JogBlog running blog

Audiofuel have teamed up with Sennheiser to compose a 15 minute soundtrack called Thru the Gears.

I was a bit hesitant at first to try it, as it’s got some mean looking man on the cover dressed in an Adidas hoodie but as I’ve played to death all the other Audiofuel tracks, I thought it would be a nice change to have something fresh to listen to while I went on the treadmill at the gym.

It’s a coaching track, so you’re told what to do and when and a girl with a nice roboty kind of voice tells you to stretch for a minute, then to walk for a minute, then to increase the speed for three minutes, then another three minutes, then two minutes, then there’s a cool down period where you walk and stretch. I didn’t bother with the stretching bit and just walked during those bits.

This session is amazing. Proper amazing. It really powers up as you get faster and faster and there’s pianos and strings and guitars and bass and everything and it all mounts up to one massive crescendo and you forget how knackered you are as all you can feel is one big fuck off buzz.

After I’d finished, I wanted to do it all over again but as I had a body pump class starting, I nipped into the changing room to get my phone out of my locker and to post on Audiofuel Sean’s Facebook wall to thank him for the big fuck off buzz I’d just had.

Then I did my body pump class and went home and told Shaun how good it was and then I told everyone on Twitter how good it was and it really was so good that I went back to the gym this morning to do it all over again and I got the same buzz, so it’s obviously not like heroin where you don’t get the same buzz after the first time (so I hear, obviously I’ve never had anything stronger than a Junior Disprin…).

And, amazingly, this track is FREE! Free to everyone! Hurrah!

Click here to be taken to the Audiofuel website for your free Thru the Gears download. 

Stats
Distance: Don’t know as I wasn’t taking much notice
Time: 15 minutes
Free soundtracks: 1
Big fuck off buzzes: 2

I did a load of exercise last week. It even included a bit of running, but it mostly included cycling to the gym and going to spin classes and a body pump class.

This week I hadn’t done much exercise, except for a bit of running on Tuesday. But today I made up for that by cycling 2.5 miles to the gym, going on the rowing machine for 15 minutes, doing a 45 minute body pump class, doing 15 minutes on the treadmill, doing another 15 minutes on the rowing machine, then doing 10 minutes on the elliptical-trainer before going up to reception and asking if they had any spaces left on the spin class that was about to start.

The man said yes.

So after all that exercise, I went and did some more in the form of a 45 minute spin class.

I’ve been going to spin classes for about a month or so now and I had originally thought that they’d be like body pump, i.e. follow a format and specific exercises to the same music each week, until they bring out the latest version (or whatever you call it). But no, spin (or RPM as it’s called in my gym) seems to be whatever the instructors choose to make it.

I’d been going mostly on Wednesdays which has a great instructor who has played, amongst dancey stuff that I’ve never heard of, a weird Nirvana ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ cover and Prince. Cool.

One week I was hardcore and after my Wednesday class, I booked myself on another class the following morning. I don’t know what music this instructor played as she had us bouncing up and down on our saddles like we were doing aerobics and I was too busy being traumatised by flashbacks of Helen’s and mine Mateivator workout the other month to notice what music was being played.

Today’s instructor was brill. None of this up and down and bouncing around and trying to keep coordinated with the others nonsense, but a really good workout alternating between fast sprints and hill climbing. She really pushed us, telling us to up the resistance (the other instructors mostly leave us to get on with it; the Wednesday instructor one morning even got off her bike and came over to mine and turned the resistance down to zero; she obviously knew I was a lightweight) and the music was great. Today’s tunes included Massive Attack, Credit to the Nation and Rage Against the Machine (turning it off before the naughty words [unlike the XFM DJ who left it on while he went to the toilet about eight years ago when I was listening to the radio at work]).

After my mammoth three hour workout, all I wanted was a cup of tea. Proper tea. With moo juice and sugar. I gave up tea years ago and only drink fruit or herbal tea or hot chocolate (and wine and beer, of course) but as I was getting changed, a cup of tea was all I wanted. Actually, I wanted a fry up too, but didn’t think they did that in the gym cafe so I settled for a cup of tea.

The cafe was empty except for one young lad with mousey brown curly hair, wearing a blue denim jacket and camouflage combats. He soon left, leaving me alone with only the sounds of the air-conditioning and the squeak of the milkshake machine to keep me company.

I finished my tea and headed off for my 2.5 mile cycle home. Passing Rocky’s Cafe and the smell of fry ups didn’t make me want one any less, but because I am a finely tuned athlete, I went home and had a home made muesli bar and some home made spicy cauliflower and potato soup and now I think I need a bit of a lie down.

