Technological firepower

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We all lurve gadgets and most of us have a selection of redundant kit from various generations sitting gathering dust, while we proudly sport the latest model.  There is no doubt, however, that the latest kit is totally awesome and Nick’s Garmin Forerunner 305-8RR II is a case in point here. 

Not only does it read your heart-rate, but it has a satellite dish that enables it to work out your global position, your speed, the distance you’ve run, the calories you’ve used (how does it do that?), your body weight, the amount of urine you pass en route, a sweat meter… in fact it’s so fully loaded that it will even find its own way to your computer to download files.  Just awesome!

Unless, of course, you forget to charge the battery, in which case it’s pretty er, useless.  Though why not lugging this fairly heavy wrist-weight around should make Nick run slower, I can’t profess to understand.

But there you have it.

My Gore-tex jacket made its first outing this morning and whilst it was only drizzling, saturation would have occurred quickly without it.  The going underfoot was slidey in places, making it challenging & fun, but the mud was not yet deep enough to grab your shoes.  The long grass en-route had reached 100% humidity though so it felt a little like running through a puddle… in socks.

Overall I calculate, long-hand and without the benefit of space-race technology, that we ran six and a half miles in exactly one hour… making a speed of, er… 6.5mph.  I’m no heavier than I was, but Nick did stop for a five-minute pee and the toast consumed has not filled my stomach so I clearly used… more calories than however many are in that.

Strangely, although we were both running more slowly than normal, it was far faster than I wanted to run… in short, sitting here a couple of hours later, I am knackered. 

Don’t tell Nick though!

Dirty dancin’

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Kurt was really pleased to see my old trainers caked in mud yesterday, so I thought I’d get right at it with the new ones.  It wasn’t splish-splosh out there but I did find enough mud to take the edge off the sparkly bits!  As I started out, I wondered whether the combination of a mid-week training session, allied to new runners and Kurt’s encouraging comments about my running (you know how I feel about the power of the mind!) would make a difference to my speed and/or endurance.

I don’t think I would have kept up with Cliff’s whippet-like starting pace, but I still started quickly like last Sunday.  I slowed a little from time to time, but unlike last week I didn’t run out of steam – overall, I felt pretty good.  I also felt just warm enough with my new under-layer and an old Rono long-sleeve on top and longs below… and sporting my new beanie, of course!

My route this morning took in the Royal Oak, the corner of Wivelsfield Green, Hundred Acre Lane, Wellhouse Lane (with its large group of perambulators, though none with spare tea-cakes for me to scoff!), the water tower and back along the railway.  I made it 7.5 miles overall and the time was…

…65 minutes, which means an increase from last weeks 6.77mph to 6.92mph.  I was hoping that it would have been faster, but never mind.  I have a run scheduled with Nick on Wednesday and if he doesn’t knacker me out I might go for a run the with Burgess Hill Runners again that night.  It would be great to break 7mph net Sunday.

Kurt suggested that I enter Barns Green half marathon on 28th October, saying that it’s a lovely run through beautiful countryside… Kim is yet to be persuaded, but Dai said he might sign up, so are there any other takers?  Hey Nick!  You must live round the corner, so no excuses there… unless you want to get the teacakes in afterwards!

Mid-week exercise

We joined the Burgess Hill Runners on Wednesday night for some track work at Lewes sports centre and my, what a track it is!  Floodlit and in great condition, the slightly springy surface is a dream to run on. 

From the people I met, the club has a really broad mix of members but all keen to improve their running… and their banter!  It was a really fun hour and despite being newcomers, we were welcomed like good friends!

The downside?  We now need to go to the Run shop and buy some new winter kit… we were really lucky as although dark, it was quite mild, but I think that the warmer weather has now been washed and folded up into a drawer so that it doesn’t get dirty until the Spring needs it!  I definitely need one of those rain jackety things (damp is okay, cold is okay, cold and damp… ugh!) and both my pairs of Saucony’s are showing signs of distress… even the newer pair has no splodge left after the Ligurian descents!

