Race Fees: What Does it Really Cost?

by Ben

This post originally appeared on Ben’s old blog, Running From the Physio.

Recently, over on one of my new favourite blogs to read, Magpie in the Sky, Stephanie posited an interesting idea: a race price cap. She has decided that she will only pay a maximum of £1.90 per kilometre in the race, meaning that she is willing to pay more for a marathon than a half, and more for a half than a 10km race. It seems a pretty sound idea, and as she suggests, is a good way of deciding which races to do, out of the thousands available.

So, I decided to take a look at my own races: I haven’t done all that many, but I was interested. I discovered quite quickly that my first two races exceeded her limit, but that after that I had fared pretty well.

The first two races I ran were pretty big events: both marquee events for their relevant cities. They are the sort of events that are always going to be expensive, but when you’re trying to motivate yourself to get into a running habit sometimes that’s the kind of event you need. In contrast, my more recent and future races, particularly at the 10km distance, have been much smaller and cheaper events.

But, having done this, I got thinking. The entry fee isn’t the whole cost. I recalled another blog, the brilliantly named Medal Slut, discussing the cost of races last July. She had worked out that the Paris Marathon had cost in the region of £750, once travelling, accommodation and other costs were taken into account. Looking back at Stephanie’s blog, most of her races seem to be pretty local to her, a bonus of living in the London area. Living in the south-west, this isn’t a bonus I share.

So, I added two more criteria: the distance to the race, with a relevant fuel cost, and any accommodation costs. For the fuel cost, I decided that I would use 12p per mile. This may seem a little low, but I currently have a company car, and that is what I am charged fuel at (lucky maybe, but you should see my tax-code as a result!) Although I have not always had this, it seems fairest to charge all races at a flat fuel fee. Accommodation was pretty simple, the cost of the hotel room. I didn’t put the cost of food into the mix, as I still have to eat at home, and working out the difference between the cost of a meal at home, and the cost of a meal in a hotel / restaurant seemed far too in-depth.

The sharp ones among you might wonder while the Isle of Man 10k has “0” distance, despite clearly not being in the south-west. Basically, we were staying with family in the Isle of Man anyway, and from where we were staying, I was able to walk to the start. No extra distance was driven to facilitate racing. Also, all distances are rounded to the nearest 5 miles.

Unsurprisingly, the two races in which I stayed in a hotel the night before leap away as the most expensive per kilometre. Among the rest, the most significant change is probably for the upcoming Chew Valley 10k, which becomes a lot more expensive compared to some of its peers because of the distance I will have to travel.

My conclusion from all of this is that I’m not going to worry too much about race entry costs. While I might be on the look out for races that seem a little more expensive for their distance (such as the Wellington 10), or vice-versa (the Isle of Man 10k was a bargain), the difference is more academic than practical for me at the moment. Maybe if I start entering significantly more races then I’ll pay more attention, but at the moment I don’t think it is significant enough for me to worry. However, what I have decided is that I will only enter a maximum of one race per year which requires me to stay away from home: the accommodation cost really slaps a lot on, and unless a holiday can be incorporated, then I can’t afford to be doing that too often!

Isle of Man Easter Festival of Running 10k: race report

by Ben

This post originally appeared on Ben’s old blog, Running From the Physio.

When my wife discovered that there would be a 10k on the Isle of Man, over Easter, with part of the route going along the road past her parent’s back garden, it would have been rude not to take part. After all, we were already booked to go to the Isle of Man, over Easter, to visit her parents. It was ideal!

The views were pretty good – not that there’s much time for sightseeing during a 10k!

A little bit more research did reveal some slightly less ideal statistics: the race route included nearly 400 ft of elevation: maybe not a huge amount, but given that Taunton is pretty flat, and on a normal 6 mile run, I would possibly do about 150 ft of elevation, it was a significant increase to what I’m used to. Secondly, looking through the results from the past few years revealed that this was a race that traditionally had a very fast field. My personal best 10k time of 47:25 placed me 111 of 324 during the 2013 Stoke Stampede; it would have placed me 183 of 254 in the 2013 Easter Festival. It didn’t take much research to determine that this was due to the large number of university clubs that came over for the Festival.

Still, despite being slightly daunted by the hills and my fellow runners, I decided that I wanted to do it anyway. The Festival also includes a 5 mile hill climb on the Saturday, and a 5km relay on the Sunday, but I opted not to do these, as it would probably disrupt our holiday too much. Oh, and the whole hill thing.

We arrived on the island on Wednesday, after a full day’s travelling, and the following morning I went for a quick reccy around the Port Erin half of the course, getting an idea of how bad the hills really were. And actually.. they weren’t too bad at all. In fact, I actually ended up running the reccy, which was meant to be doubling up as a pre-race recovery run, in 7:39 min/mile.

Race day itself presented me with another new challenge: the race was on Good Friday evening. Although I typically train in the evenings, I’d never raced in the evening before, and so I was a little unsure about my preparation. I opted for taking it easy, having a decent, but not too big lunch, and then a top up of some toast mid-to-late afternoon. My wife and her family had arranged that they would sit and cheer me from the back wall, but just as I was about to leave, I realised I had a small issue: although it wasn’t too cold, I didn’t want to be standing around at the start line in just my vest. A short deliberation later, and it was arranged that I would wear my wife’s university hoodie, and my father-in-law would accompany me to the start to take it away again. It turns out that mostly everyone else just decided to stow their bags and layers in and around the boats on the harbour front.

