Category: Short run

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Quick Sunday run

My neighbour told me it was going to be minus 7 last night (Saturday night) and walking outside at midnight to see the pure clarity of the sky, with its bright stars and sparkling moon, I can well believe her.

But by the time I woke up this morning, the sun had worked its magic and it was only zero in the shade and much, much hotter inside my goretex jacket in the blazing sun.

Having not run for a few weeks I didn’t try to achieve too much, but had a lovely run on some paths I’ve not used for a while.  Even the mud underfoot was satisfying, with the slightly melted top surface crunching down gratifyingly giving me the feeling that I had levelled some of the ruts!

Overall I was out for 40 minutes and covered 4.9 miles at a speed of about 7.3mph.  I reckon I would have been quicker still if I’d have gone running when we got back from skiing, but hey ho!

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Hasty post

It’s been a long day (I’ve just called a halt to work now!) but I feel duty bound to report on this morning’s run before I collapse into bed!  I have to apologise because it was 16 hours ago and my memory never was that great, but I’ll do my best! 

It was a morning where a pair of shorts and a t-shirt would have been appropriate and seeing as how we both had tights and jackets on, running was a little warm.  My jacket quickly got rolled up and tied around my waist.  It was not dry underfoot though, by any means. 

I had received a sharp comment when Nick arrived about the state of my runners… basically they were still caked in mud from, er, every run I’ve done in the last six weeks.  It was a delight then to see his pristine white laundered trainers refusing (like a horse) at each new puddle of mud. 

And more of a delight still to see them sploshing in when he’d not seen one coming!  He must have been confident of taking a still-immaculate pair home with him too as he had to ask for a plastic bag for his bedraggled steeds.  Still, there must be hours of pleasure to be gained from laundering them again for next time!

It was hard going for me this morning, despite the above.  I kept having to pause, although for a few seconds at a time, to catch my breath.

I’ve realised that I’m now spouting un-adulte-rated (rated for one adult?) drivel so I’m just going to drop in the results (6.4 hard miles in one hour 3 mins: average speed 6.1mph), apologise for not writing / running last week (busy with work) or Sunday (busy with flat) and wish you a jolly good night’s sleep!  Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

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Slip-sliding away, la la laaaa…

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As I sit here, quickly recording this morning’s activity so that I can get back to work, the sun is streaming through my study window.  Beautiful!

I think there must be a new moon about now, as it was super-dark when I got up and even when Nick arrived it was cold and grey with little prospect of good cheer… as was his mood!  It’s amazing how quickly the weather, and our moods, can improve and surprise us!

I didn’t really assimilate the information when he mentioned that it would be muddy out today and I have only just remembered, hours later, that it was throwing it down with rain for England last night.  And so it was muddy!  We headed out to the Kings Head, along the secret path, before turning and coming back across the common.

At some point, on an incline, I experienced a little ‘wheelspin’, which unfortunately showered Nick in large globs of mud and later he accidentally ran through a puddle, drenching my leg in very cold and watery mud!  Fair is fair!  And to be honest, we were both so covered that it would have been hard to determine which of the mud was inflicted!

Anyway, the result today was 4.7 miles in 47 minutes… a very straightforward 6mph, which was not at all bad considering that I had to pause a couple of times to catch my breath and we were both slip-sliding away!

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Transmogrification

After working on a project late into the night, the alarm seemed to go off all too soon this morning but though it was still dark, I alighted from the bed with a spring in my still-stiff-from-the-last-run legs and got the coffee pot on.  It’s amazing how much easier it is to run (or motivate yourself to do many other things) when there are two or more of you.

Nick duly arrived and we headed out into the grey morning, which was not as cold as I had anticipated.  He was after a short run so we looped across the Common as far as the industrial estate, but on the way back the Bok in him decided 35 minutes was too short so we continued on into Wivelsfield and came back via Ote Hall.

Lots of surface water & mud today so lots of slip-sliding-away (we know a song about that mate) and Nick tried patiently to explain the idea behind transmogrification, which I now reckon might have been one of the inputs that Philip Pullman had in his mind when creating daemons in The Golden Compass.  It comes from a comic book strip, but I’ll get him explain it to you some other time!

I can imagine that I was a bit like a sack of spuds for company this morning and having dragged the sack around most of the way, I think we were both surprised when I picked up my heels and sprinted (only for a minute of so) towards the end.

Overall, 6.06 miles according to super watch in one hour one minute makes 5.96mph and not, somewhat importantly, the 9 point something that the watch was claiming… which casts doubt on the Bok’s earlier claim of an 8.57mph run last week.  Some quick retro calculation puts the figure more correctly at 7mph for his run, which is still great by any standards after the excess of Christmas!

