Lincoln 10km 2015

This is the forth time I have done this event and I enjoy for different reasons. It's a local event and one that I can go back each year and see if I can get any quicker. Quite a lot of my friends do the race which is always great to catch up with them. The course is flat and fast and is a great course to get a PB. The spectators really cheer you on all the way round the course which helps especially towards the end when it starts feeling tough and finally the finish, running alongside the cathedral and finishing in the castle grounds. Unfortunately this year we had to finish outside the cathedral due to Lincoln castle being closed whilst being refurbished.

The first two times that I ran in this event I had never really done much training and I was just happy that I managed to finish. Last year was the first year that I had properly trained for the event and I was able to do it in 47:07. A year on and all I wanted to achieve was that sub 40mins result. I would have been really pleased with a 39:59.

I woke up this morning and I felt confident that I would achieve my sub 40 minute target. The weather was perfect, sun out, very little wind.

I had my normal pre race breakfast of porridge and a banana a cup of coffee and a pint of water. I drove to my friends house where we always meet and had good walk up to the start line. At the start with approx 4300 runners eager to get going. It's always a great atmosphere at the start line, so many people who are running and plus all the spectators that make the event extra special.

At the start of the race I knew that I wanted to start off fast and see how I got on. The plan was to run below 4 minute k's and just keep going as long as I could. My first km was 3.34 which is always my fastest km whenever I do a race. I knew that if my average pace was a 3.50 per km,  by 8km I knew I would be able to hold on and get my sub 40 result I have been working towards. My plan worked and I had just left enough in the tank to achieve what I had wanted Sub 40. Official time was 38:47. I couldn't be happier with the result and I know some serious training will be required to better this result. 

The Lincoln course is all on closed roads and there are spectators all the way round the course. They say the course is flat which it is but the start line which you have to cross twice is very slightly up hill and it can catch you out if you push too hard. I love the end of the race as the crowds that line the streets makes it very memorable and it pushes you on to get across that line. 

To end a great day I was spotted on the local news on BBC1 running past the cameras at the start. Quite glad they didn't see me at the end.

Ashmei Ambassador Day

A while ago I had filled in an application form for the Ashmei Ambassador Day at their HQ in Aldbury. I never expected to hear back from them as I didn't think I would be one of the lucky ones to attend. I received an email on the 9th March saying CONGRATULATIONS! A week later I'm in Aldbury and I am excited about meeting the Ashmei team, learning more about the brand and also meeting the other ambassador hopefuls. 

As soon as I arrived I was talking to people about our experiences in sport, future events and learning about what makes them tick. I was really keen talking to a few of the Ultra runners that were there as this is one type of event I would like to try one day.

Performance, Quality & Style are the 3 words that they live by and you could see that in the kit. Ashmei talked to us about the merino wool that they use and how it keeps you warm when it's cold and keeps you cool when you are hot.

Programme 
We would like you to arrive between 10am and 10:45am. During this time, we will serve coffee and take individual photos, so no need for everyone to arrive at 10am - although there will be lots of like-minded people to chat to. 
  
10:00    Welcome coffee with Stuart Brooke, ashmei founder, filming & photo shoot; 
10:45    Welcome words, presentation of the Ambassador Programme & 
             Q&A session with Stuart; 
11:30    1 hour run or ride from ashmei HQ on the Ashridge Estate. Please note 
             that this is not a competitive run/ride. We will keep to a conversational pace. 
13:00    Refreshments and goodbyes 

We all received a free pair of socks to try on the run and over the 5 mile run they felt comfortable and had no issues. I was running a half marathon the next day so I knew they would get a proper test then. Every other pair of socks that I have tried have given me blisters. Getting blisters is something that I have had to manage and try and look after my feet as best as I can. 
Well I completed my half marathon and I can honestly say that I ran my second fastest half marathon (this was hilly) and I have no blisters at all. I never once feel my feet over heat and get sweaty. Great pair of socks and will definitely be getting some more.







