Short run – Page 13 – Foster Runs

June 16, 2013

Playing catchup

As many students will have heard me say over the last few years, the one thing that you can guarantee about habits is that they lapse. The key thing to remember is that when you realise that a habit has lapsed, you just pick up where you left off… with no emotion.

So although I’ve not blogged for six weeks, here I am back at the keyboard picking up where I left off.

Although I’ve not blogged, I have at least completed a few short miles: On the 12th May 5.02 miles in 40 minutes; on the 3rd June 2 miles in 18.31; and on the 4th June 2 miles in 18 minutes. All on the machine.

The lack of running and blogging was initially due to a busy few weeks, with conferences, a ten year reunion at LBS and the marking of 100 strategy papers for a friend at UCL. Then I just didn’t feel like it and found other things to do, like gardening, barbecues, researching or relaxing. Then, when I did do a couple of shorter, faster runs, I didn’t run because I could hardly walk for a week with a pair of wooden calves. [Memo to self, stretch after running!]

Eventually it was due to lethargy, which reminded me why I created this running/writing habit in the first place, way back in 2007.

It wasn’t just about keeping fit and slowly improving my ability to write: it was as an antidote to the tiresome physical and mental lethargy I feel when I don’t exercise.

So three runs in six weeks, totalling 9 miles in 78.5 minutes, average speed 6.88mph and a lapsed habit finally restarted.

April 24, 2013April 24, 2013

Short run & spring clean

It was a beautiful Spring weekend and breakfast was consumed outside both days. But this shouldn’t lead you to think it was a relaxing weekend!

Last week a visitor asked how often I cleaned the deck and whilst he seemed satisfied with my response, I now knew that it wasn’t only me that thought it needed attention.

Worse still, I knew that it needed resolving before I put the garden furniture on it for the summer.

It’s a horrible job, trying to wash off two years of weather & wear with a broom and a pressure washer. But Karen was down so it became a group activity and by the end of the afternoon we had completed the top deck.

My Sunday run then was a barrier to further progress so I made it a short one. I chose the Wivelsfield/Ditchling Common circuit and then added the loop out to Hundred Acre Lane for good measure.

It started cold (in my shorts & tee-shirt) but I soon warmed up and had fun in the remnants of sticky mud that barred the path from time to time.

I estimate that the route is 6.2 miles so the 58 minutes it took to complete meant that I averaged 6.4 mph.

And then it was back to the deck washing and treating, which meant that by the end of the day I was pooped!

The deck now looks like this…

… which is hopefully sufficiently nondescript for no-one to notice it for another couple of years!

March 10, 2013

Pain relief

My overarching reason for running this morning was to relief the muscle pain created by washing the cars & gardening yesterday. My shoulder particularly had reminded me that I had overdone it every time I turned over in bed last night!

A run seemed like the best way to loosen up.

I dialled in 7mph on the machine and after each five minutes I took a couple of sips of water and increased the speed by 0.1 mph. There was an ongoing conversation in my head about whether to run 5 miles or for an hour.

I settled on 45 minutes, after which time I had run 5.5 miles, an average of 7.3 mph.

My shoulder is still painful, but the muscles are a lot looser so it’s not grabbing my attention so much. More gardening required methinks… just not today!

March 3, 2013

1000 feet

Thursday I was feeling demoralised. Nietzsche said that you can have as much joy in your life as you are willing to tolerate sorrow and if that’s right then I have had a few days of being at the bottom of this sine curve.

An alternate way of looking at it might be to say that March had arrived (almost on Thursday) but the weather has not yet improved sufficiently to go outside without protection against hypothermia.

A run with Daren was a perfect tonic and with the same four high-performance layers as last week to keep me warm, we set out into the gloomy morning.

Runs with Daren can’t always be full of laughter, but it’s pretty much impossible not to have some invoked as a result of our discussions! I forget why we laughed, but we did laugh, especially when I almost landed face-first into the thick mud at the bottom of Wolstonbury Hill.

I almost wish that my hand hadn’t saved the day as it would have been a way funnier photo.