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Ch-ch-chilly!

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It gets tricky, reporting on events more than a couple of days old.  What do you say?  Yesterday’s day before yesterday?  Hence, on a fweezin’ cold and dark night, I’m sitting in my study punching away at the keys so that I don’t get that far behind.

Yesterday morning seems like an age ago now, but the memory lives on.  It was a perfectly still, clear and dark morning until the sun woke up to the aroma of my making coffee (pictured above) and spread a blue glow around the perimeter of the eastern horizon.  I was gazing out at this big, deep blue sky waiting for the coffee to finish gurgling when it struck me that there was a huge star hanging up there, like a Christmas star in waiting (apologies for the camera shake which make it look as if it were travelling).  It really was very impressive, most especially as there was not another star to be seen in the firmament.

Nick arrived and as I welcomed him through the front door, the -5C outside temperature turned the inside of the hall to ice,  Oh boy, was this going to be a cold run!

Kitted up in our warmest gear, we set out into the stillness of the morning and despite wearing gloves, my hands were already painfully cold by the time we reached the end of the road!  It may have been cold, but it was a beautiful morning and that always makes a difference.  The ground was crispy and my still-sparklingly-clean runners crunched along merrily.

We headed out past the Royal Oak and around the back of St Georges Retreat and somewhere here my sparkling trainers did a neat disappearing act… cracking through the frozen top layer into a puddle of mud.  Amusingly, Nick did the same in synchronisation, but we hardly had a chance to laugh as our breath was taken away by the view to the south-east.  With moments to go before the sun rose about the hills, it gave us a stunning display by running a glinting highlighter pen around the silhouette of the hill.  Simply stunning!

We headed up onto Hundred Acre Lane and then I pulled a neat trick, by not taking the tight turn for home, but rather following the path that returned the long way around through the wood and back through Wivelsfield.  By the time we got to open fields, the sun was streaming down and it was easy to imagine that it was warmer… apart from the numb sensation at my extremities!

We returned to the house having achieved a reasonably sedate 6.4mph over a time of 1 hour ten minutes, which meant we had covered 7.5 miles… not bad for a mid-week run.  I must be getting used to it as I suffered no aches after at all.. mind you, since returning I seem to have been running from one meeting to the next, so I’ve not had the chance yet!

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Man about town

Getting up late yesterday morning yielded a couple of benefits: I didn’t have time to go for a long run in the hissing rain and the rain stopped by the time I was ready.  Judging by the amount of standing water, it was going to be a hilariously muddy affair.  I had washed and properly dried my runners last week (they were gleaming, quite frankly) and as I ran towards the path signposted ‘ankle high mud’, they skipped merrily past in the other direction… me having no alternative than to skip along too, on account of my being tied into them!

So this was a rare road run around town.  I love looking at other peoples houses (where does the apostrophe go??!) so I munched my way along the sidewalks happily gazing sideways.  I quickly realised that this was going to be a ‘hot lap’ in more ways than one.  There was a moment when the sun came out and I was instantly roasted alive inside my Gore jacket.

I have been vacillating over which item of gear is my favourite.  The contenders are my disco runners, my all-weather Gore jacket, my woollen (two L’s) Thurlo socks, my iQ beanie… but today I decided it has to be my lambswool soft Rono under-layer.  I realise I’ve just said my, my, my, my, my… but if you’re jealous, go see Kurt at Run and he’ll sort you out with your own!  The Rono under-layer is just a little thin t-shirt made of the softest material known to man; worn underneath the Gore jacket, it is SO comfortable and if you’re looking for a last minute present for a runner in your family, this is it!  And SO perfect for a Boxing Day jog!

Ah… Christmas presents!  That reminds me… I really must go shopping!

For some reason I keep kicking the inside of my left ankle with my right shoe (like just once or twice in a run) and running on tarmac enabled me to focus on what was happening at ground level.  I think that I have stopped focusing on this important area and that some imperfections have crept in: not extending my legs enough; or landing on the outside of the heel; and certainly not leaving from the big toe, rather just from the front of the shoe.  Running on mud masks these aspects as the focus is on staying upright, especially if there’s a camera around!

The route was a mixture of downs and ups in the end and I ran within a reasonable envelope of speed (not sprinting nor crawling) so I was quite surprised when I calculated the results.  I ran five miles in 40 minutes, which is 7.5mph on the nose… truly a hot lap!

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A Bok in sheep’s zimming

Public apology: It has been pointed out to me that the reason for Nick slowing down prior to the final hill last week was not, as I had guessed, to gather his energy, but rather for my benefit, ungrateful sod that I am. 