Whilst out on the run with Ashmei and the other ambassador hopefuls it was another good opportunity to talk to the other runners and talk about training tips and tricks and races that we all have up and coming and what we would like to achieve.

The Ashmei ambassador day was a great experience as I have never done anything like this before and was a great opportunity to meet the Ashmei team and get to know even more about the great brand and to here how it was all developed. It was also great to meet other runners, cyclists and triathletes, to share stories from events from the past, future events and the training that we put our bodies through. I am very grateful for the invitation to the ambassador day.

Thank you Ashmei

Below are a few pics from the day.

Stroke crank and scarper

Stroke crank and scarper recently got in touch with me through twitter and  asked if I could write a brief piece about myself and my training. I have only really been writing my blog for a few days and was nicely surprised that someone had asked for me to share training experiences. A link can be found Here for their website and you can read my blog post.

Stroke crank and scarper provide t shirts and hoodies for triathletes.
They have asked if I could up date them monthly on how many training is going and my race results.

click on the logo and be re-directed to their website

Yoga

I have never thought that yoga would be something that I would ever want to do. I always thought of it as very pointless and that I would never benefit from yoga.

How very wrong was I. Tool part in my first yoga class on Wednesday and I really enjoyed it. Yoga helps with overall core strength, flexibility and relaxation. All three is something I need to incorporate in to my training programme.

I am hoping that yoga becomes of my training programme and that in time helps with my overall performance in sport.

Healthy Eating

I have changed my diet at the end of last week and I must say I have been really pleased with the results. In one week I have managed to lose 2kg. My training has remained the same and I have been eating more food. The right food has been finally getting in to my body. 

My diet has never really been that bad, I very rarely eat processed foods and my wife and I always make home made evening meals. My main problem has been breakfast and sometimes lunch. 

My breakfast used to be cooked breakfast. This would include, scramble egg, bacon, sausage, beans, chopped tomatoes, fried bread, hash brown and a slice of toast. Now the scramble egg is good for me. Bacon is always grilled. At lunch I usually didn't really eat much or I would have a plate of chips. I managed to lose weight eating all this, but then I got to the stage where I couldn't lose any more weight.

I have now changed my diet and now the weight has quickly shifted and I feel better for it. My breakfast now consist of me eating a banana and a handful of mixed nuts just before I go to work. Three hours later I have breakfast which is usually cereal or porridge and 2 slices of fruit loaf. Lunch at the moment is an apple and 2 carrots. When I finish work at 1400hrs I will have something like an omelette and then will have my evening meal later on. 

Just Joined A Gym

I have just joined a gym and had my induction. Didn't really do much at the gym, but one thing I did do was leave my phone in my locker and just got on with it.

I'm not to clued up on what all the kit does and what I'm supposed to be doing, but I'm sure I will get used to it over time. The only reason why I have joined the gym was to improve core strength and to assist with injury prevention. I have not joined to become bigger and bulkier.

Next item on the agenda is to hopefully join a yoga class. I have been told a few times that I am not very flexible so I'm thinking that yoga will help in that area.

This is not me, I'm not that flexible.

RACE SEASON BEGINS

So February has been a crazy month for me as I had a race every weekend. 5 races in total all running going further than I have ever run before and pushing new boundaries.

Events
Caythorpe Trail half marathon 1:38:19
Rauceby Ripper 8.7miles 1:00:28
Stamford 30km 2:13:56
Sleaford half marathon 1:27:00
Belvoir Challenge Trail marathon 3:47:38

It's been a long hard month, training when I can but not really much threshold work. Just a lot of steady tempo work to make sure that I stay injury free and that I'm ready for my next race.

I couldn't be happier with how this month has gone I have had a lot of support from friends and family. I have had a lot of nice messages from people wishing me well and congratulating me on my progress.

Caythorpe half marathon was the first race of the month. It was a cold morning and I had heard that this was a tricky course with hills and mud. Very enjoyable run and with it being my first race of the season It was a good test to see how the training had been going over the winter. The head wind at the beginning of the race was horrible, but once we turned out of the wind it was brilliant.

