A light-hearted look at running, cycling and general fitness
I told Twitter I was too hungover to Juneathon today but Michelle said I had to Juneathon, even if it was only two sit-ups, so two sit-ups I did.
Stats:
Sit-ups: 2
Time: 2 seconds
Calories: Probably not very many
After being up late celebrating the second anniversary with Little Crutchey Man, I dragged myself to work and yawned all the way through to 4:45 when I left the office and got on the train and cycled home and as I got to the Tesco roundabout I thought to myself oh shit, I haven’t Juneathoned and so I took a long cut through the park which must have added an extra two hundred yards to my journey, but all extra exercise counts, right?
I borrowed a Greensand Way guide book from the library and this morning I scanned and printed the relevant page for the bit I wanted to go down and it starts off on the hill, like I didn’t have enough of hills yesterday, and I follow the route for about half a mile and then I get to a road and it says to turn right along the road and then left through a farm and I don’t want to go through the farm as it’s all gated and stuff and I’m not brave enough to go traipsing through someone’s home and garden, even though they must get hundreds of people traipsing through there each year and so I carry on down the road and although I was supposed to do 3 miles today, I only end up doing 1.75 and most of that was walking and it even ended the way it began, going uphill.
Bah.
Stats:
Distance: 1.77 miles
Time: 24:01
Pace: 13:35 m/m
Calories: 151
Greensand Ways: 1
Footpaths through farms: 1
Footpaths through farms I was brave enough to go through: 0
Music:
The Clash
Siouxsie & the Banshees
Audiofuel
XTC
I went to work and when I got there, there was one of the girls I work with in the kitchen and I said I’d brought my nice bike in today and she told a clinician who also happened to be in the kitchen that sometimes I cycle home and he said where do you live? and I said Walthamstow and then I said, oops, I mean Ashford and he said that’s quite far and I said yes and it’s 13 miles down the A28 and quite busy and he said yes it is busy and I said and lots of lorries too and he said yes, lots of lorries, I wouldn’t cycle down there and then I thought if a bloke, even if he is a clinician, is too much of a wuss to cycle down the A28, then I should be scared too and so I said is there a quieter way to go? and he said yes, but it’s lots of zig-zagging around and so I thought oh, I don’t want to go zig-zagging around but when it got to about 4pm, I looked on Google Maps and plugged in postcodes from A-B, or from Canterbury to Ashford anyway, and the second route it gave after the 13 miles down the A28 one was down some quiet roads and only another mile longer and so I decided to do that and printed off the directions and FUCK ME, IT WAS 11 MILES UPHILL and I wanted to die or at least cry a bit and then I had a beautiful view for a bit and then a loooooooooong downhill bit and then I think I must have missed my turning but a sign said Wye was half a mile down the road and I thought oh, there’s a train station at Wye and only one stop from Ashford, I’ll go and get the train and so that’s what I did and I eventually got home about two and a half hours after leaving work and I was really really really really really really really really really knackered after cycling uphill for 11 miles and I swore to myself that I was never ever ever ever ever going to cycle again.
At least, not until the next time.
