Matt Gets Running

Bath Half Marathon 2011

Bath Half 2011 Medal

Well, that was fun! Okay, if I’m being entirely honest, the first eight or nine miles were fun, and it was more of a slog after that, but still!

It was a nice day for running. It was pretty chilly first thing, and especially hanging around in the runners’ village and the start pens, but it warmed up as the day went on, and there were even some bursts of nice spring sunshine. No rain, which was a nice change from the Bristol Half…

There were apparently 11,000 people running, and it certainly felt like it. It didn’t thin out as quickly as the Bristol race, partly because it’s a two-lap course. It was quite impressive to hear the rumbling of a motorbike escort, followed by the two race leaders, overtaking on their second lap as I was somewhere around the three mile mark!

In the end, Edwin Kipkorir of Kenya finished in exactly 64 minutes. Sixty. Four. Minutes. For thirteen miles. It makes my cardiovascular system shake with inadequacy just thinking about it.

Personally, I kept up a determined, consistent pace (i.e. a slow plod) all the way around — as you can see from the RunKeeper log — and came in somewhere around the same time I managed in Bristol in September, i.e. about 2 hours 50-something. The official results aren’t up yet, so I don’t know whether I have a new personal best or not, but it was certainly close.

The spectators were a great crowd; there’s a lot more residential area on the route in Bath, and there were plenty of people with their windows open pounding some music out for us on top of the official entertainments like the samba band. Although I think I heard the “Rocky” theme just a tad to often, personally…

One running highlight was a bloke who ran the entire course with a guitar, spontaneously breaking into a bit of singing and strumming every now and again, all while keeping up the jogging. He was running for Jessie’s Fund, a music therapy charity, as I found out when I jogged alongside him while he was being interviewed for local radio.

But my favourite runners, or at least my choice for “most masochistic”, were the two nutcases who ran the entire course dressed as a pantomime camel, for the Breast Cancer Campaign. That can’t have been easy.

The lowlight of the race was probably between miles nine and eleven. From around the ninth mile, it really started to quieten down, as the bulk of the runners had gone on ahead, and the rest of us were really feeling our legs starting to get leaden. I overtook a lot of walkers who’d obviously set off jogging ahead of me at the beginning but run out of steam, and everyone else was just concentrating on putting one foot in front of the other, and not feeling quite so cheery.

At this point I started having quite odd thoughts. I remember jogging behind a couple of near-identical women running together, one in lurid blue, one in lurid red, for about ten minutes. I started wondering whether if I put some 3D glasses on, I could turn them into one single badly-dressed person a lot further away, which would be a big improvement…

But, heading back towards town, although my legs were getting heavier and heavier, the crowd started building back up again, and there were lots of friendly shouts of “nearly there!” to keep me going. It helped to be running in a charity t‑shirt, too; I got lots of “Come on, Lifeguards!” all the way…

Finally coming up to the end, I managed to put on some speed and do a near-sprint finish, which was more than I’d managed for Bristol!

All in all, a good half-marathon, on a good day for running, with a good crowd. And I can just about move, still. Although I may need a dose of “vitamin I” to let me walk to work tomorrow. Just as well I’ve taken the morning off!

UPDATE: I was disappointed at first when I checked the official results — 2:56:49 — but it turns out that Bath uses “gun time” as their official time. That’s the time from the official start time until you cross the finish line. Starting right at the back, it took me more than five minutes just to get to the start line!

Luckily, they also tell you your “net time”, (start line to finish line, which is how the Bristol Half is measured) and I came in at 2:49:38. Which means I shaved more than four minutes off my Bristol Half time. Not a huge improvement, but I’m definitely not getting worse, at least!

Marathon Eve

So, it’s the evening before the Bath Half Marathon. In the morning I’ll be heading off for the Bath Racecourse, who are running a service where you park at the racecourse and they get you into town on a bus, which seemed like an easy option.

Today I’ve taken things nice and easy. I’ve done very little, I’ve drunk plenty of fluids, and I’ve eaten a fair few carbs. Not that that last point marks this Saturday apart from any other Saturday, for me 😉

Now I’m going to spend a half-hour getting stuff ready. I want to get everything sorted out for the morning — from programming Bath Races into my car satnav to laying out the plasters I want to remember to stick on a certain couple of sensitive areas of anatomy ((If you don’t know what I’m talking about, then you probably don’t want to know, but just in case, this link may enlighten you.)). That way I can do the bare minimum in the morning; just get up, have a shower, drag my clothes on and get out of the door.