Most enjoyable race for me during Feb has to be Sleaford half marathon. It was my first half marathon that I had ever done last year and this year I knew I would better my time. All the marshals I have managed to get to know throughout the year as they are either member of the Sleaford Tri Club or members of the Sleaford Striders Athletics club who I have run with on training runs a few times. So it helped me push on harder as I had some great encouragement from them all as I ran round. Also at the end of the race everyone cheers you back in with so much enthusiasm.

Hardest race has to be the Belvoir challenge marathon, this is purely for the distance of the race and the terrain and the hills that were involved in the race. Probably not the best marathon to do as your first, but I do like a challenge. It was very muddy from the start and there were some nasty hills that just sap the legs of any energy you have. I remember getting to the 17 mile mark and just thinking why am I doing this, I had hit a bit of a wall. I then got to another hill and that was it, I started walking and was talking to myself out loud using quite a few naughty words. It didn't take me long to get going again and then getting angry with myself for walking and wasting valuable time. I was just very thankful for the next food station a mile later where I was able to get some drink and more importantly some JELLY BABIES.

The Rauceby Ripper is a great trail run, its a really good course. very well organised and the finish is great as it mostly downhill. I hope they never changed that. There was a great turn out by Sleaford Triathlon club as last year it was the first event that members of the club attended. I'm already looking forward to this race in 2016 as I hope to break the hour mark.

Stamford 30km was a tough event and I only wanted to take part in this just to get that distance under my belt. Very well organised, the course was quite challenging with a few hills thrown in to mess around with your pace. The marshals on this race were full of life and were very supportive to all the runners.


Caythorpe Trail half marathon 1:38:19
 

Rauceby Ripper 8.7miles 1:00:28






Stamford 30km 2:13:56
 

Sleaford half marathon 1:27:00 PB






Belvoir Challenge Trail marathon 3:47:38
 

So February is over and so is this crazy month. Not sure if I will do a heavy race month like this again as my body took a proper beating over the month, my feet have never looked so good. I have been so pleased with all my race results and setting new PB's that I never thought I would be able to achieve.
One thing I have learnt, I don't know how to use a race as a training run, I only know how to race a race and I put everything in to it.
With this year being the year that I hope to complete the full outlaw I have put a massive tick on my check list, which was to be able to run a marathon. Some people said I was crazy for picking the Belvoir challenge as my first marathon but I wanted to try a hard marathon that would push me physically and mentally. I'm sure it will be a race I think about when I'm running the marathon at the Outlaw. I hope to use the Belvoir challenge as memories of a hard race and hopefully give me the strength I will need on the inside to get me round the full Outlaw triathlon.

HAPPY NEW YEAR

January started off really well, by the 3rd Jan I had already completed my first half marathon of the year. I have been stuck training on my turbo trainer due to the weather not being good. It's either been too cold or too wet or both. So plan was to slog it out on a turbo trainer and go for a quick run afterwards.

I hadn't done Lincoln Park Run since August where I was close to getting a sub 20 minutes time. I really wanted to give it a go but since august weekends had been so busy. I had finally an opening to get to Lincoln and try and get a sub 20mins at Park run. Well I managed and was over the moon with the result. I managed to run 19:19. Didn't think I would be that much below 20 mins. who knows maybe one day I could get a sub 19 minutes. Not even going to think about that for a while.

Last day in Jan went for an early morning swim for an hour and then wanted to go for a long bike ride. This was the plan with a friend the day before. We had a plan, we went swimming and then we headed out on the bikes. The ride out was great we were hitting a good speed, traffic was minimal and it was looking good. Until we go approx 20 miles out then he were hit with snow and we had turned a corner and had to contend with head wind as well. Great both of us getting really cold. The snow had stopped and it was the wind that was the problem head wind with wet clothing on. Well we didn't get to 60 miles like planned, instead we turned off early and headed back home. We managed 45 miles in the end I have never been that cold before.