Stats:
Distance: 15:62 miles
Time: 2:08:09
Speed: 7.3mph
Calories: 539
Hills: 11 flipping miles of them
I decided the other day that if I can run 5 miles without stopping, I should be able to run 3 miles a bit quicker than I have been recently. My long-term goal, as usual, is to run 10 minute miles but I don’t think I’m up to that yet so I set up Cedric to pace me for 10:30 minute miles and off I go down the road and I want to change the screen so it shows pace, time and distance but I press the wrong button and it’s gone onto laps so I press another button and the timer stops and I think bollocks to it and I start the timer again and forget about pacing myself and just carry on but after .75 miles I get a strange crampy type feeling in my bum and I want to stop and so I stop and walk for a bit and then I start to run again and at 1.3 miles I want to go home but I think no, I am hardcore and will not wimp out at 1.3 miles and I get to Tesco and decide to go down a different road to the one I usually go down and then I’m going down a path through a housing estate and there’s a sign that says no boating, swimming or fishing and I wonder what it’s talking about and I peer through the bushes and I see a tiny pond of murky green slime and think no one’s going to want to boat or swim in there anyway and I’d be very surprised if there were any fish living in it either and I wonder if they have difficulty getting pizza delivered round here as most of the housing developments aren’t on Google Maps yet and the pizza drivers are a bit stupid and Perfect Pizza can’t find our house, even though it’s on a busy main road although Pizza Gogo found it without any problem but Pizza Gogo have closed down and it’s very sad as they made really nice pizzas and didn’t turn up half an hour late with cold pizzas like Perfect Pizza do and then further up the path I see a hoody walking towards me and I think what’s a hoody doing here? and the hoody gets nearer and I see it’s not a hoody but a Muslim girl and I think I haven’t seen one of those since leaving London and then a cyclist goes past me and gives me a dirty look and I think why’s he giving me a dirty look, I’m on the grey bit of the path and he should be on the red bit of the path and there’s even a big picture of a bicycle painted on the red bit in big bold white lines and I think GET ON THE RED BIT WITH THE PICTURE OF A BICYCLE ON IT, YOU ARSEHOLE AND STOP GIVING ME DIRTY LOOKS and then I’m in the little park and I can’t remember which side of the park the next path I need is on and I get to the end of the park and it looks different and I look to my left and I think well, it’s definitely not that way and so I go right and then I get to the end of a road and I think huh? the road doesn’t end here and I wonder if it’s the same park and it looks different and then I realise I’ve come down a different way and I’m looking at it from a different angle and the path is opposite and I go down the path and I’ve still been mostly walking all the way so far and I wonder if I can run to the gate and I run about two feet then stop to walk and I walk for a bit and then tell myself that I am going to run to the gate and I do run to the gate and then I’m knackered and I walk down the road and I tell myself that when it starts going downhill, I’m going to run and it starts going downhill and Paul Weller starts singing about being in a tube station at midnight and I run down the hill and get home having not quite achieved the 10:30 minute mile thing.
Stats:
Distance: 3.04 miles
Time: 39:05
Pace: 12:52 m/m
Calories: 277
Different roads: 1
Murky green slimey ponds: 1
Hoodies: 0
Muslim girls: 1
Cyclists not recognising pictures of bicycles: 1
Music:
Audiofuel
The Jam
Everyone in the gym pissed me off today. I get on the cross-trainer and I can hear someone on the phone and I think get off the phone and I look around and it’s someone on the other side of the room and she’s shouting into her phone and at last she goes off to shout into her phone in the changing room and then the pacing man starts doing exercises on the mat next to my cross-trainer and in between sets he does his pacing around the gym thing but at least he’s behind me so I can’t see him pacing but each time he comes back and lays down again to do more exercises it annoys me and then I can hear some women talking and I bet they’re fat and blonde and pikey looking and I look over to where the fat blonde pikey women talking noises are coming from and yes indeed, they are in fact fat and blonde and very pikey looking and I think shut up you hideous fat pikeys and I finish on the cross-trainer and go on the rowing machine and there’s a young lad the size of a pipecleaner with the fat pikeys and he picks up a free weight and starts to wobble with it for a few seconds then puts it down and then the fattest blonde pikey changes the music on the stereo and turns it up so loud I can’t hear my iPod and I think turn the fucking music down you selfish fat pikey and the pikeys are standing around talking and not doing any exercise and I think do you think you’re in your front room or something? and the music’s so loud and I want to go and turn it down but I’m too scared as the fat pikey woman looks like a gobby cow who’d start a row in public and so I turn up my iPod but I can still hear the shit music and then the pipecleaner comes over and stands next to me while I’m on the rowing machine and looks at the screen and then he says something and I stop rowing and take my earphones off and shout PARDON? over the shit pikey music and he says what score do you get? and I shout WHAT DO YOU MEAN SCORE? and he says what number does it go up to? and I shout I DON’T GO BY SCORES and he says oh, how many metres do you do? and I think metres? I don’t count metres, I’m a girl, I count calories and I shout I DON’T COUNT METRES and he says oh, and wanders off and then all the pikeys including the pipecleaner pick up a free weight each and they’re wobbling about with them and I think please injure yourselves so you don’t come in here again and I think they probably won’t come in here again anyway, hideous fat pikeys aren’t known for their athletic prowess and enthusiasm for healthy living and maybe they’re just killing time while they’re waiting for Greggs to open so they can queue up with all the other fat pikeys and buy cakes and pasties and then the fattest pikey leaves and I breathe a sigh of relief and I hope the others follow her but they don’t and they’re still hanging around in all their pikeyness but they leave eventually and then two young boys come in and one of them is wearing bright yellow trainers and Hawaiian shorts and the other one is wearing a big gold chain and they wander around for a bit looking lost and I’m wondering if it’s National Go To The Gym And Wander Around But Don’t Actually Do Any Exercise Day or what?