Given the hills, and my result a couple of weeks earlier in Bridgwater, my race plan had been to start off around 8 min/mile, and see how I was doing halfway through. However, my pre-race run had given me some more confidence, and I’d done a little bit of maths and decided to go for 7:40 min/mile, which would put me on pace for somewhere around my PB. But my main focus, after flying off too fast in Bridgwater, was to pace my start.

Knowing that the field was likely to be pretty fast, I placed myself basically at the back for the start. This had the intended result, and I was pretty much bang on pace as I hit the first kilometre marker. Up until this point, the course had run along the lower promenade, and the first, sharp, incline followed, taking the route up to the upper promenade. Amazingly, I climbed it without a problem, and I might have even managed to smile for my father-in-law, who was halfway up with his camera. (I don’t recall actually seeing the result – but I might have done?)

The side glance at the camera doesn’t work, does it?

The course remained reasonably flat for the next couple of kilometres, before dropping back to the sea on the opposite coast, on the aptly named “Shore Road”. In fact, during the race I ran along roads called “The Promenade”, “Shore Road” and “Bay View Road” in both Port Erin and Gansey/Port St Mary – imagination is clearly not a Manx trait. After a short scenic run along the coastal path around Gansey Point, I passed a chap dressed in a tiger onesie who was clearly struggling with the heat, and then tackled the second sharp incline on the route, once again taking from me a lower to an upper promenade. I felt this climb much more, coming around around 6 kilometres into the race, and I spent the next couple of hundred metres catching my breath back.

The run then weaved its way through the middle of Port St Mary (I think?) and I ran this part of the route alongside a chap who must have been a local, because everybody, and I mean everybody, that we passed greeted him by name. It was quite surreal! I pushed on away from him as we started to climb up towards the back of Port Erin once more. This part of the course had been in my reccy run, and so I knew what to expect from the long drag up past the back of my parents-in-law’s house. Along this stretch I fell into running-synch with a fellow runner, which really helped me with my pacing towards the end.

My sprint finish – followed more closely than I realised by my “pacemaker”!

After receiving the boost of seeing my wife, daughter and in-laws, all that remained was the last kilometre, which featured a drop back to the shore. I upped my pace to keep up with my own personal pacemaker – even though she didn’t realise that was what she was! The hill down to the shore was a little steep, and actually forced me to consciously slow my pace in order to stop myself being a bloody mess at the bottom! We reached the bottom (one of the two “Shore Road”s), and I started to push the pace myself, accelerating away from my “pacemaker”. Unfortunately, what I had forgotten at this stage was that the finish line was further along the coast than the start line had been, and so my sprint finish had been a little premature. I slowed somewhat as we climbed a short hill, but pushed on again when I could see the finish line: the digital clock tantalisingly displayed 46:5? as I approached: it would certainly be a PB, but could I crack 47 minutes?

I thought so.

The provisional results revealed I was wrong. I was timed at 47:00.0 – dead one, even to the nearest tenth of a second, to 47 minutes. Couldn’t the timer have pressed their watch that tiniest bit earlier, for a 46:59.9? But no, sub-47 is yet to be cracked.

Still, this was by far the best race that I’ve taken part in. The course itself was a delight to run, my fear of the hills was completely unfounded. The scenery was amazing, with stunning sea views of both coasts. We were admittedly blessed with lovely weather, but this race is already in my diary for next Easter. And you know what… so are the hill climb and the 5 km.

Bridgwater 10k: race report

by Ben

This post originally appeared on Ben’s old blog, Running From the Physio.

My main challenge this spring was to complete my first Half Marathon, something I achieved in Silverstone at the start of March. However, I wanted to make sure that I had something to work towards afterwards, and so I registered for the Bridgwater 10k, which was four weeks later. The idea was that this would firstly keep me training, and secondly, give me an idea of where I was so that I could start to focus on achieving my second big target this year of running a sub-45 minute 10k.

The course was advertised as being PB friendly due to being almost completely flat, although there was a note that 300 metres of the course was off-road, making it a multi-terrain race, rather than a road race. Having seen significant improvements in my parkrun PB since my last 10k race, I went into this race full of confidence that I could take a decent chunk off my previous time (47:25). My rough target for Bridgwater was around 46:30, something that I felt should be within my capabilities given my parkrun times.

Unfortunately, the run started badly, and only really got worse. For the first time in a race, I wore a Garmin, but it only really served to confuse me. While my Garmin told me that I had charged off, and was running somewhere around a 7:00 min/mile pace, I reached the first kilometre marker at around 4:50, which equated to around 7:45 min/mile pace. I had two options: either my Garmin was telling me porky-pies, or the marker was in the wrong place. Unfortunately, I couldn’t really tell which: I felt like I was running pretty quickly, and so was inclined to believe the Garmin, but on the other hand, I knew that GPS watches can’t always be relied upon. So I sped up.