December 2014

Nothing really happened in |December just getting some much needed rest and getting my race diary ready for next year. 2015 is starting to look very busy. Lots of different events planned and no idea why I do this to myself. I guess a year after starting training I did't think I would be writing a blog about my journey and what I have done throughout the year. 

After my charity bike ride in May 2013 I kind of fell out of love of cycling and didn't really ride my bike much after. It showed as by the end of 2013 I was at my heaviest and I still didn't want to cycle. I have always enjoyed sports as throughout my life I have participated in a lot of different sports and I think as much as I enjoyed doing all these different sports in the past I didn't love them. With triathlon its completely different I have enjoyed all aspects of the sport. Running and swimming I consider my two strong points in the sport. The bike I'm still unsure. I am hoping to get in to some local time trial events and see how I get on with other cyclists. 

I decided to go for a quick run on boxing day and loved it. Not many people out and it was a great way to feel burn some calories and not feel guilty about what you ate over the Christmas period. 

It snowed on Boxing day evening and two friends and myself decided to go for a run in the snow the next morning. we managed a 15 mile trial run. Running in ice cold snow filled puddles and then complaining about having cold feet was all part of the fun and with minutes you wouldn't even know your feet were cold until you hit the next puddle.

November Time for some FUN

So first event was the Winter Wolfrun. This was a 10km obstacle course. My good friend David 'Titch' Marshal likes to organise a bunch of us all to get together and take part in these types of events. He does a really good job organising us all and he gets loads of interest. He also owns the local sport shop in Sleaford. The guy lives and breathes sport. http://totalsportsandsupplements.co.uk/

Right enough of plugging his business, but its a very good sports shop and they go out of there way to help anyone out.
Back to the wolfrun. I think there was approx 30 of in our wolfpack and it took ages to get round the course for a 10km distance. This was however not a race it was a time to be with other like minded people who enjoyed fitness and have a laugh. I think that everyone that took part couldn't stop laughing.

Throughout November I have just been training as I have been all year and then I found out that Total Sports & Supplements were going to be hosting the first ever Sleaford fun run at the start of the Christmas market. This was to be a 3km fun run. Whilst probably having a coffee at the shop and talking to Titch we came up with the idea that I should run it backwards. 3km running backwards why would anyone want to do that. straight away we searched the internet to see if there was a world record and there was. some guy in Germany who could run it 11mins. So we thought is there a record for the someone running 3km backwards in a Santa suit. No records have been found. 

Well it came to the day of the race and another nutter runner like me were to both run it backwards dress as Santa. The other nutter of runner is Zoe Louise. We both ran it backwards and my legs were aching quite a lot afterwards purely due to the fact that I have never ran backwards before and it uses complete different muscles. It took me 20 mins to do the run backwards, which is a unofficial WORLD RECORD for running backwards in a Santa suit. Unless someone can prove otherwise.

Peterborough Half Marathon

So this month was all about me completing my final half marathon of the season. I have ran 2 others prior to this competitively and I have managed to do a few half marathon training runs. This would be the race where I could truly see how far I have come. I ran my first ever half marathon back in February this year and I found it very difficult as I had no idea about pacing and I had never ran that distance before.

So on the 12th October it would give me a real idea how my training has come along. The race is flat and I heard it was a great course to achieve a PB time. It was also the perfect race as the two friends who called me fat back in January were both able to run the race. One of the friends I had already beaten at 5km and 10km distance now was time to see if I could do it at a half marathon.