Stats (gym):
Cross-trainer: 30 minutes
Rowing machine: 30 minutes
Weights
Calories: 370
Girls shouting into a phone: 1
Pacing men: 1
Fat blonde pikeys: 3
Pipecleaners: 1
Boys wearing bright yellow trainers and Hawaiian shorts: 1
Boys wearing big gold chains: 1
People actually exercising in the gym: Not many
Last week I’d arranged with myself to go to the gym this morning before supermarket shopping but when I woke up, I couldn’t really be bothered and I said to Sir Limpalot I don’t want to go to the gym and he said ok then, you can help me with the gardening and so I got changed into my gym gear and went to the gym.
When I got to the gym there was a sign saying that Ashford Community Church was there and all were welcome and I thought maybe I should go to church instead of the gym but then I wondered how many calories you burn praying and I thought probably not many, unless it’s one of those happy-clappy churches were people do a lot of dancing and singing and not just a normal church where you listen to the vicar saying thou shalt not steal from the collection box and stuff and so I decide not to go and do some praying but to go to the gym as originally planned and I haven’t been to this gym on a Sunday before and it’s quite busy and I get on an elliptical trainer and stay on that for 20 minutes and then I got on the rowing machine and I wanted to do 20 minutes on that and then go on the treadmill but when I got to 20 minutes, the treadmills were still being used by people walking on them so I decide to do 25 minutes on the rowing machine but at 21 minutes and 30 seconds, someone stops walking on a treadmill and gets off and I think oh no, I can’t get off the rowing machine at 21 minutes and 30 seconds, I’ll have to round it up to 25 minutes and so I stay on the rowing machine and hope no one else gets on a treadmill but someone does and I’m looking at the clock and at 24 minutes and a bit there’s still people walking on the treadmills but at 24 minutes and 50 seconds someone gets off a treadmill and I stare at it for 10 seconds before getting off the rowing machine and getting on the treadmill and running on it for 10 minutes.
Stats (gym)
Elliptical trainer: 20 minutes
Rowing machine: 25 minutes
Calories: 305
Treadmill:
Distance: 0.95 miles
Time: 10 minutes
Pace: 10:32 m/m
Calories: 97
Calories burnt through praying: 0
After a very moderate Friday evening for me where I drank less than half a bottle of wine, I wake up after dreaming that my dead dad and my dead brother came to arrest me and take me away and I get up and I look on Gmap Pedometer to plot out a five mile route and I go off to do my five mile route and wonder if the path is still cut in half by waterworks but it’s not and it takes me out through a housing estate and then I’m lost but then I realise I’m not lost and I go down the path and then down the other path and back up the road and down another road and then down another road and then I’m back on my road and my five miles is going to end going up a hill and when I get to the top of the hill, I’ve done exactly five miles and I think I might as well carry on and run down the hill but it’s windy and it’s like running on the flat but I carry on anyway and I get back and I’ve done over five miles and that’s the furthest I’ve run for ages and ages and ages.
Yay.
Stats:
Distance: 5.31 miles
Time: 58:28
Pace: 11:01 m/m
Calories: 546
Moderate Friday evenings: 1
Bottles of wine drank: less than half
Dreams about dead dads and dead brothers: 1
Pathways cut in half by waterworks: 0
Paths: 2
Uphills: 1
Downhills: 1
Winds: 1
Music:
Audiofuel
Madness
Sex Pistols
And I mean a bit. I cycled an extra half a mile back from the station, after popping into Tesco to buy jacket wedges and wine.
Hardcore or what?
Stats (cycling):
Distance: 5 miles
Time: 33 minutes
Speed: 9.1mph
Calories: 142
Extra halfs a mile: 1
Tescos: 1
Packets of jacket wedges: 1
Little bottles of wine: 2
But as I’d been there for four months, instead of the six weeks I was originally hired for, I can’t complain. So, in six weeks, I can go back to being a full-time lady of leisure. Yay.
And after I went to work and lost my job, I cycled home and am now very saddle sore.
Stats (cycling)
Distance: 16.91 miles
Time: 1:43:57
Speed: 9.8 mph
Calories: 520
Jobs: 0
Sore bums: 1