New Clothes!

Well it's been a terrible week for training and everywhere I look there seems to be reminders of how much work I've got to do. Last Sunday was Nottingham's Robin Hood marathon. Today was the Great North Run. Whenever I drive around the city or to work I see smug looking goody-two shoes runners casually sprinting up hills barely breaking a sweat. Advertisements for running kit seem to laugh at me from large bilboards. Or maybe I'm just feeling a bit guilty about my lack of effort this week.
This week's shameful schedule:

Sunday- 7.5K (the furthest I've ever run)
Monday- looking after my daughter in the day and then a night shift
Tuesday- sleep and another night shift
Wednesday- recover from night shift and a walk only
Thursday- work in the day, complete lack of motivation when I got home at 7pm
Friday- looking after Katherine, took her swimming- not sure splashing around with her counts as training, stayed at a friend's in the evening so no training then either
Saturday- Deep water aqua (weird but fun- 2m deep pool, flotation band strapped around your middle and lots of resistance exercise and jogging/ jacks/ kicks)

So that's one run and a deep water aqua session. And a lot of food including dinner at a friend's, a chocolate pudding, and cookies on the night shifts. And a few biscuits. And some salt and vinegar hula hoops (without doubt the best hula hoop flavour) And takeaway pizza on nights. Oh dear. Hardly the diet of a marathon runner.

But in some ways, this is good. This is my life- I'm a busy, working Mum who has lots of commitments to church and her friends and quite likes her food. Fitting training in is going to be tough some weeks and I'm bound to have weeks where the diet goes out of the window. Next week I'm doing two "Long Days" at work on Monday and Tuesday which means leaving home at 7am and not getting home until 9pm earliest. Two more days completely written off. But after that, the week is pretty clear.

My left foot hurt quite a bit after Sunday's 7.5K and I think it was the start of a bit of plantar fasciitis so actually having a week off running probably isn't a bad idea. It seems to be fine again now though so no excuses! Wednesday will definitely feature a run. Absolutely. Promise. Unless it's raining.....

I'm meant to be blogging about kit. I have no idea about what sort of stuff I need for running long distances and there is so much on the market (most of which seems entirely unnecessary). However, being a sucker for new, shiny things I scampered off to Decathlon (other sports shops are available!) in search of some motivation-inducing stuff. I returned with: new running leggings (with a cool, shiny strip thingy that might stop me getting run over at night); a fairly luminous pink vest affair (could also double for fancy dress at 80's party); a long sleeved running top for if it's cold and a running water bottle. Cool! At least I look the part now. 

The water bottle is truly useless. It's got a little flip spout and the hole that the water comes through is miniscule meaning you give an almighty slurp and get a tiny 2ml of water. Now, when I'm running, I huff and puff like some sort of overweight bear having a ITU admission-worthy asthma attack and a tiny 2ml just isn't enough. Back to the drawing board on the water while training front.

I'm thinking that at some point I'll need some new trainers but am going to save this for when I need a serious motivation boost. Nothing like an urge to run than in new, shiny trainers! Lots of larger sports shops and specialist running shops do gait analysis and then try to flog you expensive running shoes designed to specifically work with your running style. At the moment I feel like I'm so unfit that I could possibly run on the treadmill in the shop in case they laughed at me. Sometimes the marathon seems such a long way out of my reach.


Next time: more about Mark Versey- the reason for this marathon madness.

Mending a broken heart with a .....Zebrafish?!

Hello!
So, it's one week into my "official" (very much in inverted commas- but I am trying hard!) training. Week One has involved the following:

Saturday 3rd- 40 lengths swim in 30 mins
Sunday 4th- 4K jog/run- see last blog. It hurt. A lot. Must stretch before and after running.
Monday 5th- REST!
Tuesday 6th- 3 miles on cross trainer, 3.5 miles on bike
Wednesday 7th -REST!
Thursday 8th- 6K jog/ run/ walk (First thing in the morning, not good. Felt exhausted!)
Friday 9th- Walk 2 hours total.

Not exactly stuck to the plan but it's better than nothing. And, I have great news of joy and wonder.....
A new record has been set in my life! I jogged/ ran/ stumbled for 7.5K this afternoon! Whilst this is not very far in comparison to the final goal, it is by far the furthest that I have ever travelled at more than a walk. Forgot to check the clock before I left but I think it took me somewhere between 50 and 55 mins which isn't fast but let's face it, I'm not going to be completing this marathon in record time. I'll settle for just completing it to be honest!

Whilst writing this, I thought "I wonder what percentage that is of our far I have to run on the big day." Oh my. The marathon is a whopping 26.2 miles which is a mammoth 42K!
I've got over 5 times further to run than what I did today! This has brought me out in a cold sweat. Best to move on from facts and figures sharpish.

Anyway, this blog is meant to be about British Heart Foundation.
So here's getting back to facts and figures of a slightly more grave nature than how far I can't run.

About 2.7 million people in the UK live with heart disease. That's a lot aint it?

One in every 145 babies is born with a congenital heart disease. That works out as 12 babies with a heart defect of some sort born EVERY day. Blimey.
Breast cancer is very well known about and publicised (and absolutely, rightfully so) but women are THREE times more likely to die of coronary heart disease than of breast cancer.

