Miles this week: 17 Via Cycling
Still
to go: £1,143.00
Brrrrr!
Is
it me or is it cold heading out there in the evenings? Nope just me then!
Guessing I’ve gone soft with my time side-lined or it could be the speed I am
getting up to on the bike either way it’s chilly!
Running
in cold temperatures involves a fine balance between keeping warm enough but
allowing sweat to evaporate and this is a very individual thing! Wearing more
than one layer is a good idea; you can always remove a layer if you get warm.
Over time you will learn how many layers you need for certain temperatures and
in what conditions you need to don the hat and gloves, not that I’m a hat
person.
Remember
to take account of the wind chill factor. For cold and windy days a windproof
but breathable top or jacket is a good investment. When the temperatures are
very cold a close-fitting base layer or a thermal layer will trap warm air to
keep your body at a comfortable temperature.
When
you go out for your runs, be careful not to overdress. Once you warm up, your
extra body heat will make it feel about 15 to 20 degrees warmer. So, for
example, if the temperature is above 12 degrees Celsius, you'll probably be
fine wearing a T-shirt and shorts.
The best way to make sure you’re at the right temperature is to do a
vigorous warm up with stretching, that way you don’t have to carry excess
clothing around when out and about running.
This week’s training programme would
have had me doing:
Day 1 = 3 miles
Day 2 = 5 miles
Day 3 = 3 miles
Day 4 = 8 miles
As with every week the long run has gone up by an
extra mile but you will also notice the medium run has now increased by an
extra mile giving a total of 19 miles.
Well I have been reading chapter four this week and
they covered two main areas mental attitude and everyone’s favourite thing to
skip stretching.
The mental attitude of this current chapter has
gone from ‘it doesn’t matter’ to ‘As if’. By this the book explains to develop
the as if attitude by acting as if it were already true by being confident and
optimistic and when asked how training is going respond by saying it is going
great and I have no doubt that I’m going to do well, or asked how you feel you
could respond with I feel terrific.
There are two reasons to stretch. The first reason
is to of course prevent an immediate injury resulting from performing forceful
muscular contraction with muscles that are insufficiently warmed up and
stretched. This generally isn’t too serious if you don’t because being a long
distance runner you’re not doing any explosive movement. So the muscles
generally get the chance to warm up over the duration of the training session.
However if I was a sprinter or in a different type of sport such as football I
would have to make sure I am fully warmed up and make sure all my stretching
had been carried out before I could even think about participating.
With long distance training though, it is important
to stretch afterwards as this will help clear the lactic acid that can build up
in your muscles over the course of your run. Obviously no harm will come if you
want to warm up and stretch before the run either.
The second reason is to prevent overuse injuries as
mentioned in last week’s blog ‘Exercise Good or Bad?’. The chapter goes on to
cover how to stretch, when to stretch and what to stretch before it provides
the reader with some very useful illustrations of how to do certain stretches.
The illustrations cover eight different muscles
from Calf, quadriceps, hamstring, lower back, inner thigh, outer thigh, arm and
shoulder, gluteal and hip flex and with a total of nineteen different stretches
there’s no reason for any reader to pick up a silly injury from not stretching.
So had my second phsyio session this week, which
resulted in more of the laser treatment that I spoke about last week in three
different places around my ankle. I was also shown another exercise to do with
the previous nine I already have. My ankle felt very tender after my
appointment but the physio said this was to be expected. I did ask if I was ok
to start testing it out on short runs, to my joy she said yes. I know I will
have to be very careful and monitor my progress but at least it’s a start.
Back out on the road this week with a seventeen
mile cycle session which took me across Bracknell and Wokingham. I have also
been looking to either find a gym that is cheap so I can use a cross trainer
but as of yet haven’t found one, I don’t mind paying a month’s fee but the
joining fee is where I draw the line. Not willing to pay around £45.00 for at
best two weeks’ worth of gym work, I have found one or two reasonably priced
cross trainers on gum tree that I could possible buy if no joy finding a gym
but I don’t really need one of these machines lying around my house after I’m
done with it.
With around
11 weeks now to raise the minimum of £1,000.00 and 20 weeks to raise my total
of £1,500.00 now is the time I start to beg for your support and donations. Please be sure to visit my fundraising page at
Leigh
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