Oh, and to make sure that his heart hadn’t exploded… more of which later.

Meantime, please bear in mind that one of the things that I really love about running is getting out into the fresh air and allowing my mind some space to think.  In my work I occasionally help teams to be creative and one of the easiest ways to facilitate this is by getting people to leave the office, with its myriad distractions, to go for a walk around the block or into a park.

This morning was overcast but relatively warm and whilst it threatened to rain, it actually held off until we were back.  We took a different route out and having warmed up gentle-like, bowled along at a quite reasonable pace.  Behind the Royal Oak there’s a most beautiful and ancient church and this morning we ran past this way, up the driveway and across the main road into the back of Wivelsfield.  From here we followed my Sunday route for a while and it was on this uphill through the wood that I first realised something was amiss.

I was undoubtedly on good form, probably due to my shorter-and-faster-than-normal Sunday run, whilst I suspect that the Bok had spent most of his weekend ambibing incohol and being deprived of sleeping it off by two inquisitive sons.  As we pushed heartily up through Hundred Acre Wood, my inner peace was disturbed irrevocably by a recurrent beeping.  The Bok looked sheepish, which was a sight in itself, confessing that his nuclear-powered externally mounted satellite global heart position monitor was warning of impending disaster, with threat to life and limb. 

I think I preferred it sans power… it was more peaceful.

At the top of the wood the Bok started to gallop again, only to refuse at a small brook.  If there had been a rider on his back, they would definitely have got wet.  If I had’ve been behind him at the time, then he’d have found out how deep the brook was, head first.

Ho hum.  Next time!

We eventually worked our way, beeping and gasping, across to Ditchling Common and it was when we were crossing the next road that I first realised there was a second, more subtly irritating noise.  This clacking disappeared once we were back on the muddy stuff, only to reappear at the bottom of the hill as we ran along towards Wellhouse Lane.  The unmistakable sound of a Zimmer frame dragged my mind back, kicking and screaming, from whatever peaceful haven it had found.

We slowed for the Bok to regain his composure whereupon he amazed me utterly by sprinting forward 100 feet, leaving meto carry the Zimmer.  And good job that I did, because he promptly collapsed back onto it when I caught up with him.

My prognosis of alcohol abuse linked to sleep deprivation was confirmed a couple of minutes later when he saw me take a swig of beer from a can of Grolsch: I actually took a swig of pop from a bright blue bottle as I passed a discarded beer-can laying in the grass… I can only rest my case!

And back again we were at the gentle uphill and the fast rise past the Station, me being admonished for misrepresentation to the beeping soundtrack of his exploding heart. 

I was determined to finish gently, but he dumped the Zimmer outside Daren’s place and started to motor down the hill, me tagging along in the wake of his testosterone.  As with last week I tagged along behind down the last 400m, but this week he increased the pace to try to shake me.  As with last week I gently closed the gap and out-sprinted him to the finish.

The run was done and the results were in: and they were not pretty!  We had covered 6.8 miles in 1 hour and 50 seconds… a mere 6.69mph compared to last week’s tantalising 6.99mph and my triumphant, if damp and windy Sunday 7.07mph.  But still better than the race-off-as-quick-as-you-can-and-then-collapse-in-a-heap 6.63mph on Wednesday 21st.

I’m sure the Bok will back at fighting weight next week and ready to mete out some much deserved punishment, but in the meantime I shall have a well deserved bask in the warm glow of his discomfort.

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Swimming

With driving rain and severe gusts of wind blowing the cobwebs of of the trees, it was certainly not the weather to be going for a run this morning.

The principle that Kurt at The Run Shop advocates for fair weather runners like me is to wear the right gear so that you’re always comfortable.  So I donned my goretex jacket, beanie hat, long tights and woolen Thorlo socks and out I went for a run.

The going was somewhat more than wet underfoot, but we’re not far enough through the season yet for the mud to be all-encompassing.  Most of the water was either sitting on the surface or running off and judging by the backs of my tights, even Nick wouldn’t have noticed if I had splashed mud on him!

I ran out to the Royal Oak and across to the outskirts of Wivelsfield before cutting up through the woods towards Hundred Acre Lane.  Here it was just a lickle scary, with long gusts tearing through the trees above and raining twigs and other detritus down on my head.  The expectation of something larger following them down was ever present.

I swung in a large arc through the wood to come out near Lew’s place, looping around Ditchling Common Industrial Estate and heading back down the magical path.  I reckon the gradient must go this way as it was easy to speed through, hastened by the wind whistling through Damoclean branches above.

