Running

Wokingham tomorrow. Weather not looking ideal. Should be fun!

on the upside there should be a nice tail wind for the long straights on the way home!

hopefully!

Lasagne, red wine, flapjack, yoghurt, coffee. Race number pinned on to vest, chip on shoe. Check.

READY TO RACE!

yeah mate
leave hostelry early
natural sleep
eat 3 hours before
RACE
good luck

Good luck tomorrow chaps!

Hope Wokingham was good fun.

Christened a pair of Roclite 295's today, impressed by them.

Well that was a bit tougher than i thought it would be, felt terrible from km 8-15 and lost a lot of time, feeling better from 15km onwards but the headwind and my legs put paid to getting much time back. 1:26:06 according to my stopwatch, so nearly 2 minutes off my PB but think I'm capable of a 1:25, will have to enter reading and see what the weather and leg gods bring!

Ugh! Shit run compounded by my first ever schoolboy error of shoe laces coming undone (from a double knot, the slippery bastards) just after 6 miles. I'd been ticking along nicely at about 5:30/m up till then, but just couldn't get back into a rhythm when starting back up, and lack of recent miles due to injury showed up severely for miles 9-13 as the splits went out the wrong side of 6m/m. 1:16:23, nearly five minutes outside PB, and can probably only put a minute of that down to conditions, with another half a minute for the laces. Oh well, good training run, and a useful reccy of the course, which I think could be good for a PB attempt on a nicer day, in better condition.

shoe laces coming undone (from a double knot

I was shown a knot variation by @_leon which has worked well, I can't put it in words, think it's closest to the one described here:

http://www.fieggen.com/shoelace/surgeonknot.htm

Another tale of Wokingham woe here. @PhilPub and his red shorts were just ahead of me until mile ten at which point my wheels fell off and I could have walked the final three miles faster. Three minutes outside pb which I had been hoping to break!

So to cheer myself up I entered the three peaks in April. Now for some fell training.

Sounds like a mixed bad for all today then.
New forest wide open spaces were as beguiling as ever with the sounds of skylarks setting me off well.
Not a great beginning as setting off after control 2 to fast downhill fell run meant me arriving at control 4 without having been to 3..doh. Fuck it keep going .
Middle of the race was on pace taking a joint first out of the 72 in field on a hill leg that was satisfying but overall not great.
Moar caffeine gels needed have run out of supplies bought with prize money am Pissed at having to lay out again :/

@rhb yeah that's the knot.

@Sainsburys_Ed @PhilPub @juanito Strong work from all of you at Wokingham! Hopefully you didn't have to see any bleeding nipples (not my own) after the race, like I did last year.

@_Leon Sounds like fun though - skylarks!!

I shoulder barged at least five people today and as my comeuppance, tripped on a paving slab and landed against (then slid down) a shop front. Cartoon style. But seriously, if I am running towards you and I move to one side of the pavement, don't fucking move into the space I just vacated, just move over a little bit and then we can both pass and no one gets annoyed. Why is this so hard?

@Arducius excellent result today! Told you you'd probably go sub 1:30 @ Reading.
Was that your first ever HM?

I'll go in my Ghostbusters slippers next time then.

that's an easy one...

Thanks Tom, well chuffed with the result - 1:33 is way faster than previous HMs (both about 1:45). Not sure about going sub 1:30 for Reading, got to keep London as the main goal but the course yesterday had some narrow, muddy trail sections which Reading won't have. Plus if I can latch onto a pacer... we'll see.
Are you running Reading?

Strong work from lots of people this weekend by the sounds of it, you guys might not be setting any PBs but those times are impressive!

And @hats - What is with that? It's like you've just made space so they can fill it. Happens way too often.

I took it easy yesterday and did nothing strenuous to allow myself to recover after Sunday's HM effort, went out for an easy paced 4 miles at lunch today: HR 10 bpm higher than it normally is when I'm going faster. More time needed to recover then I guess!

Are you running Reading?

Not at the moment - I'll decide soon though (if there's still space). Had a cold for what feels like forever so have put in very few miles recently. And now I've somehow got an Achilles strain. MEH!

Great 23k run on the 14th, almost enjoyable. 6:24/km without having to push hard at all.

Excellent 10k run on the 18th, felt great and happy to duck down to 5:57/km.

Horrid 24k run on the 19th, never enjoyable. 6:52/km and the last 15k was hideous despite it being pan-flat. Guess I wasn't fully recovered, but I pushed myself through it.

I had to move that 24k run forward a couple of days as I was doing a 180km ride on the Sunday. Dreading how my legs would be for that but it was fine, and legs felt nice and free the day after.

No long run this week, it's a fast 10k instead. I'll probably do a gentle 10k today (a week off from intervals), push hard on my run in to work tomorrow, and then another easy/recovery 10k on Friday.

My new favourite person to follow: Elise Downing, running round the UK coast.

Cambridge Half tomorrow morning - it's cold and windy out, I'm undertrained and full of cold, but I'm kind of looking forward to it. Or at least, looking forward to getting to eat my favourite ever meal afterwards (smoked cheese pie at the Cambridge Blue).

Also if anyone's interested, I've started blogging on the Running Stories website: http://www.therunningstories.com/part-1/ Gratuitous picture of a womble included.

Managed a two hour plus run this morning without pain, delighted with that. Started with a swim in Parly Hill lido, so was halfway through the run before I got any feeling back in fingers and toes. Will try for the same tomorrow.

Good luck @hats !
Great news @kl !

good luck tomorrow racers!

not really looking froward to tomorrows run, i completely bonked on todays short run, the 5 hours of cycling before hand might have had something to do with it, but thankfully had my 4 legged running buddy to keep me company - had to walk for a bit as i was seeing stars!