WEEK FOUR – DONE

Firstly a big thank you to everyone who has taken the time to read my blog and the lovely comments you have posted, facebooked, emailed and said in person. It is wonderful to know I have so much support and interest in my Virgin London Marathon Journey 2010. I keep meaning to try make my posts shorter but when I start I seem to bubble over with Marathon chatter, maybe as the weeks progress and I get tired my posts will get shorter. . . .

Highlights – See Sunday!

Lowlights – The backlog mountain of laundry that comes with training for a Marathon!

Inspiration - This week comes from Daniel and Adele, my wonderful, talented, enthusiastic and supportive (although sometimes a bit begrudgingly) children!

Day 22 Monday 25th January 2010 - The Recovery Massage

Normally I would do a recovery swim on a Monday lunchtime but I felt tired and my legs were still a little sore and although I didn’t feel drained in the way I did last week after the Ilkley cross country, I decided to have lunch with a friend instead.

Nicky is currently doing a massage course and had asked me to go along on assessment night which just happened to be today! Brilliant an hour of relaxing massage at no cost and although Nicky is just completing her course I don’t doubt for a minute that she will pass. I was so relaxed I nearly fell asleep and though not the same as a sports massage, my achy stiff legs felt so much better after the hour! – Thank You Nicky

Nicky will be qualified soon and I’m sure she will give preferential rates to fellow VARR members, so if you are looking for a way to feel equally relax after a hard weeks training or just want to treat yourself give me a shout and ill put you in touch. 


Day 23 Tuesday 26th January 2010 – Group 2 – My Heros

I woke up tired this morning as I was up late typing my Brass Monkey race report for my blog, but I wanted to get my story down. Had another busy day rushing around with work, didn’t get back to the office till late and so stayed behind to check my emails and missed the Ab Class again (though I know I left it too late on purpose).

There was another fantastic turn out for run club tonight. I had another ten or twelve in my group again, some of the new faces from last week had returned and we had yet more new faces. At first my legs were none too happy that I was making them run again, particularly when I lead the group up Kirkstall Lane! I was glad to drop back and keep one of the new girls company and arrived at the lights a little out of breath! I sometimes worry I’m not such a good example as a group leader when I’m struggling myself. Though I do like to lead from the back chatting to people and hopefully giving them the same encouragement and support I received when I first joined the club.

In my working life I have always enjoyed helping to develop members of my team and seeing them move on to new things and as group 2 leader i get the same satisfaction when people leave my group to move up to group 3!. I enjoy meeting and getting to know new people and have made many good friends but I love to see them progress and move up a group when they are ready. Some quickly move up to the next group others move up and then come back for a while, others I have to gently persuade them its time to give it a go! And this week after a year of consistent running and a fantastic first half marathon time I have seen Sue move up to group 3, somehow I don’t think she will becoming back to my group. But I look forward to running with Sue on a weekend and I know she will help bring my own pace on some more! But as Sue moves on Geoff seems to be moving in to group 2 having run a few times with us now, I’m sure he will be a regular. Geoff is also an inspiration I enjoy listening to his journey to a new, fitter, healthier Geoff and all the exciting things it is bringing him. It’s not every day I get to run with someone who is to be featured in tri-athletes world! Really looking forward to seeing your photos and reading your feature Geoff!

A few members in the club have told me I should move up to group 3, but i don’t want to as long as members enjoy running with me I’d like to lead group 2, I am proud of them all and it is an honour to run and support them, even if it is sometimes from the back!


Day 24 Wednesday 27th January 2010 - The Ten Hour Training Day


I had a 10 hour training day today! Yep honestly I did!

8 hours sat in front of a computer at work training to be a super user on the new IT system which goes live on Monday and 2 hours at the gym! Guess which I preferred? I didn’t manage to get up early so had to do my double session back to back, but this seems to work ok. I made a conscious effort to eat well at lunch time and snack in the afternoon on fruit and yoghurt! Then I hit the treadmill for my interval session, I’m not sure your suppose to but have to say I’m actually beginning to enjoy this session. Has taken me a while to master altering the speed manually and counting the minutes properly to make sure i don’t end up cheating! What I’m really starting to like about doing intervals on the tread is I’m never sure who is going to jump on the tread next to me. And today it was the trim looking Paul Warren!