If you want to see how I’m doing at any point tomorrow, you’ll hopefully be able to see a little dot that represents me crawling around a map as I jog on my RunKeeper profile page. I’ll probably start off sometime between 11 and 11:30, I think.

You’ll have plenty of time to find me on that map. My running speed doesn’t seem to have improved any since the Bristol Half Marathon, where my time was 2:53:43. This means I’ll be coming in around… er… last, on the Bath Half. Certainly the race info pack seems to suggest that if you take more than three hours, then people start sweeping up and opening roads around you.

But hey, I’m not in it for the speed. For this one, I’m in it for the RNLI, of course, so please give generously, and think of me slogging around the streets for a few hours tomorrow…

Hopefully there will be a happy post-race post tomorrow evening, or Monday morning — I’ve taken Monday morning off work to give myself some recovery time!

Beating the Weather

I’m sitting in a café writing this blog entry, looking smugly out at the weather I would have been slogging wetly through if I’d gone out for my normal Sunday run.

It’s a typically British Spring selection of random sunshine, showers and hail out there, rotating about every five minutes. Nice. Luckily, I took a look out of the window yesterday, clocked the nice sunshine, and nipped out for a quick 5K then, instead. It was lovely and bright and mild yesterday, perfect jogging weather.

That was probably my last jog before Sunday’s half marathon, unless I particularly fancy a short evening run at some point this week. I’ll try to walk to work rather than take the boat as much as I can, though, just to keep the legs ticking over.

Looks like I’ve raised £40 for the RNLI already — thanks folks! — which isn’t bad in a couple of days. I shall throw some begging tweets and Facebook status updates out this week and see if I can get a few more donations before the day 🙂

How Not to Train for a Half Marathon

From recent experience, here are a few tips on how not to train for a half marathon:

Pick a half-marathon that’s run at the beginning of March. This makes sure you have to keep training through the freezing, dark winter months. The Bath Half Marathon is an ideal choice.
Pick an over-ambitious training plan that has you running three times a week, even on Boxing Day. Make sure it’s a group plan, using something like a RunKeeper FitnessClass, so you can see lots of other people sticking to the plan all over the world, while you’re failing dismally.
Get stressed out by the spectre of an approaching Christmas, with all the shopping and other worries that it entails. Also develop a niggling ache while running. This two annoyances combined should let you decide to take the whole of December off from running, which is clearly excellent training.
Take up drinking again just before winter, thus ensuring you write off a few Saturdays where you could otherwise be running by drinking too much the night before at various Christmas parties.
Speaking of Christmas, try putting on nearly a stone in weight by over-indulging in December and carrying on eating at that kind of level post-Christmas, too. Even though you wanted to lose weight before the half-marathon, not gain it.
Be sure to get ill a few times. If you can come down with a cold before Christmas, something gastric between Christmas and New Year, and then follow that by another bad cold in January, that’s about perfect.
Make sure you pick a year where it rains a lot at weekends, especially if your normal favourite route takes you along towpaths that flood easily, and through forest paths that turn into foot-deep mudbaths after a shower.
In February, if you arrange for your job to go crazy with reporting deadlines, and also get the auditors in to double-check everything you’ve done recently, that’s excellent icing on your cake of bad training.

Sigh.

On the plus side, despite this blog being quiet, I have managed to run a bit in the last few weeks. I’ve not been out in the evenings — running is so much easier in daylight! — but a couple of weekends ago I ran 7K, last weekend I ran 8K, and yesterday I ran 10K.

Well, I say “ran”; the first couple of weeks I had to stop for a couple of breathers and walk up the hill, because my late-January cold was still lingering on and affecting my breathing. But yesterday I made a conscious effort to jog, albeit very slowly, all the way up the big hill in Leigh Woods, and I felt a lot better for jogging a decent continuous distance.

Especially as it’s now only a couple of weeks to the Bath Half!

Speaking of which, I’ve just set up my Just Giving page, where you can sponsor me to help out my chosen charity, the RNLI. A very worthy cause, and I’m not just saying that because one of my university friends now helps to crew the Clovelly Lifeboat!

