbs through the water to a zesty Latin beat, it’s pretty bloody hard!

The class is held in Highbury and Islington pool from 9pm-10pm on Tuesday nights. It is important to note that this particular night is ladies only night, so sorry guys, if you were thinking of trying, you may need to research a different, mixed class. For the class they closed off most of the pool and just had one tiny little strip that could accommodate one person swimming up and down. They also lowered the temperature of the pool quite a few degrees in preparation for all the exertion and jumping up and down. But it wasn’t too bad! A couple of other women warned me that the pool was freezing just before I was about to get in! It was probably about 20 degrees? I told that I had swum at 3 degrees, at which they both simultaneously shivered at the thought and began to back away slowly!

After a few minutes the instructor Judy Milner appeared to start the class. She was a very energetic woman, and overall got really into the dances. At a couple of points during the class the instructor even fell off her perch as she was dancing! Although she did divulge that she was feeling a little bit under the weather, so not sure if it was enthusiasm or fever! Frequently she tried to elicit claps, smiles and cries of ‘Hey!’ from the class. I joined in with these gamely, but felt that very few people did it, maybe for fear of looking stupid? Ever since I put one foot across a small gate and it opened before I could get the other across, leaving me helplessly straddling the swinging gate in an ungainly position until somebody bodily lifted me off of it, I no longer consider this factor. I’ve already been down to that point and then some!

The first few dances were a warm up. They were energetic and followed on quickly from each other. Straight away she launched into the dances, and I tried to fight the water drag to keep up with her. I was actually really enjoying splashing the water about, gamely ignoring the near drowning of those around me (this only really occurred to me later!) for the first two dances. Then she paused her tape and made a pointed announcement quite probably aimed at me. “In Aqua Zumba, we do our arm movements underwater, okay?” Humbled, I had to calm down a bit for the rest of the class.

A few of the songs that were played were the same as the normal Zumba songs, so it was nice to hear some familiarity, especially as the variety was in the dance that was tailored to the water environment. I was especially chuffed to hear ‘Ari Ari’ by the Bombay Rockers! I love this song so much that it is one of my running songs. And I was even more intrigued when the whole class had to get into a big circle to start! We did choppy hand movements and hoppy leg movements, all the while bopping round in a circle! The dance ended with a ‘Hokey Cokey’ style circle close and open. This was all punctuated with the surprise use by the instructor of a very loud whistle. She did not shout instructions for this song, or dance it all out, but mostly waved her hands and blew the whistle enthusiastically. But for the rest of the songs she did shout or gesture instructions as well as dance.

The atmosphere in the class was jovial, but there wasn’t any time to chat to any of the other participants, as the dances were following thick and fast! Still, I was corrected a couple of times for mistakes I made, mostly when my confusion started drifting the whole class to the right in an attempt to prevent bumping into me!

I love the fact that they have this particular class only for women. Women who do not want to be in swimsuits around men, maybe for fitness or religious reasons can come and feel comfortable. The employees are all female at this time too. This is definitely one to try! But be prepared to be feeling the ache in your legs the next day – I know I am!

Information about Highbury & Islington Aqua Aerobics classes can be found here: http://www.aquaterra.org/highbury-pool-and-fitness-centre/aqua-aerobics

Follow the instructor Judy Milner on Twitter @DosSeis.

Flatt7

Ps. Photographs not taken in order to respect the privacy of those attending the Ladies only nights.

Fens of Fury



Fens of Fury

Today I spent the day going to Cambridge and participating in the adventure run Fens of Fury! Now as the course wasn’t quite varied enough to do a full narrative style review, i’ll just highlight the main aspects of the course and the event in general.

The first thing to mention is of course the amazing events village! For the first time in one of these types of runs, the event village was actually a pleasure to sit in. This was partially due to the perfect weather (sunny, with a slight breeze) and also because there was a pizza stall, a beer stall and a cake stall! Seriously, what else do you need in life, ever.

Fired Up pizzeria with enthusiastic staff!

A big group of people waited quite a long time for the shuttle bus (despite promising to run them until 11am, I strongly suspect they weren’t planning to come back out until a member of the group rung them). This meant when I got to the ground it was so close to my wave, and I wasn’t even changed, panic stations were setting in a bit. But they changed me over to a later wave with absolutely no hassle, which I was chuffed with!

I spent a bit of time changing and cuddling with Milly the dog (who I managed to get fully lying down and showing me her tummy in glee!), and then ran over to the start line for the beginning of my wave. Now was the start of my struggle with the safety pins! Seriously guys, they were terrible, might have done a better job with blue tack. Along the course I found myself constantly repinning my number, losing two of the pins along the way.



A brave team tackles the obstacles
 

Onto the course itself! Now the majority of the course was very gently undulating grassland, springy underfoot and very pleasant to run on. In my personal preference, it was a little too pleasant for an adventure run! There should be surrounding grunts and cries of “Are you KIDDING me??!” or it’s no fun! But they did spice up proceedings with a few obstacles. The first ones were hay bales, which were such good fun to spring up and dive down from! I really enjoyed this section, actually. A massive ditch needed to be jumped across, with ropes to help you up the other side. Although there were some brave souls just leaping, i’m afraid I sort of edged down the bank and did a little hop across. Yes, i’m still ashamed... There was a cargo net to go under. Is it worrying that I now feel weird going under a cargo net if i’m not spitting out mud? At one point the path curved round into a woody bit and we had to hop over a tree. There was a cool muddy bit with sucking mud and water, and a photographer stationed there too, so I hope they got a shot of me! They had a section of ice cubes that you had to crawl through (pretty genius!). I was fine here, but several people I spoke to had cut their knees on it, so it was probably the most hardcore obstacles of the race. Nearing the end of the race, there were a couple of big rack thingies to climb over, one metal and one wooden. After this it is just a final sprint to the finish! On the second to last obstacle I overtook a couple that had been running faster than me all race, which I felt a bit bad about, so sorry guys if you’re reading!

 

After finishing and changing, I went back out with my camera to the last obstacle and got some shots with my camera. I shared these with the Fens of fury admin, so likely these will be up with the other pictures! Then I sat and ate pizza and enjoyed the sun and atmosphere. After all the runners had finished and had had time to chow down, there was a little award ceremony, congratulating the fastest individual and team, and a round of applause for the main organiser Doug.  Also, don’t forget that it was all held for Addenbrooke Charitable Trust Dementia and Delirium Services, and over 2 and half grand was raised in aid of this! So well done all who contributed to fundraising!

I would actually say that this is a well organised race, and all the organisers and marshals were very pleasant and friendly. Food, drink, portaloos and charity ambulance services were all in place! But be aware that it is a fairly tame experience, designed for those who like gentler running conditions. I heard talk they were going to change the course if it had rained so that nobody got cold and wet! Not the mentality i’m used to at all! Usually it’s: “I don’t care if there’s a blizzard, get in the freezing trenches now!” So if these types of things appeal to you, but you want a (very) gentle introduction, then this race is the one for you.

Check out the Fens of Fury webpage here: http://www.fensoffury.com/

And the ACT webpage here: http://www.act4addenbrookes.org.uk/

 

Flatt7