Paul appeared when i was about half way through my session and although I couldn’t talk to him when i was running my interval it was great to chat in my two minute recoveries.  Thank you Paul for helping me to run my last two intervals a little stronger so my session ended up as

2@11, 2@11, 2@11.5, 2@11.5, 2@12, 2@12, 2@12.5, 2@13

I was glad to have 10mins to stretch and recover a little before going into Body Pump! Another brilliant session, though i think the Abs tracks just get harder and are a tad technically difficult for a 40+ mother of two who fancies she could run a marathon!

Day 25 Thursday 28th January - To swim or not to swim

Today is a rest day but because I missed my swim on Monday I have been trying to decide if I should swim. But after a lot of arguing with myself I have come to realise I didn’t “miss a swim session” I “added a recovery session” which I know is as important as all the other sessions. And so I had my 2nd full rest day of the week. Though I did do a monthly shop round Morrison’s with the kids and this was probably harder and more tiring than yesterdays tread session!


Day 26 Friday 29th January 2010 – Kelly is Back!

Its Friday – Its 6.15am – Its Cracker Kelly - Quite simply the best hard core spin class!

Leave the gym feeling in the zone!!!!!

Legs ached rest of the day!!!

TSR – Thank you for your support and input into my marathon training!


Day 27 Saturday 30th January - A Typical Saturday For A Marathon Runner!

6am alarm goes off – should get up and do some house work before my weekend training begins. This is what Marathon training does to you, you have to schedule in when you’re going to basic chores.

6.30am – manage to get up have to at least sort the laundry and get the kids school uniform on to wash. Rest of the house work will keep!

7am – make big bowl of porridge got to fuel 10 miles this morning

7.30 – wake kids – Dan is up and dressed in his running gear in no time at all. He reckons he doesn’t really like running but how many 13 year old boys do you know who would get up willing at this time on a sat to go for a run?

8am -Chase Adele to get ready - have a panic searching for my kit

8.30 – and we are all just about ready for when Harp picks us up, we drop Adele on our way and get to park run in time to do a half mile warm up. I worry as legs feel so tight and I feel breathless. 10 Miles, I think I will struggle to do 10minutes!

9am and were off, Dan was soon in front of me and I had a steady run, not because I thought I should take it easy but because that’s all I could manage. The only reason I managed to run it all was because I spent the entire course running and chatting to different people. Barbara, Liz G, Liz J, Gillian and Suzanne – thank you all! At one point there were a few more of us girls running in a group sharing an appreciation of a certain some ones legs as he effortless lapped us! The conversation quickly deteriorated from there and I pushed on with Suzanne. I kept getting sight of Daniel in front of me and I was pleased to see that he was still running. It was Dan’s 10th Park Run (for which he will get a special T-Shirt) and he got a PB but these things didn’t bother him, what made his day was the fact that as he has said several times over the weekend “I ragged you mum” which apparently means “I beat you by a good time mum”

9.45ish -after Harp and I had checked in at the finish line and stopped for a short catch up with fellow runners we set off and ran a further 7miles back to my house. We both felt this seemed to go quite quick and I have to say considering how much Park Run had hurt I felt I finished strong. A big big big thank you Harp, I’m sure without you it would have felt very different.

11am took Harp back for her car, quick cup of coffee, a banana and a toasted currant teacake. Put second load of washing on. Head to the gym.

12 noon body pump. I did think about not doing this so I could get my household chores done but I really love my body pump and I think I benefit as mush from the psychological boost this gives me as much as the physical effect. However I could have kissed the instructor when he said “we won’t be doing lunges today”

13.30 picked Dan up (if any of you are wondering I hadn’t abandoned him at the park, his dad had picked him up), home, grab bite to eat, quick bath.

14.30 Dan to hairdressers

15.30 put 3rd load of washing on, quickly wash up breakfast pots before Debra came round to discuss Run Club things

17.30 pick Adele up, realise she doesn’t have any suitable running clothes for tomorrow, go through my things to find something that a) kind of fits and B) she is willing to wear!

18.30 Cheese omelette and steamed vegetables and wholegrain bread for tea, put 4th load of washing on!

20.00 ready for bed, but is too early, but yet another load of washing on and wonder how on earth I’m going to get it all dry!

21.00 – Housework still not done, but can’t fight it any longer - Night night!


Day 28 Sunday 31st January 2010 – Adele’s First Race As A VARR Junior

Yippe, I got a lie in this morning and didn’t get up till 7.30 (which as I have been awake for several hours through the night is a good thing). Adele is up early today and gets herself dressed ready for her first Junior Race, she looks brilliant in her VARR vest!