Finally! Santas!

Although this was only meant to be a 2K fun-run, actually getting to the start line felt more like a marathon. But finally, after finding a suit that actually fit me, and after the first attempt was called off due to ice, the Bristol Santas on the Run race for Children’s Hospice South West went ahead on Sunday.

It would have been a fairly surreal sight in December, with hundreds of Santas (and their little helpers) jogging around the harbourside — the route went through Millennium Square, across Pero’s Bridge and around the bit of harbour between the bridge and the Centre a couple of times, then back to the Lloyds Amphitheatre — but in late January it seemed extra-weird.

Still, plenty of the original entrants turned up to this re-arranged event, and paraded around to confused looks from passers-by. And lots of money will hopefully be raised for a worthy cause…

Here’s a picture of the start line, which gives you some idea of the spectacle 🙂

Santas on the Run 2010, Bristol (as run in January 2011!) — Santa Start Line

That was the only running I did over the weekend, and it was at least 3K shorter than a normal weekend run for me. But it was also my birthday weekend, and I was away from home for most of it, so I don’t feel too guilty. Having said that, I feel like I may have gone down with a cold now, so maybe I should have what opportunities I had to get out running.

Oh well. Hopefully I’ll be better by next weekend, and I can try a longer run to practice for the Bath Half…

Arcade Fire

Things I found out on my run last night: 1) It was cold. 2) My hip aches. 3) I was tired. 4) I don’t much care for Arcade Fire.

Still, I think it was probably important to drag myself out, reluctantly, for my first mid-week run of the year. I’ve got to build some momentum back up somehow. I got out on Sunday, too, but I didn’t have time to blog about it, being mostly knee-deep in books all weekend as I did some early spring cleaning.

And so I slogged through 5K, despite wanting to stop a few times and walk for a while. I also had to shut off the aforementioned universally acclaimed album, because it was so bloody dreary I started considering throwing myself in the river. The Suburbs just sounds like a dull version of OMD crossed with the Human League to me.

Instead of chucking myself in the Avon I switched to Medollic’s new album, which was far better jogging material. Not entirely my cup of tea — they’re rather too perfect for my shambolically-attuned ears, and tracks like Dollhouse, the title track, are far too straight-up rock for me — but Fable, a list-song in a very American/Canadian-Female-Singer-Songwriter-stylee, if you know what I mean, hit the spot, among others.

Anyway. First cold, dark mid-week jog of the year under my belt, and hopefully I’ll be heading on in the right direction and building back up my distance for the Bath Half. Which is in about five and a half weeks’ time now. Gah!

January Sunshine

Today I went out for my first jog of the year — my first jog in more than a month, in fact, having taken December off! It wasn’t as difficult as I feared it might have been. Helping with that was the weather — sunny, cool but not freezing, just right for jogging. I felt good enough not to bother starting back too gingerly and gently, so I did a full 5K starting with Bridge Valley Road. I was slow, but not much slower than normal, really, so I’m pretty happy with that.

Which is just as well, really, as it’s just under two months to the Bath Half Marathon. Hmm. Might have left building up my training a little late. Still, if I get back to my usual routine fairly quickly it shouldn’t be impossible. I guess we’ll have to see!

Happy new year, everyone 🙂

New Server

[Warning: this post does not contain running]

Just a quick administrative heads-up: I’m moving this blog to a different server. It should be a transparent process ((Well, apart from the sub-title up at the top of the page being “…On a new server.” for a little while, so I can tell what’s where.)). If you see anything odd going on — broken links, pages not displaying correctly, anything like that, please let me know in the comments here (assuming you can!)

Thanks!

Matt

Hiatus

You may have noticed a short hiatus on the blog. That’s related to the short hiatus in my running.

As I mentioned last time, I’ve been feeling a bit tired and run down this month. As a result, I’ve not really been looking forward to going out for a run, especially on the dark weekday evenings. And at the weekends, I’ve either been feeling a bit poorly or been a little too busy to get out.

Plus, it’s been absolutely bloody freezing. It’s not easy to get out the door when it’s dark and ‑2C outside.

As Arline said in the comments here a couple of posts ago, “There seems to be a fine line between not doing some thing because you really need a break, and not doing it because your motivation just isn’t there.”