My subdued mood made the Tank Tracks seem even tougher than normal… Daren chose this time to nonchalantly share that our 10km circuit involved climbing 1000 feet… just three circuits would equate to climbing Snowdon.

I couldn’t help thinking again about Cloud Atlas as we ran down the hill towards the cars. This run is like a microcosm of life, with tough bits and easier sections and runners who are the same on each circuit, and yet always different.

We were surprised that despite feeling much slower, we dispatched the 6.25 miles in 1:15, the same as the previous week.

February 24, 2013February 24, 2013

Of wise men

One of the benefits of running on the machine is the amount of thinking that I do. Towards the end of my run I started thinking about what made the archetypal ‘wise man’ wise?

On a Strawbs album when I was growing up there was a quote from the Buddha:

As a man of discernment, standing on a rocky eminence, boholdeth those who are below and in distress; so doth the sage, who by his wakefulness hath put to flight his ignorance, look down upon suffering mankind from the heights of wisdom that he hath attained.

It’s from memory, so it might not be strictly accurate, but the question remains: how did the sage put to flight his ignorance?

The curiosity to observe what was going on around him and the humility to do it without judgement? The perception to see behind the obvious and the flexibility of thinking to embrace this new information. The courage to challenge dogma and the resilience to keep going when this got hard work?

These are all relevant sterling qualities, but is there also some reason they often seemed to favour living in the wilderness… even if it was only for 40 days and 40 nights?

I think the reason has to do with the way that blue sky thinking comes to us. To my mind the sky is on the inside, held as one of the millions of life-inputs captured within our subconscious. It is within this entity that ideas happen and all that is required to access them is a quiet conscious mind.

You’ll have to forgive this slightly kookie subject… it’s the kind of thing that happens when I stare at a white wall for half an hour. Along with myriad ideas for how to easily suspend an iPad in front of the running machine to give me something to think about while I’m running.

I ran 5 miles in 42.40, an average of 7mph and I’d like to leave you with something else that has been running around in my mind… if you have time to watch it?

February 22, 2013

Cloud Atlas

I thought Sunday was cold, but it was positively balmy compared to what greeted me as I opened the car door at Jack & Jill on Thursday morning.

Testament to the temperature was Daren’s somewhat uncharacteristic first question to me… ‘shall we go & get a cup of tea?’

The idea rolled around in our collective mind for a few minutes, but ultimately our good sense was overridden and we went for a run anyway.

It was twelve degrees warmer than my run in Sweden last month, but felt WAY more chilly and my nose physically hurt from the icy tentacles of the sharp easterly wind.

The normal route was undertaken which is largely sheltered from an east wind so normal hilarity soon returned to the dynamic duo.

As per normal we ran through all manner of discussion subjects… to give you an example, I likened our recurrent run to the novel (and now film) Cloud Atlas, with us repeating our journey again and again, facing different challenges each time but with the same key characters. In terms of Jonathan Livingstone Seagull, our ebullience appears to make each circuit greater fun than the last, albeit with the occasional exception. Life is like that.

Unlike normal, the obligatory mud at the bottom of Wolstonbury was not appealing to take head on. We attempted to skirt around the issue, on account of the icy water in the deep puddles… and both failed.

On a day when even the tank tracks could not quell our enthusiasm, it was a small price to pay for such an enjoyable outing.

We finished the supremely hilly 6.25 miles (10km) in a characteristically sedate time of 1:15… although 5mph is actually pretty good bearing in mind our shared paucity of runs over the last month.

February 22, 2013

Warm up

After eighteen days away working in warmer climes (we won’t dwell on the international news stories about the attendant cyclone and the flooding it generated in the local area!), the UK was a COLD place to return to.

The hot and humid weather on the other side of the world was not conducive to any exercise other than the occasional evening dip in the swimming pool so I have no running to report during that period.

As a result of these two factors, exacerbated by jet-lag, my run last Sunday was in the warm embrace of the running machine and at a gentle 6mph warm up pace.

I have nothing much more to report, other than my memory remains as fickle as ever… even five days after the event, I’m struggling to remember the myriad thoughts I had.

