Back to basics

As I wrote in the previous entry, I've been thinking about my original goals, and while I can't pinpoint exactly where I lost sight of them, I definitely did. So now it's about going back to basics, and thinking about what I want. What I want is to lose weight, get fitter, tone up as the fat comes off, and build endurance, skills and abilities as I go. I also wanted to do things like run a sub-30 minute 5km, which currently feels laughably far away. You can't escape the fact that I'm still running the same sort of 5km speed as I was doing 18 months ago when I was a relative beginner. There are definitely aspects of my running I've improved on, but speed training has been put aside while I've focussed on distance, and I think I need to take note of that.

I'm not saying I woke up the morning after I wrote the last blog post, jumped out of bed, prepared a day of healthy meals and snacks, drank loads of water, and did tonnes of exercise, but my brain is shifting slowly back to the goals I had. I need to find the piece of paper I had my running PBs written on (I have them stuck up on post-its on my kitchen cabinet, but I think they could be out of date) and start destroying them. I need to find my other PBs - things like time taken to row 1km and 2km on the gym rowing machine, how much I can bench press, how much I can deadlift, how long I can hold a plank position, and how many 15kg chest presses I can do in 90 seconds... I have no idea where I stand with these, at the moment. I think it would be good for me to start pushing myself to find out.

Anyway, since I last wrote, I've done a couple of workouts, swims, and so on, but two notable things I wanted to write about. So let's start with Saturday. Saturday was long run day, this weekend, and only 2 weeks before the Great North Run, I needed to get a decent run in to help my confidence after a really shoddy effort the week before. With a refreshed mindset, I was determined to try a structured run/walk but I purposely slowed the speed down to maintain the running for longer, and still tried to keep a brisk walking pace in the splits. I went with a basic 6/1 split - 6 minutes of running, 1 minute of walking. A couple of times I walked 3 minutes, while I drank some water, ate a bit of a 9Bar, and gathered my thoughts, but mostly, I stuck to 6/1. I was absolutely thrilled with myself to finish almost 11 miles this way - it's so unlike me to be so structured!!! Granted, I aint winnning any prizes, running 10.9 miles in 2hrs 21, but as an average pace goes, it's actually not far off my HM PB pace, lol... Plus I took a lot of confidence from it. :) I worked out later that if you took the walk breaks out, I had RAN almost 9½ miles. O. M. G. I don't think I've ever ran that much in one session, ever. Proper thrilled.

My personal trainer had given me a bit of a lecture last week, as I was telling him about the stuff I wrote in the blog, and he told me to "stop thinking you're a beginner!" - and move my mindset to intermediate. I thought about how, despite doing some form of weight training now for over 3 years, I give myself a hard time for how little I can do, and I saw that he was right. I can actually do a lot more than I think. So, let's move on to the second thing I wanted to write about, and that's yesterday (Monday).

I started the day at 5am, which I've not been consistently doing for a while, and was in the gym before 7am. I did a warm-up, some treadmill work on the incline (my trainer suggested I put the incline to 10%, the speed to 6km/hr, and then briskly walk for 30 seconds, then run for 30 seconds, without changing the speed, and repeat that 10 times. I managed 3 before I thought I might die... but I'll do more next time) then loads of stretching, and some sit-ups, squats, etc... I then did some treadmill short sprints and rests (HIIT, high-intensity interval training) designed to push me past my perceived limits. The idea being, I set the speed at the highest speed I think I can maintain for 30 seconds, then after 30 seconds rest, I take the speed up by 0.1 km/hr and do another 30 second sprint, and so on, 5 times - so I end the 5th sprint 0.4km/hr faster than what I "thought" was my top speed. Great idea, but - me being me - I started conservatively..... In the first set, the 5 sprints were done at 9.7 km/hr (equivalent to 10 minute miles) up to 10.1 (equivalent to 9:30 mins per mile) but in the 2 minute rest period I realised the last sprint still hadn't pushed me to my limits, despite breathing heavy and sweating lots, so in the second set I started at 10km/hr and incrementally went to 10.4 km/hr (equivalent to approx 9:15 mins per mile) - I will definitely attack this one in future cardio sessions, I know I can do better.

I'd finished my morning cardio session with more stretches, and a 500m sprint, and went to work. After work, I went back to the gym for my first proper resistance session since scraping my hand so badly a few weeks back - I haven't properly done my own weights session for a while, so I wanted to give myself a good but not TOO tough session, test out where I am, and give myself a basis to improve on from here. I swung kettlebells, pressed and curled barbells and dumbbells, did weighted sit-ups with a barbell, russian twists, plank and side planks, looooads of stretches, including on the vibrating powerplate, and generally felt freaking amazing. There is something fundamentally awesome about swinging a 16kg kettlebell with 1 hand for 30 reps, while a guy next to you swings the same size bell with 2 hands and collapses in a sweating heap on the floor after 10 reps... Of course, I don't know how the rest of his session had been, but still - HUGE grin. :) And I feel hardcore to the extreme when I do clean-and-press lifts with a barbell - last night I played it safe with a 10kg bar, but I'll look to move this on.

After an hour with weights and stretching, I got changed and went into the swimming pool - just a leisurely 12 laps of the 25m pool in breast stroke, because by now I was tired, and starving hungry. I gave the steam room or sauna a miss, and headed for home, feeling pretty damn happy with a 3-sticker day.

And what do I mean by a "3 sticker day"...? Well, at the begining of the year I pinned a large wall-calendar to my wall in my hallway, and bought a tonne of little feet-shaped stickers. For each run, gym session, swim, walk of more than 3 miles, or other type of exercise session (such as indoor climbing, or badminton), I stick a sticker onto the chart. I filled gaps around the edges with motivational phrases and stickers, and I look at it each morning. (click pic to enlarge)

So as of end of yesterday, 2nd Sept, in 245 days I'd earned 205 stickers. In 245 days, I've had 89 rest days (which averages out as 5 full rest days in every 2 weeks) - but I've definitely been slowing down on the sticker-collecting front over the past couple of months. It's time to get building it back up again. :) I'm feeling ridiculously positive, and motivated to push through September strong and successful. There's the small matter of a half marathon in 12 days' time, but hey, if I can harness the way I'm feeling today, there's no way I can fail to get a PB by the time I cross the finish line in South Shields. x