And I think I’m on the other side of that line now — I really need a break.

Generally, I’m an all-or-nothing kind of person. Which I why, I think, I’ve been a little scared to take some time off running. There’s always that worry in the back of my mind that I might not start again. But the build-up of stuff this month — the lack of motivation, the aches and pains, the general Christmas not-enough-time syndrome, the cold snap — have maybe been pointing towards the conclusion that yes, it would probably be good for me to take a few weeks off running.

When I finally had that thought, on the walk home from work a few days ago, my brain did a little happy backflip as it changed from it’s “oh my God I haven’t been running for nearly two weeks argh” guilt-trip to a new, serene, “maybe it’s actually okay to give myself a break and start again in the new year” mode of thinking.

And I reckon that’s what decided me, in the end. It’s an especially good time to take a break, not just because I need it, but because there’s a new year coming up soon, and that will be a great re-starting point. Especially as I’ve signed up for the Bath Half in March, so I’ll have something to train for…

So, I am officially giving myself the rest of the month off. I’m tired, I’m achey, it’s cold, it’s dark, I have less free time than usual, and, fundamentally, I just plain feel like it. I’ve been running for eighteen months or so now, and I’ve not really had even a week off in all that time. Even when I’ve been on holidays I’ve done miles of hiking.

So, I’m taking a short holiday from running. I’m keeping up some exercise; I’m walking to work and back, which is about 5km a day. And just because I’m officially giving myself the rest of the month off doesn’t mean I won’t nip out for a sneaky run if I suddenly feel like it on a sunny weekend day…

Mostly, in fact, it’s not running I’m giving up for the month, but the guilt about not running. Which seems like a good thing to skip for a few weeks.

So, hopefully that explains the hiatus. I shall probably find something to blog about between now and Christmas, but if not, then have a happy holiday, everyone!

Sad Santas

I was a Sad Santa on Sunday.

As were these other people. We’d all made our way to the Lloyds Amphitheatre to take part in Santas on the Run, a 2K charity fun run for the South West Children’s Hospice. As you’ll have worked out, the idea is for everyone to dress as Santa for the run, and apparently more than 500 people had signed up for the event. Some kind people had already contributed on my Just Giving page, I’d collected some sponsorship at work, and I’d tipped off the local paparazzi. Well, I’d mentioned it on the Bristol Flickr group’s discussion board, anyway…

I did have some reservations on the walk down to the start, though. And yes, I did walk a mile down the Hotwell Road at 10am on a Sunday morning dressed in a Santa costume. There was hooting involved. And some occasional pointing. Not to mention half the police in the South West driving past on their way to their afternoon’s student demo (my pics of that here) crowd control duties. That was a bit odd.

But my reservations were mainly about traction. It had been a bloody cold night after quite a rainy Saturday, and the ground was icy everywhere. It was also so foggy you could barely see the other side of the harbour. “On way down to register for #santasontherun,” I tweeted. “Hope they’ve gritted the route, or it’ll be Santas on their backside instead.”

The lack of Santas when I got to the Amphitheatre was a clue, and my suspicions were confirmed by a couple of the organisers greeting me with disappointed faces and the news that the route was just too icy to be safe. The Amphitheatre itself had pretty much been a skating rink when they arrived to set up, and the rest of the route — especially Pero’s Bridge, often a curve of slippery metal in Winter — were still un-runnable.

So, I and the other Santas who’d not heard the cancellation announcements on local radio headed off across Millennium Square, pictured above, to the kind, warm interior of The Living Room, a fashionable and lovely bar who gave a free hot drink to anyone in a Santa suit that morning — thank you!

After a commiseration drink with my friend José, who’d come along to support me, I drifted back home, still be-Santa-suited, and still garnering the odd confused look and occasional cheery hoot.

There is some good news, though — I heard from Children’s Hospice yesterday, and they’re rearranging the run for January 23rd! So, odd though it will be to be dressed as a Santa nearly a month after Christmas, I’ll at least get the chance to do something surreal and, more to the point, give my various sponsors the run that I owe them 🙂

So, thank you, kind sponsors, for sponsoring me, and rest assured I still intend to run 2K as Santa, no matter what time of year it is when it’s finally safe to run!