Stats
Cycling: 5 miles
Rowing machine: 30 minutes
Treadmill: 15 minutes
Elliptical trainer: 10 minutes
Body pump: 45 minutes
Spin: 45 minutes
Time: 3:02:57
Calories: 1,469
Cups of tea: 1
Fry ups: 0
Young lads with mousey brown curly hair: 1

Yesterday, I was extremely hardcore and burnt off almost a pizza’s worth of calories (that’s 1,000 to those of you who don’t speak pizza) by cycling 3 miles to the gym, doing a 45 minute spin class, followed by 25 minutes on the rowing machine, 20 minutes on the elliptical trainer, 10 minutes on the rowing machine, then cycling back home 3 miles, via the optician who told me I had cholesterol on one of my eyes and need to go to the doctors to get checked for high cholesterol (which reminds me I need to go across the road and register at the medical centre).

So, after yesterday’s extremely hardcore effort and spending the rest of the day in a nicely weary-from-exercise state, I wondered how I’d feel this morning.

I felt great. And I wanted to go for a run. So, as my feeling-great-and-wanting-to-go-for-a-run days are pretty few and far between these days, I thought I’d better get out there.

I looked in my gym-and-running-kit-drawer and BAH! I didn’t have any tights with a pocket to put the door key in as the ones with a proper pocket are both in the wash and the ones with a crap pocket are waiting for me to sew up the hole in the front that I noticed was there just before I went into a body pump class, thereby making me spend the whole class wondering if everyone could see my knickers.

But then I remembered my full-length Ron Hill tights that I don’t really like wearing because a) they’re not the comfiest of tights; and b) I look like a dork wearing them but decided it was either a) look like a dork with a pocket to put my doorkey in; or b) look even more of a dork with a key tied to my trainers.

I decided to look like Dork A.

As I got out the door, I realised I was dressed head toe in black with my long-sleeved black running top, my dorky Ron Hill full-length tights and my black gloves that I’m still wearing because it’s still cold here in countrysideland and so I set off looking like the Milk Tray Bloke or whoever it was that climbs through windows and stuff delivering chocolates to sleeping maidens, although in Ashford, it’d be more likely to be a burglar climbing through a window to be greeted by the sight of a chav unconscious on the floor after being rendered paralytic by too many blue drinks in the classily named local nightclub ‘Hustle’.

I run round my usual three mile route which takes me along the road for a bit, then along a scary track for a bit where I saw what I thought was a small white dog then realised it was a medium-sized white carrier bag and got to the dumping-trollies-and-other-rubbish bit, then over the bridge where they’re building a new housing estate called ‘Bridgefield’; imaginatively named what with there being a) a bridge; and b) a field, then down the non-scary trail and past the sheep, then down the hill until I got back and saw that I’m still really really slow and I wonder if I’ll ever be able to post my pace without deep embarrassment again.

Stats
Distance: 3.01 miles
Time: long time
Pace: slow
Calories: 287
Eyes with cholesterols: 1
Doctors registered with: 0
Dorky tights with pockets for doorkeys: 1
Runners dressed up as Milk Tray Men: 1
Housing estates with imaginative names: 0

On Saturday, Helen and I had arranged to meet up in Tonbridge (with it being 30 minutes from both of us on the train) to go for a run, but a couple of days beforehand, Helen had said she was feeling a bit wheezy and could we just go to the pub instead? I said no, what kind of alcoholic do you take me for? We are finely tuned athletes and must run and not slack ok then, fine with me, we can go for a walk and a look at the castle and so we met up and when we met up, I switched on my pedometer and we had a look round the outside of the castle

but we couldn’t see a way to get inside the castle, so after we’d finished looking at the outside of the castle, we followed the river up to see where it went and it would appear to be a splendid place to run and after we’d finished walking up and down, Helen said we should find a pub and I looked at my pedometer and it said we’d gone 8,500ish steps and so I said let’s carry on walking until we’ve done the government recommended 10,000 steps and then we shall have earned our beer and Helen agreed with this so we walked up the road a bit and I kept checking the pedometer and eventually it got to 10,000 steps and we said yay and went to the pub, then we went and got pizza then we went to another pub and then another pub.

But that was Saturday.

Last week I transferred my gym membership to the one in town as I’ve been paying for classes in the gym in town on top of my membership to my local gym and so I decided this was a waste of money and so I enquired about membership and the membership girl said I could get student membership for £25 a month and this includes the gym, all classes, swimming pool, steam room, spa and jacuzzi and so I thought bargain and so I transferred my membership and had my induction on Sunday and the new gym has machines that I’ve never seen before, not even in my London gym, and you also get a key that you put into the machines and it tracks everything you do which is pretty cool for a statistic geek like me.