One of the current research projects run by BHF is called "Mending Broken Hearts". It's all about a random little zebrafish. This zebrafish is pretty special and has a skill worthy of display to Simon and his Britain's Got Talent crew. The zebrafish can mend it's own broken heart. If its heart muscle is damaged, no sweat, no bother, no blue light ambulances needed, it simply recovers and hey presto, back to full strength. Now the thing with us humans is that if we damage our heart muscle, it never recovers. Scarred and pretty useless. Sometimes worse than useless. This leads to heart failure which is pretty much as bad as it sounds. Go to www.BHF.org.uk/research to find out more or watch this slightly cheesey video: http://vimeo.com/19384995

So that's just one of the BHF projects and a pretty good reason for you to all dig deep and donate pots and pots of your hard-earned cash or ill-gotten gains. And if you can't afford pots and pots then just a few quid will do. We'll talk more about that in the future! Chaaching! (Did I mention I've set a goal of £2500?)

Lovely. That's all for now. Next time..... New Clothes!

The training schedule

So I always said that when September hit I'd start to train properly for the marathon.

Well it's September. Oh good. Can't tell you how much I hate running! Probably about as much as Paula Radcliffe hates it when people ask her if she actually pees herself when running competitively to save time. For the record, I'll stop to pee if I need to. No worries there.

Anyway, I emailed the lovely running support team at the British Heart Foundation and said that I was wondering if the personal trainer that supports their runners would put me a plan together to help me train. There were a few questions on a form to fill in.
I, of course, lied.
According to the form, I'm of above average fitness, weigh half a stone less than I actually do and exercise twice a week on average. Excellent start.
Then a happy email from the mis-led trainer pops into my inbox. Several attachments included. One about stretching (haven't read that one yet- wish I had, will explain in a bit). One about general advice. And one with what doesn't appear to be a training plan but rather a schedule of torture.
Seriously, it's ridiculous. This week I am meant to be doing the following:

Monday: 30mins cross-training
Tuesday: 45 mins steady run (whatever "steady" is)
Wednesday: 40 mins body conditioning or pilates
Thursday: 45 mins steady undulating run (undulating? as in hills? I don't think so Pal)
Friday: Rest (thank goodness!)
Saturday: 45 mins recovery run and stretch session (how is a run "recovery"?)
Sunday: 75 mins long run, easy conversational pace (surely that's walking then?)

And that's week one!

Now I know that I've got a church meeting Monday night and choir to lead on Wednesday night so I thought I'd better get going this weekend.

Yesterday, I went for a swim. 40 lengths of 25m pool in sub 30 minutes. Great. Easy peasy. No running involved.

Tonight, I've been for a 6km run. It took me 43 minutes. I was determined to at least jog all the way rather than my usual stop-start technique of run a bit and walk a bit.  I achieved that! No walking for me. Nope. None at all. Some fairly slow jogging in there, especially up Aspley Lane which seems a lot steeper incline when attempting to run rather than when I drive it. But some quite quick running (down-hill of course) and no walking at all. Did I already mention that? No walking!

All good. However, the no walking rule appears to have taken over now I've stopped running. The laptop needed the power cable as battery getting low. I got up to walk to the other side of the lounge.
Ouch. Ow. Oooch. Eeek. OUCH.
Why have my calfs (or calves- never sure which is plural cow and which is plural lower legs. Bad considering I'm a doc) seized up already?! They really hurt. And I've got an all day theatre list tomorrow so that'll be a right laugh.

So today's lesson for a non-runner running a marathon is stretch. I'll be reading that stretch sheet then Thanks BHF!

Next time......more about BHF.

The starting line

This is the very first blog I've written and I'm hoping this blog will chronicle the ridiculous few months I have ahead of me.

Why?

Briefly:
Our best man and my husband's best ever friend died suddenly on February 25th this year. He was 38. Essentially, he died of a heart attack. At 38. And Mark was a fit, football crazy, golf mad, sport loving man who even worked for a sports organisation. We've been devastated by losing him.
It's wrong that young people die of heart disease. It's wrong that middle aged people die of heart disease. It's wrong that we don't understand enough about congenital heart conditions and premature onset of cardiovascular disease and so much more.

So......
I'm running the London Marathon in 2012 for British Heart Foundation in memory of the very wonderful Mark Versey.

You might think "Well that's lovely Lizzy, but what's the big deal? Loads of people run the London Marathon every year. 37, 000 of them to be precise."

Well, I can't run.

I mean it. At school I always ran the 100m (shortest distance possible) and if possible got out of sports day with some music commitment excuse. I tried to play goal shooter at netball (less running). I hung about on the wing at hockey and looked sheepish. At the gym I avoid the scary treadmills and favour aerobics or Zumba or ballet fit (when I actually drag my rather chunky bottom off the settee). Last year I watched my husband run the marathon and was so inspired I thought I'd give jogging a try. I found I was generally more successful at walking. I've even forced myself on a "Learn to run" course.

So this will be the blog of how a non-runner learns to run a marathon. Not because I enjoy running (I hate it) but because it seems appropriate that I do something that's a real challenge to celebrate the life of Mr Mark Versey and to raise vitally important funds for research into heart disease.

Next time..... the training plan.