I’m not even certain about the time & distance, but I’ve decided the most likely combination is 5 miles in 49.5 minutes.

January 20, 2013

The snow thickens

With the snow following me back from Scandinavia this week and without the benefit of Martin’s running spikes, I opted for a run on the machine this morning.

On a scale of enjoyment, running on your own on a machine compares poorly to running with friends in interesting places, so my aim today was to get on and off as quickly as I could.

I set my goal as 45 minutes, dialled in 7mph and got on with it.

What can I say? The cheese plant waved gently at me as my head bobbed up and down. I got the stitch after about 25 minutes and I couldn’t shake it. I needed my mental stamina to finish. I counted down the minutes rather than watching the distance increase, amusing myself by trying to do mental arithmetic to see whether I needed to increase the speed to get an average of 7mph… the machine takes long seconds to get up to speed initially.

And failing at the arithmatic: 60 minutes divided by 7 is…? The seconds make it a complex calculation to do… and to then compare with the current time/distance equation, especially when you’re running… and especially when your body is rebelling.

I was about 6 seconds adrift at the 45 minute stage, covering 5.24 rather than 5.25 miles and thus averaging 6.98mph. But who cares… I was just glad to have finished.

It’s still snowing outside, harder now and I’m hoping that trains, planes and automobiles will all be running on time as required this week!

January 20, 2013

The Stockholm Syndrome

There were a number of facets of my run last Sunday that were unusual. It was dark, minus ten degrees and the ground was covered in packed snow with a layer of powder snow on top. Oh, and I was in Stockholm.

My brilliant host Martin had persuaded me to take my running gear and he augmented this with an extra pair of running tights, a head-torch and a set of running spikes for the bottom of my trainers.

I was particularly glad of the latter. My outside runners were covered in mud from the previous run so I had packed the pair I use on the running machine. Only when I put them on did I realise how slippery the soles were: a combination of the rubber hardening with age and the silicone lube we use on the machine.

It may have been minus ten, but it really didn’t feel that cold, which may have been due to low humidity. We ran gently along one of Martin’s training routes, through his neighbourhood, around his local lake and up into the forest. It was beautiful and I could certainly get used to this being my local run, snow and all.

All too quickly we were back at the house and I felt elated… 55 minutes had passed in a flash! I’ve no idea how far we ran, but we were chatting constantly so probably about 5 miles.

After work the following evening, Martin decided I should experience more of the local way of life. We headed to a local recreation centre and I once again changed into my running gear… this time swapping the slippery-soled runners for a pair of long Swedish ice skates.

The last time I can easily remember being on ice skates was around 1995. Whilst standing nonchalantly with my hands in my pockets I had slipped over and fractured a rib! Not wishing to worry Martin, I withheld this information!

Not expecting to go far, we set off along the track… across the surface of the lake. You might think this sounds crazy, but the track would have been maintained by a tractor, so the ice is pretty thick. Having driven on frozen lakes in the past it wasn’t the thing that was concerning me… I just didn’t want to make an idiot of myself by falling over!

Fortunately some basic elements of the technique (none of them glamorous, alas) came back to me and we completed the lake circuit… a whole 3km!

That was the hors d’oeuvre. We changed, showered and climbed into the the typically Swedish sauna… it was a mixed session and everyone was naked, though clearly no-one seemed to give a hoot.

Having been thoroughly heated, Martin led me outside, across the snow and down to a small jetty on the lake… still naked, of course. Here there were a pair of stainless steel handrails and between them the treads of a ladder descending into the black water.

The water on the handrails was frozen, as was the surface of the jetty and only a submerged fan prevented the surface of the water freezing over like the rest of the lake that we had been skating on.

I thought a little trepidation was probably in order, but I didn’t want to show myself up as a weak-minded Brit so I grasped the icy handrails and started to step down until only my head and hands remained in the air.

It’s possible that my mind has blanked out the experience, but it didn’t seem that bad… probably because I had been recently super-heated . I counted to five before I retraced my steps out of the water and then walked back across the snow. We even sat outside for a few minutes chatting before returning to the sauna… with our feet lifted off the frozen ground!