So, this morning, I wanted to go to my new gym but then I thought I might as well run, as I’ll be going to my new gym tomorrow for my spin class and then on the machines for an hour until my Specsavers appointment and so I decided to go running through the fields and when I got to one of the fields there were sheep in it and I though uh oh, do sheep bite? I’ve never been in a field with sheep in it before and all the sheep came running towards me and I thought aw, poor sheep, they probably think I’ve got food and I haven’t got any food for them, maybe I should have brought them some crisps or something although maybe not lamb flavour and I’m walking through the sheep field in case I scare them by running and I go past them and turn around and they’ve all turned round to look at me and then I’m out of the sheep field and go through another field and then back onto the road and I see a sign for a footpath I haven’t seen before and it leads up a hill and so I climb over the stile and run up the hill and then I’m higher than houses and I go over another stile and down a hill and at the bottom of the hill is a half-built housing estate and I don’t know which one it is as they all look the same and I keep on running but I don’t know where I am and I think oh no, I’m going to get lost and go on another eight mile journey and then I see a road sign that looks familiar and then I realise I’m only half a mile from home and not lost at all.

Stats

Saturday
Steps: 10,000
Castles: 1
Pubs: 3
Pizzas: 1

Sunday
Gym inductions: 1

Tuesday
Distance: 3.26 miles
Time: not telling
Pace: not telling
Sheep running towards me: lots

p.s. Bonus points if you know what the title is referring to

You’re probably thinking that, since my last blog post of 22 February, all I’ve done is sit around listening to my new iPod Nano while reading free marathon magazines and drinking free glucose energy shots and only getting off my chair to count how many steps it takes me to go and make some hot chocolate.

Not true.

I have, on:

23 February: Cycled 2.2 miles to the gym, did a 45 minute spin class, then cycled 2.2 miles back

24 February: Cycled 2.2 miles to the station, walked round London, cycled 2.2 miles back (with added bonus bouncing when falling off drunk)

25 February: Went to the gym and did 20 minutes on the cross-trainer,  20 minutes on the rowing machine, 20 minutes on the stationary bike

26 February: Run 3.01 miles

28 February: Went to the gym and did 20 minutes on the rowing machine, 20 minutes on the treadmill, 20 minutes on the cross-trainer, 20 minutes on the stationary bike

1 March: Cycled 2.2 miles into town, went to London and cycled 2.2 miles back

2 March: Cycled 2.2 miles to the gym, did 45 minute spin class, cycled 2.2 miles back, then cycled another 1.8 round trip to the farm shop

3 March: Run 3.02 miles

So there.

Ner.

The Ultimate Guide to Marathon Running is a 164 page magazine book type thing with a foreword by Liz Yelling aimed at beginners, intermediate and advanced.

It has training advice, nutrition tips, essential gear and schedules for all abilities.

There are eight parts to it:

Part one: Advice on how to set your marathon goals

Part two: Essential kit guide

Part three: Starting training

Part four: Preparing for a run

Part five: Nutrition

Part six: Check the technique

Part seven: Training

Part eight: Injury prevention

Then at the back are race tips, tactics, fuelling and recovery for the big day, along with schedules ranging from 4 hours+ to sub-2 hours 55 minutes.

Plenty of photos and step-by-step guides, written in an easy to understand language. It’s like a big glossy magazine for us hardcore finely tuned athlete types.

At £7.99, I’d say it was well worth the money.

For more information visit magbooks.com

I got sent some GlucoTabs and GlucoJuice to try out. According to the blurb, they “deliver a pure fast acting carb boost in the form of glucose just when you need it most whether warming up, training, competing or warming down”.I haven’t done much in the way of training recently. Exercise, yes. Training, no. Still, before departing on a recent run, I decided to see if the GlucoJuice would give me a boost, as the blurb says the 60ml compact shot will deliver 15g of fast acting carbohydrate in the form of glucose. I was a bit hesitant in trying it, as “15g of glucose” sounds gloopy, sticky and sweet. But it wasn’t. It was fresh and light, kind of like that expensive water you can buy in bottles with a hint of fruit taste and wasn’t sickly at all.Nice.Couldn’t tell you whether it gave me a boost or not and I haven’t tried the GlucoTabs yet, but I’m giving a pack of them to Helsbels to give a go with her marathon training and I’m sure she’ll let you know what they’re like.And for those of you who, like me, don’t like to drink anything calorific that doesn’t contain alcohol, they only contain 16 calories.