Okay… so I just looked out the window to see a gorgeous day sitting in my garden, but you know what I mean!  Soon it will be winter drawers on, mark my words!  ‘Til then… I must go and see if it really is warm out there!

Longs on

I had no inclination at all to run this morning and it wasn’t until I had consumed my huge espresso that I could even countenance it!  This lack of inclination, in addition to a chilly wind, meant that the longs came out for the first time since the spring.

The mind is fascinating though, as when I actually started running it was at a far brisker pace than normal… my legs were on good form, only my mind had been in denial! 

I took a shorter route rather than push myself too hard and there were several times when I needed to pause for breath or slow down, but each time I got to an uphill I would push against it, almost racing myself (gently) to the top.

Despite the slow bits and the pauses, I managed 6.2 miles in 55 minutes, which is an average speed of 6.77mph… not bad, bearing in mind how little I’ve really been running and that I was running on my own.

Kim and I are planning to do some circuit work this week, so we’ll see what effect it has!  Good I hope, as Nick is about to make a reappearance after his rib recuperation and it would be nice to run him ragged for a change!

Leaden legs

There are several effective ways to get the heart rate over 120 beats per minute, which is a good cardio zone for someone of my tender years: interval training is my usual way but yesterday I decided to scarify the grass. 

Now, those gardeners amongst you will know that scarifying by hand is a long and tedious task, but essential to keep your lawn looking great.  The combination of planting the legs, exerting downward pressure with the arms and twisting the trunk whilst pulling the rake through the grass pushes the heart rate quickly skyward… in fact after every ten minutes of rigorous work, I need a break and I’m sure that someone else could count my heart beats just by listening.  I certainly could.

So, three hours and lots of breaks later and I had reached a decision… to buy an electric scarifier!

This morning my shoulders, back and arms were all (more than) a little tight and I thought a run would be the perfect antidote.  The weather was beautiful and I set out on one of the short run routes.  Twenty minutes was all I managed however before I was walking for five, another twenty and I had decided to walk home.  My legs were heavy, but that’s not normally a problem: it was actually my mind that wasn’t in gear.  They say that grass can do that.

Walking back did give me an ideal opportunity to gaze at lots of beautiful houses, either admiring them or silently assessing how they might redesign their house or garden to add value or panache… although I dare say that people passing me must have thought I was just  a weirdo walking along in my shorts!

So, hardly a run this morning, but I do now own an electric scarifier.  I only mention this in case anybody would like to borrow it!

The morning after

After yesterday, the run this morning was always going to be a slightly more genteel event!  I had the privilege of being joined (though that may have been followed) by Kim as we vaguely followed Daren’s route on a gorgeous, sunny morning. 

Kim looks very appealing in her running stuff and as a result we almost got eaten by a herd of growing calves who thought that she might be a tasty snack.  Dai had carefully explained how to whisper to a horse yesterday and so we (sufficiently savvy to know that these were not horses) ran away.  In a straight line! 

We also surprised a railway engineer laying down on the job in a most dangerous fashion… face down along the parapet of a railway bridge with no safety harness, pointing the brickwork below him!  He almost jumped out of his skin when I said good morning!  Sorry chap!

Between our bovine escape and Kim stopping to chat up a few people en route, our time was not great, but it was a lovely run nevertheless.  9km or just over five and a half miles in one hour ten minutes.

Intolerant behaviour

Dai joined me for a really lovely run this morning, during which we apparently talked a load of rubbish… I thought it was quite a profound conversation but Dai is an intellectual so it probably just sounded like idle chitchat to him. 

We pretty much duplicated my run from last week, but the superior technology of his Garmen confirmed that it was 7.26 miles in 1 hour 10 minutes and that our best pace was 5 minutes 57 seconds per mile… which can only have been the ten yard sprint down the hill at the end, otherwise the run would only have taken us 43 minutes!  Statistics huh?! 