We had a bit of a shock when we got out and discovered how cold it was and had to defrost the car, ran back in for extra layers! Pick Helen up then Vikki and on to John Smeaton for the 4th Peco Cross Country.

Meet up with Team Dooley and Ellie takes Adele for a little warm up and generally looks after her. Thank you Ellie, you are a star! I am a little nervous for Adele, she decided she wanted to run this as she said Ilkley had looked fun (not sure it felt it at the time) but she has done exactly ZERO training for this run. I have watched her many times run in play and believe she is a strong natural runner and she is doing her rugby training, but even so two miles seems a long way to run with no practice, but anyone who knows my daughter will know there is no point in arguing with her when she has set her mind on doing something! My only advice to her is enjoy it and get as muddy and wet as she can!

I needn’t have worried Adele had a really strong first race coming 13 out of 16 and at only 11 she was one of the youngest in a field of 11-15 year olds. I am very proud Mum and have to hold back a tear. Later she told me how she had run it all and once the field had split only one person managed to get pass her and that was at the water jump. She said she knew there was someone close behind her as she could hear them and see their shadow but when she saw their shadow get closer to her she ran faster as no way was she going to let anyone else past her!

And as for how my race went? Well officially I had told myself and anyone that asked, that I was just there to run not race, I had trained hard this week and was expecting my legs not to be at their strongest. And Tom had said it was ok to have the 8 races in my marathon programme so long as I treated most of them as training sessions! But my inner voice kept saying I wanted something special from myself in this race! And it ended up being special for two reasons. 1) I ran the whole thing, I did not walk one single step 2) You will have to read my race report below . . . . .

I set off at the back a steady but strong pace and as I reached the first field I could see several VARR vests but one my one they took the water jump and disappeared out of sight. As i reached the second field i could see the VARR vests again running up the hill and as i reached the bottom of the hill myself I could see Helen Bailey a long way in front of me. I settled in behind a vet and steadily made my way up the hill, as Helen reached the top I lost sight of her. I eventually passed the vet and a few more besides and as I turned at the top I caught sight of Helen again and realised I had gained on her and so I picked my pace up thinking I should try to keep her in my sight. I kept gaining on her and then I realised that if we had come up a hill we must surely have an equal downhill and I thought perhaps, maybe, just maybe I might challenge Helen! The downhill came in a wooded area and normally I would be cautious of tree roots and slow myself down so as not to fall but by then some competitive part of me that I didn’t know existed had decided I wanted to chase Helen down and I flew past her, not stopping to look or say hi I pushed on. I had no idea how Helen had reacted to this, had she just let me pass or was she preparing to challenge me, I hoped she was. I could hear someone else behind me breathing hard but knew that wasn’t Helen, then I sensed someone at my shoulder and I glanced to see Helen right beside me I dug in hard, and kept her just at my shoulder I could tell she was working as hard as I was. I took the water jump first but then it was an uphill and Helen challenged me I couldn’t hold her off and she passed me, for a moment I resigned to losing and told her to run hard (I’ve no idea if she heard me as I could barely breath) but I stuck with her the best I could. I lost sight of her and was a little disorientated and nearly missed the sharp turning left to the route back home. I gained on Helen again and once more challenged and passed her but my lungs were really bursting and Helen soon went ahead again, a fair fight, fairly won! But then a runner from another club passed me and like Adele earlier, no way was I having that, I had worked too hard, how I found it I don’t know, maybe it was hearing Tom and H and the others cheering first for Helen and then me, but I gave it one last effort, and took the runner, Helen was still ahead of me as we entered the field we had started in, I threw my water bottle at H and gave it everything, I drew level with Helen as we reached the second group of VARR supporters and I could hear them all cheering and shouting us both on. Now I have to say I love Helen dearly but passing her again, and crossing the finish line in front of her felt . . . . well . . . . FANBLOODYTASTIC . . . . . and has to be the Highlight of my week!

As I write this now I feel a little guilty about how competitive I was with Helen today, but I thank you Helen for been competitive back, as you made me push myself harder than i thought I ever could!

Thank you all once again for taking the time to read my blog, I hope you have enjoyed it. If you would like to leave a comment on my blog, you can do so by clicking on the word comment just below and to the right.