Rest

I've been resting my poor legs for the last week....and as a consequence reverted to bad eating and drinking habits :-( Reason? Had quite sore shins after my last long run and a stabbing sharp pain in my right calf muscle. I think I upped the mileage and the intensity of my running too quickly AND I ran a lot on pavement. So that was a good lesson to me.

My right calf muscle is still twitching slightly but I've discovered the stairs calf stretch which is working wonders for me...

Today went for 5.5km run at a slow speed (8.5km/hr) and felt fine. I'm relieved that I didn't get any stabbing pains and my shins are no longer sore.

All I have to do now is manage to up the intensity very slowly so that I don't do this all over again.

And I must start drinking more water and less tea AND cut out the sweet stuff and the alcohol. I was doing sooo well too.

Ah well, all part of life's rich tapestry I guess ;-)

50 minutes - Ouch!

Decided to do a longer run today at a slower pace as advised by all the marathon training programmes. I find it really hard to run slowly. (well slowly at my level - obviously it's all relative!) Went to the local park again and did about 6 circuits then back to the house. Didn't feel too bad. I've been stretching like mad all the time as my hamstring and calf muscles are tight. Towards the end of this run my left knee was feeling niggly and my calf muscles felt as though they were on the verge of cramping but everything else was fine - I felt strong from a cardio vascular perspective - which is heartening ;-)

Got home, stretched for 15 minutes and will stretch again later. Have uploaded my trusty Garmin stats to Training Centre : 50 min - 8.04KM - average speed 9.6KM and average HR 144 bpm (166 is my max). Would have liked my heart rate to be less, but pleased on the whole with the run. It's going to be interesting to see how my legs fair over the next few days.

All this and had 5 guests for dinner last night which I cooked I might add ( main course AND dessert)...I was very good though and didn't drink very much at all. Did treat myself to my own Tiramisu which is excellent (I can't lie).

Loving the Garmin

Got a Garmin for my birthday so don't yet know how to use it properly but am majorly impressed with it so far. I've done two runs recently with it and when you've finished you can upload your run information into Training Centre (software on your PC) and it shows you all sorts of stats, heart rate, pace, calories - very useful.

I'm finding that the runs I do outside ie not on treadmill, are generally faster. Usually at the gym I only do 9.5km/per hour max. But I'm averaging, 10km when out running in the park with what feels like, no extra effort - strange.

Really enjoying the running, and my knees always feel slighly niggly but not really any pain at all.

Ran for 40 minutes today at what I thought was an easy pace - and I could have continued running quite easily for another 20 minutes I think. Don't want to push it though.

Wasn't going to go out tonight as stuffed from eating like a piggy this weekend with our French guests, but after the run this morning, feeling very energetic and looking forward to a nice meal somewhere....maybe Blackheath.