Although the Garmen is pretty advanced, I would be interested to pit it against Kim at some point, who runs at exactly 6 miles an hour.  She doesn’t come in a shock resistant case, but she has many more appealing features (many!), particularly as you don’t have to carry her around on your wrist.  Alas, she doesn’t much care for idle chitchat so runs on her own, which makes it more difficult to gauge distances. 

Which is why I have to make uneducated guesses as to the distances I’m running and how long it’s likely to take.  Dai was surprisingly intolerant of this approach to estimation… as an educationalist and teacher of CDT he is used to working within very fine tolerances indeed.  Give or take four miles did not impress him at all.  Oh no sir!

Breakfast did though!  Daren introduced me to Mooch76 and it’s fair to say that I have been more impressed with each of my, um, three visits now.  Part of the reason is professional admiration, as this little cafe-bar encompasses many of the aspects of customer focus and service that I hold dear.  The rest just has to do with the great standard of the food and the deliciousness of the coffee!  Dai had the small, healthy option (aka big bertha breakfast), I had the ultra healthy option (small bertha’) and Kim the vegetarian delight (wails ‘they didn’t give me any bacon’)  Duh!

Tenuous segway to short verse that I particularly like from Roger McGough which goes something like this (apologies, Roger, if it’s not quite right!)

‘There are fascists in the park pretending to be humanitarians, like cannibals on a health kick eating only vegetarians.’

Veggie steak, anyone, or do you have a fool intolerance?

Of Sunday on Monday

In case you’re going to pull me up for having a lazy weekend, I DID go for a run yesterday!  Admittedly only 7 miles (1 hour 8 mins or so), but a run nevertheless.  Down to the Royal Oak, across to Hundred Acre Lane, round to Wellhouse Lane, over to the railway and back via the station & Darens flat.  The latter seems to have a tree growing out of the chimney… is that anything to do with you Debbs… smoking weed maybe?

I had this vague thought that I was running for both Daren, whose paying customers might not appreciate his dulcet steps running round the poop-deck above their sunday-morning-lay-in and Nick, who is out of action at the moment on account of having allegedly eaten a castle of cake on his own.  Thus, with three-up, I felt justified in finding it hard work! 

The local farmer didn’t help much by suggesting I must be mad (keen observation actually!) before leisurely driving off in his air conditioned John Deere!

Sunday morning escapade

I awoke from my dreams at 7.55am and whilst it was not the sunny morning I had envisaged, I was rearing to get my trainers on… after a very large expresso, of course. 

The sun was straining through light but wet clouds as I ran up the road and as it was also wet underfoot, I chose not to follow the mud-fest route that Daren, Nick and I often take.  I was in the mood to explore, happy to follow my nose and see what there was to see.  This took me to the south and east of the town where I discovered that the council was in the process of extending the path across an area where I had often wished there had been one.  That they had not completed the aforementioned became apparent as I ran around the boundary of first one large field, then another, a third and a fourth, in search of the exit. 

It had been lightly raining with big drops of warm water, but around this point there was a deluge, almost accentuating that I was going in the wrong direction. 

I eventually came to the boundary of the golf course where there was a gate of the locked variety and no clear route through the golfers playing in the rain.  I soldiered on finding a farm track heading in the right direction, but blocked by a farmyard with some impressive looking security gates on the other side.  I hedged around the boundary and came to a point where a low barbed wire fence and six feet of driveway stood between me and the route onward. 

I almost hope that the owners of the house did see me step over the fence because I can imagine them smiling as my shorts snagged a barb and I was left pinned to the fence for a few embarrassing moments until I figured out which way I had to pull the material to free myself. 

I ran onward, back up through the eastern side of the town, smiling back at the dog-walkers and on back to the house.  Here, a glance in the mirror confirmed that I was a sodden, bedraggled, mud covered monster.  No wonder they smiled at me!

Eight miles in one hour forty.  Not exactly speedy (Nick and I ran just over six miles in 55 minutes two weeks ago, although I did nearly throw up afterwards!) but passable for a wet Sunday morning escapade.

And the sun is now burning through the clouds.  Better late than never!