RACE DAY
Weather conditions were really good, no wind and not too hot. I took two days rest before this event as I want to be really fresh and ready for this race. This wasn't me racing my friends like it may sound above. This was about me racing me. I have never felt this fit and healthy before and I knew that I could run this race well. The night before I worked out my pace I wanted to achieve and put that in to my watch. I had with me my two energy gels one to take just before the start of the race and one at around half way mark depending how I felt. I had a time in my head that I share with no one till I have ran the race that time was to run sub 1:40hrs.
I started off nice and steady and one of my friends went flying off, as much as wanted to follow him I hung back hoping that my race plan would pay off and that I would catch up with him. Well I think we got to the 5km mark I felt really good and I had already caught my mate up. So at the 5km I picked up my pace leaving my two mates behind me. This carried on for the next 5km. I thought to myself that they will come past me at any moment, Well only one of them did and he started pulling away from me. I thought to myself there is no way I can catch him now, so I went back to my race pace I had planned and by the 18km mark I had caught back up with him and had overtaken him again. I pushed on as hard as I could my legs were hurting and on the last Km my legs had started to cramp up. I managed to finish the race strongly and my finish time was 1:34:44. This meant I had knocked approx 15 mins of my previous half marathon.

That's not me smiling that is a pure grimace, was holding off cramp for ages

The website I use to work my pacing out you can find by clicking on the link http://www.coolrunning.com/engine/4/4_1/96.shtml 

September update

WE CLIMBED MOUNT SNOWDON.
So proud of my wife you managed to climb mount Snowdon with me on the 1st September. Very good climb but difficult. The year before we climbed Scarfell, so who knows in 2015 we may even climb Ben Nevis. I even found a lake where I go go for a quick swim, water was a little cloudy but not cold at all.

 

 

So this is my last triathlon of the year, I had signed up for the last minute triathlon in Southwell. Another sprint distance tri. I was really looking forward to this as I could go out and see how far I have come since January. The only problem was I had a wedding the night before and I would have to be up early to drive an hour to the event. So I had a late night with no booze. The event was also nicely represented with other members of the the sleaford Tri Club, so great atmosphere.
Swim 400m: 8:00
Bike: 17km: 35:00
Run 5km: 20:39

So this year so far has been me seeing events and signing up for them as and when I can, no real planning has gone in to it. So I decided that I really enjoy triathlons and the club that I am apart of has really help with that, making training enjoyable and it's also nice seeing friendly faces at events. so for 2015 I have decided that I wanted to step it up to the next level so I have signed up for the the Outlaw Half Triathlon and also the Full Outlaw Triathlon. Doing the full Outlaw is something that I have always wanted to do and I never thought for one minute that I could do it. I am one who likes a challenge and when I have a challenge I am focused and want to do well. So my main goal for 2015 is to complete a Ultra Triathlon.

August Update

It's the 1st August and I'm back doing another event this time I'm in Skipton ready to take on Tough Mudder. this is obstacle course which is very popular. at any opportunity they dunk you in mud and then make you run around until you get dry and then dunk you again muddy water. 

    

Took part in my first Aquathon this month and really enjoyed it. The event was ran by Sleaford Tri club and loved it. I'm hoping that I'm able to do it again in 2015. Managed to finish the course in 30 mins and for the life of me I can not remember the distance of the swim but the run was 5km. Swim was probably 400m

 

So now we get to my main event of the year, Sleaford 10km. This was the event that I said I would beat one of my friends who called me fat back in January. So the night before the event I work out what time I would like to get and set my pacing up to hit that time. We ran the race and I was very happy to get a PB on my time 10km time. I also did beat my friend but to be honest I was more happy than getting my PB. I managed to run it in 41:47. I had my watch set up to run 4:18mins per km , but I managed to run an average of 4:11 per km. I managed not to get carried away and go too fast. I kept with a good steady pace and when I got to the 5km mark I gauged how I was doing and was able to push on at the same pace.

  

Last event of the month was the sprint triathlon relay national championships. For me this was a big step as it was a big triathlon and was at Holmepierre Point lake in Nottingham. This event consisted of 4 people in your team, each member had to swim 750m bike 14km and run 5km. I have no idea how we got on really. I know I swam well and biked ok and I felt good on the run. I remember the run to be easy on the outward leg but on the way back in, it was head wind all the way. I still managed to run a 21:18 5km. so not all bad.

This would prove to be a good time to check out holmepierre point as I was thinking about signing up for the Outlaw Half Triathlon. 1.2 mile swim, 56 mile bike and 13.1 mile run. More about that later.