Category: Running

I woke up from a nice dream about cows just as Shaun was going to work and as I was quite nicely awake, I thought I’d get up and see if I could manage to do a run at a decent hour of the morning and not a time approaching lunchtime.

So I did. At 7:30am I was out the door, thinking I was very hardcore, until I remembered that someone recently had been for their Juneathon run at 4:15am.

I didn’t want to run on the isolated trails at that time of the morning and I definitely didn’t want to risk running into any school run mums with their very dubious driving skills along pavement-less lanes and so I had a look at a previous four mile run and, hurrah! apart from the first quarter of a mile, it was all on cycle paths and footpaths and so I set off being careful for the first quarter of a mile and didn’t get run over by any school run mums putting on their make up or lighting cigarettes or whatever else it is they do instead of LOOKING AT THE FUCKING ROAD and I get safely onto the cycle path and along the road and there’s quite a few people walking their dogs and schoolkids walking to school and I go through the field and there’s a sign on the sheep field with a picture of a sheep that looks like it’s had a chunk bitten out of it and the sign says this is what can happen if you let your dog worry sheep and I think that sheep looks more than worried, it looks pretty pissed off and maybe they shouldn’t put sheep in fields where people are allowed to walk their dogs but I never see any dogs off their leads here anyway as they’re all evil countryside devil dogs and I get back before 8:30 and I’m showered and hair washed and dressed before the postie’s been and he’ll probably have a heart attack if I answer the door to him wearing something other than a) my dressing gown; or b) my running gear.

Stats
Distance: 3.85 miles
Time: 47:45
Pace: 12:23
Calories: 376
Dreams of cows: 1
Up earlies: 1
School run mums: 0
People walking their dogs: some
Pictures of pissed off sheep: 1
Posties with heart attacks: 1

Today’s effort was my feeble little three quarters of a mile route. I saw more people than I usually do in a proper run though. There was a man taking his dogs into the park, two people sitting on a bench next to a man in a wheelchair, then I passed an old lady and a girl with a baby and a woman trying to cross the road with a man in a wheelchair.

You can tell I’ve been out of London for too long, when I start thinking eight people is busy. I’m off to Camden on Thursday where I’ll probably see more than eight people.

Stats
Distance: 0.77 miles
Time: 8:15
Pace: 10:43
Calories: 80
People seen: 8
People I will see on Thursday in Camden: more than 8

Had I not had a friend stay over last night that we escorted to Headcorn this morning, and had I not gone to the supermarket afterwards, I would probably still be in my dressing gown, so the title isn’t actually accurate.

But today’s effort was a run round the garden. But at least I did run it this time, despite what the pace says. I started off doing just the back garden, then went back inside and asked Shaun if 291 feet counted as a run, but he said no, I’d have to run round the front garden too, so back outside I went.

Did I feel like a total tit running round the front garden? Oh yes.

Stats
Distance: 0.11 miles
Time: 1:45
Pace: 16:30
Calories: 8
Back gardens run round: 1
Front gardens run round: 1
Mes feeling stupid: 1

I was going to go out for a run in the rain but when I got outside the rain stopped and the sun came out and I ran in the sun but then the rain came, along with the wind and I ran past the lake and the water was very very high and I ran past some fishermen and I hoped I disturbed all the fish so the fishes swam away and didn’t get murdered and although I did actually run most of the way, my time was very very slow.

Stats
Distance: 6.31 miles
Time: 1:17:16
Pace: 12:15
Calories: 626
Sun: some
Wind: some
Rain: more
Murdered fish: none I hope
Juneathons completed: 18/18

This week’s diet has consisted of this:

Monday: Smoothie for breakfast, salad for lunch, BBQ fillet thingy, potatoes and cabbage for dinner

Tuesday: Smoothie for breakfast, pizza and garlic doughballs for lunch at Pizza Express with Helen, beer for dinner

Wednesday: Smoothie for breakfast, salad for lunch, wine for dinner

Thursday: Smoothie for breakfast, salad for lunch, wine for dinner

If you swap the smoothie for a cigarette and swap the salad for a sandwich (except for the weekend when I didn’t have lunch either), this was pretty much my diet for the whole of my 20s. Now I’m a bit older, I am aware that this diet isn’t very conducive to, well, anything really but especially running.

But it’s Juneathon and so I have been out for a run in the rain where I got soaked in a different kind of way.

No alcohol is involved next week until Thursday, so I should get my mileage back up again then.

Stats
Distance: .77 miles
Time: 7:45
Pace: 10:05 m/m
Calories: 80
Healthy diets: 0
Juneathons completed: 17/17

Psychokiller by Talking Heads is currently playing on the radio and as I can’t be arsed to think up a decent title, that will have to do.

I suppose I’d better start by apologising to Hal Higdon, as his schedule said I was supposed to do 4 miles today but due to drinking Tuesday and Wednesday, I was too tired and so just did my little .75 run. Oops.

I am off out tonight too, so don’t expect any major effort tomorrow either.

Stats
Distance: 0.75 miles
Time: 8:02
Pace: 10:39
Calories: 79
Psychokillers: 1
Schedules stuck to: 0
Nights out in a row: 3
Juneathons run: 16/16

Don’t worry, I’m still vegetarian, even if the house is not very vegetarian-friendly at the mo due to Shaun’s three day meat festival (I’m out three nights in a row this week so he’s unloaded Tesco of their meat aisle, by the looks of the fridge).

Although Helen made me drink beer for about eight hours yesterday in Tonbridge (I think we made it to all the pubs in the High Street; we won’t be going back to the one that charged £4.90 a pint though), I did Juneathon today by doing my little .75 lap and my legs still haven’t recovered from Sunday’s hilly 10k, as my calves were very painful at the end.

Ouch.

Stats
Distance: 0.76 miles
Time: 7:57
Pace: 10:28
Calories: 80
Hours spent in pubs yesterday: 8
Pubs visited in Tonbridge High Street: all of them
Meat festivals: 1
Killing calves: 2

That’s what Shaun said to me when I announced I was going to the shop to buy some wine. Well, what he actually said was ‘if you fuck up Juneathon because you’ve drunk too much wine, you’ll never live it down’.

But my Juneathon integrity remains intact as today I went out for a run. I decided to do the very short route today which is just as well as when I got back to the front garden gate, my calves seized up, probably due to the hills in yesterday’s race.

Ouch.

Still, that’s 13 out of 13 Juneathons jogged, logged and blogged.

Stats
Distance: 0.73 miles
Time: 7:33
Pace: 10:22
Calories: 63
Wine: lots
Juneathons f***ed up: 0
Juneathons completed: 13/13