This was the big one for me – the week with 10 miles. I don’t know something about it sounds more serious and hard going. To get beyond it would be such an achievement – both physically but more importantly mentally. I knew I was going to go hard on this week as the following week I planned to do nothing other than sleep and eat (actually I did plan on commenting on blogs but the sleeping took over!)
There was a part of the route I was really unsure of so day one of my week I decided to go and walk that part. It showed me that actually I do need to go into the road on a National Speed limit, including some tight (and dangerous) bends. I thought there may be a different way around but there isn’t. It turns out that I still managed to miss a big chunk of the route! It did mean I could stop and take pictures though – and by the end of the day I had already taken over 30K steps – a great start to the Fitbit workweek hustle.
A lot of my week daytime was taken up by making costumes for World Book Day and so I really pushed myself in the evenings. Running Club on Tuesday I decided that I would go with the Blue group (the highest/fastest level) as they were doing 6 miles at a 10-12 minute mile. I would love to say I ran with them but in all honestly they were FAST. Our nice run leader Helen did keep trying to slow them down but it really isn’t in their nature (someone afterwards told me that a lot of them run a 6 minute mile!). I think they did the first 1.6 miles at an 8-8.5 minute mile – of which I was trying to keep up with. After I realised they were going so fast (and lots of reassurance from the lovely Helen) I slowed down. I also met Claire who is doing the same half marathon as me. I didn’t end up running 6 miles (5 I think) – but it certainly made me try to push myself more (as I struggled to get up the stairs when I got home!)
Thursday I ran 10 miles.
I still can’t believe that and mostly I think I even actually managed it by telling myself that I wasn’t “running” it was just jogging! What is that about – why do I feel the need to put myself down? It wasn’t non-stop as I did pause for a drink/take a layer off and to answer text messages but I did it in 1 hour and 40 minutes. I just listened to music rather than a podcast and it was the first time I felt like I was thinking about things other than the running. I read somewhere about planning the dinner so kept trying to think of ideas, but more importantly I came on to why do I believe I can’t run? I thought about all the things I have been told by others that I cannot do but have already achieved. Then I got on to the why people have told me those things to make it important to me to break the core beliefs that they are right. That was in the morning and I promptly went for a sleep so by the evening I felt ready for more! My friend Katy had invited me to Body Pump – which to me sounded like an aerobic type class and I could probably do with some stretching. Erm no. Maybe I should have asked, or looked it up. Katy told me to grab a step on the way in – it’s only once I had paid for the class that I realised it was WEIGHTS! Another one of those omg I can’t do that moment (I have no upper body strength). But the class was a nice pace (once someone helped me completely struggling to change the weights on the bar after I was done in after the WARM UP!) there were only a few times I was like I can completely not done this at all.
It took the 48 hours I was told for the pain to really kick in. People were seeing me and congratulating me on my 10 miles – and I was just like – I did Body Pump! I still managed to get around Park Run with my youngest despite the pain in my legs. My 9 year old and husband ran together and both got new personal bests! By Sunday my one arm was so bad that I had my husband cutting up my Sunday lunch! But still the family were insistent that we all went out for a ride – just to my husband’s Nan’s house but it was the first time I had used my bike more than just around the block. Again I know it sounds silly at my age but I never had a bike with gears and haven’t rode really since I was a kid so I am more nervous than ever that people will look at me and think I am weird if I get it wrong. Everyone seems to expect people to ride bikes – I feel this especially as I get a lot of comments on my adult Microscooter.
The only plans for the following week are to rest!