Probably determined to get a girlie squeal out of me, my wonderful host then repeated the exercise… this time with a camera to capture the moment. Two photos were taken though, despite the effects of the cold water, only one is publishable!

Worried about my place in the Brit-dip-list and also strangely enjoying this new experience, I returned for a third time to lower myself into the icy water. I actually can recommend it… highly!

We showered & changed & headed out for food and a celebratory glass of beer!

I now understand why Stockholm Syndrome is so named… despite the generally chilly winter temperature, snowy weather and extended hours of darkness, it’s a beautiful and fun place populated by really warm-hearted people. I can’t wait to return!

January 6, 2013January 6, 2013

The mud thickens

Aristotle claimed that true excellence comes from repetition and is thus not an act but rather a habit. I find habits fascinating, especially the ones that you create or optimise in a deliberate conscious way.

The whole point behind this blog for example was to create a habit of running and of writing… helping me to stay fit whilst forcing me into the habit of explaining myself in words.

Even after five years though it’s not a fully formed habit as it still requires conscious effort… I don’t yet suddenly notice that I’m leaving the house with my running kit on. In fact, if anything, I’ve got into the habit of getting up late on a Sunday and reading before I even think about running.

Good or bad, a fully-formed habit is like a line of computer code that is run by the subconscious. Hitting the snooze button is a good example of a suboptimal habit. Better to set the alarm later to the point that you want to get up, thus elongating the length of quality sleep. And then get straight up, thus helping develop conscious resilience.

Left to its own devices the subconscious will persuade the body to remain in the current comfortable state until a different motivation causes it to re-prioritise. Only our conscious is concerned with the longer-term benefits of getting to work on time.

Driving or playing a musical instrument is an example of a different kind of habit. Here the task is way too complex for the conscious to handle with its limited bandwidth. Instead. a period of practice is needed in order to show the subconscious what pattern it needs to repeat and under what circumstances. Provided the pattern is learned patiently and precisely, then a high degree of competence is feasible.

Higher degrees of competence are possible when you repeatedly break the pattern as you learn it, each time pushing the performance bar a little higher. This is the power behind interval training, where both muscles and mind learn that they can do more. Unfortunately the approach is also frustrating, as it constantly delays the reward of ‘felt competence’ for a future time.

Three years ago tomorrow I embarked on an experiment. Despite having played the guitar for 35 years, I had not progressed for 25 years and my use of the instrument had slowly declined to zero. I embarked on a series of 52 weekly guitar lessons and forced myself to practice for at least five minutes each day.

I’m still no virtuoso but my ability has improved and with it my passion. This progression has been typically non-linear. There was very little progress for a long time and then everything started to improve at the same time as the subconscious started to take over.

In the last nine months I have composed several songs and learned two short jazz pieces. The experiment continues and is now part of an interesting meta-habit… a habit of experimentation, of creating other sustainable habits.

Meanwhile, I finally relinquished the fascinating Wired 2013 magazine I was reading this morning, climbed into my running gear and set of into a grey day.

The surface water had subsided from last week, but the mud had thickened. When your feet are wet, it’s easy to persuade yourself to run straight through the puddles, but with the glutinous mud today and relatively dry feet I tried to stick to a dryer line. This meant that I was constantly testing the limits of my core stability muscles as my feet slithered this way or that on the steeper gradient at the margins.

I ran the same short route as recently, out to Wivelsfield and back via the magical path, with the latter still being uncharacteristically waterlogged.

At one point I stopped briefly to balance across a particularly wet bit and experienced a Forrest Gump moment… you know, the one where he just stops running and turns his attention to new challenges.

It was momentary, but palpable and that’s where the power of habits really come into their own. Rather than give in to the subconscious feeling (and hit the snooze button) I just started running again.

The time was slower at 55 minutes for the 5.2 mile route and it didn’t have the highs of my last run… as you can see this has made the task of writing more complex, hence my rambling post. But it was still a worthwhile step in the slow pursuit of excellence.