I knew the common would be waterlogged so I used the road to circumnavigate it, scurrying along the bank where it too was underwater.  And then it was back up into the ‘Hill with a quick sprint where Nick usually speeds up, followed by a slow jog back to the house.

My neighbours looked at me aghast… I’m sure due to the fact that I’d come back after only 45 minutes!  I had been quite sprightly though, managing to cover somewhere around 5.3 miles and returning a speed of over 7mph.

And lest you think that it was nasty horrible wet & cold out there, it was not… I was just luvverly, snug and warm in my gear and I can verily recommend the woolen thorlos!  Overall, it was a great excuse to get out and, er, swim through some fresh air.

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Breathless!

My plan yesterday morning was to start off slow so that I didn’t run out out of puff further round and see whether this would improve the overall time.  Nick arrived with a cold and a wine-induced headache, which helped me convince him it was a good plan.  Alas, the slower start only lasted for five minutes by which time his faculties had magically reappeared (BOING!), but it at least gave me half a chance to warm up!

The going was wet in places and downright slippery on some of the little wooden bridges that we cross, but otherwise it was a mild and pleasant morning.

On the return leg there is a downhill section that is always hilarious in the wet.  Both Nick and Daren always max it down there, irrespective of the conditions (which reminds me, I really must write a review of the marvellous book Feet in the Clouds by Richard Askwith – don’t bother finding out what it’s about, just buy it and dive in!) and today I took their lead and chased Nick down the hill.  Risky strategy, which could easily have ended in tears, but I managed to hang on to just enough grip to change direction in all the right places before I ran into anything.

After that there’s a gentle uphill, where Nick slowed considerably, I’m guessing to gather his energy for the faster uphill drag by the station.  Somewhere in this slower section Nick almost took a pearler (alas unnoticed by me), but at the last minute remembered that I didn’t have my camera so managed a recovery to save it for another day!

We hammered up the rise to the top of the town, after which it’s all downhill, which was a good thing as I was all-in! 

In the same way that Nick doesn’t warm up, he doesn’t cool down towards the end either!  The last 400m is tarmac and gently downhill and here he generally stretches out ahead of me, slowing towards the end to allow me almost to catch up.  Today I hung onto his coat-tails sufficiently that in the last 100m I could sneak strategically into his slipstream, enabling me to sprint past him to the finish.

It was a pyrrhic victory as I was then pretty much speechless for a couple of hours while I tried to breathe normally again!

Deliberately following the same route as the last two runs meant that there was a time to beat, which is an interesting exercise (especially for adrenalin junkies!) but detracts from some of the enjoyment.  We’ll go a different route next week.

Oh, and the time?  54 minutes, which beat both the previous weeks by a good margin.  Now, how do I persuade Nick to let me have a slightly longer warm up?

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Heavy air

As excuses go, it’s not a bad one: believe me, having employed thousands of freelance staff over the years, I have heard a goodly few reasons why people can’t do something.  What sets this one apart, aside from the fact that I’ve not heard it before, is that the Bok ventured it as the probable reason why I was not running so well this morning.  This is a third-party excuse, making it far stronger.

He is such an amazing friend that he completely ignored the scientific control group: the fact that he was breathing the very same heavy air and yet, if anything, appeared to be faster than ever!

It’s fairer to say that I didn’t run on Sunday, that I had a glass of wine last night and went to bed late.  But then he didn’t run Sunday either, probably had a bottle of wine last night and got woken from his slumber several times by his sons.

He’s just faster and there’s an end to it!

It was lovely to run in the warmth again though – a whole 9 degrees (Centigrade I hasten to add!) and although the sun didn’t really break free until we were back, it was a bright morning.  What was very different was the amount of standing water present en route and by default, mud!  It’s a great workout for the core stability muscles and they were well used today: I had one moment and Nick had at least two that I saw, but neither of us even came close to hitting the deck.

Give it time though as the mud only gets thicker and more tricky as the autumn progresses!  I hope it’s a day when we have a camera with us… whoever it is that goes down!

We proved that we were rubbish at cattle herding on a narrow bridge, where we just couldn’t get the bovines to pass us.  Instead they stood in our way for as long as they dare before turning around and fleeing from the two strangely dressed bipeds!

In the end we ran the same route as Friday in 58 minutes – three more than I thought it took before, although Nick’s watch, very conspicuous by its exhausted absence today, had claimed it took us 57 minutes last time round.  The mud was definitely a factor in this, but I suspect it had more to do with my walking at several points while the Bok could have bounded on!

Different tactics will be applied next time out in an attempt to experiment and we’ll see if we can’t get the time down a little (ergo, speed me up a little!).  Watch this space for the results!