This, on reflection, was a BAD IDEA. By the end of the second mile, my Garmin pace was still around 7:00 min/mile, and shortly after this I reached the off-road part of the course. This was described to us before the race as being about 150 – 200 metres. It wasn’t. I tried to push hard to keep my pace on track, thinking it would be a short section, but as it dragged on, I realised that all I was really achieving was tiring my legs out. I reckon that this section went on for about 500 – 600 metres, and (as we’d been told) it was heavy going; slippy mud, jumping over puddles, very uneven surface with occasion rocks. My legs, already suffering from my bad pacing over the first couple of miles, were wrecked during this bit. The rest of the race became an annoyed trot home, during which I ran around 7:50 min/mile, generally a comfortable pace.

I completed the race, pretty dejectedly in 48:25. When I posted after the race that I was disappointed with this, a few people pointed out that it was still a good time, and looking back there is an element of truth to this. I felt that I had run an awful race, and so to end up being only one minute outside of my PB, and two minutes behind my target, I was clearly able to maintain a reasonable pace even after the poorly paced start. Still, it can only be a positive that my reaction to my disappointment was to start looking for another 10km during the summer to target for a PB. But before that, the Isle of Man Easter Festival of Running 10km!

Silverstone Half Marathon: race report

by Ben

This post originally appeared on Ben’s old blog, Running From the Physio.

Running the Silverstone Half Marathon has been the focus of my life for the past four months. (Well, that and raising our daughter, who is currently just under five months old.) The first – and not the simplest – challenge was packing. Despite only staying away for one night we ended up with a pile of stuff that looked like we were surely going away for a month, or maybe even two. I blame the baby, although it might have helped if I hadn’t taken almost all of my running kit with me! In my defence, the weather has been so changeable lately that I wanted to cover as many eventualities as possible.

With a 5-month-old, there’s no such thing as travelling light!

We stayed at a Travelodge that was only a couple of miles up the road from the track. The hotel was accompanied by a Little Chef, in which the menu, if I’m completely honest, was not ideal race fuel material. The closest I could find to some last minute carb-loading was a very greasy beef lasagne with chips and garlic bread. That counts, right?

After a night in which my wife tired herself out trying to keep our daughter quiet so that I could get as much sleep as possible (which as it turns out, was quite a lot), we headed back to Little Chef for a slightly more appropriate breakfast of porridge. I don’t think the staff had really counted on the effect a run would have on their breakfast supplies: as I was leaving the diner, I heard one of the staff comment to her colleague that they were running out of porridge. Oh, I had a bacon sarnie too. I uhmmm… needed the fat and salt?

Having heard about all of the parking trouble there can be at Silverstone, we did not delay in heading straight over to the track: I figured that I’d rather spend an hour sat in their car park annoyed at getting there so early than 30 minutes in the hotel and then 30 minutes queueing in traffic, stressing about arriving in time. As a result, we drove straight in without trouble, and were parked: 2 hours and 20 minutes before the start of the race.

So, yes, a little bit of time to kill.
– Sat in the car listening to the radio for a bit: check.
– Slow walk over to the start area: check.
– Identified key points of interest, such as bag drop and toilets: check.
– Looked around the spectator areas to work out where my wife and daughter could watch the race: check.
– Wandered slowly around the “charity village”: check.
– Stood around shivering: check.

Look, it was cold, okay?!

All this procrastination completed, and still there was over an hour until the start of the race. Luckily, as the MC pointed out over the PA system, “this is no small local race with 400 competitors”, and as a result we were been chivvied to the start line a full 45 minutes before the race was scheduled to begin. Which, given how long I had been killing time for, was no bad thing. The start area was very well labelled, with signs indicating which area you should start in, based on your predicted finish time. Given that I was aiming to finish in under 2:00 hours, but didn’t really know much more than that, I positioned myself towards the back of the 1:50 – 2:00 section.

Thankfully, the location of the start, and the sheer number of runners around helped to protect against the vicious wind during this last 45 minutes. My plan for the race was pretty loose: stick around the 1:58 pacer (thanks Runners World!) for the first bit of the race and see how I felt. So it was a bit of a relief when the pacer, along with his nice big obvious flag, arrived. I positioned myself about four rows back, although by the time we had all been compressed to the start line, I ended up a little further behind him. Just before the start, predictably, but still enjoyably, the DJ put on Fleetwood Mac’s “The Chain” (the BBC’s Formula 1 theme music), which did add to the atmosphere significantly. And was a definite improvement on S Club 7…

And then the race. The start, as with all races, was a bit manic. But for a change, by the time I reached the first mile marker, I was a little bit down on my 9 mile pacing, though I wasn’t too worried, as I was still only just behind the pacer. The first couple of miles were a little difficult just because of the sheer number of people. I’m more used to little local races, so I found it a bit tricky having to avoid stepping on people’s heels and having huge groups that involved significant sideways movement to get around.

Still, I successfully negotiated the crowds, and made it to the 3-mile water point. At this juncture I have to make a confession. On my training runs, be they 2 miles or 11 miles, I never take water with me, and never fuel during my runs. Ever. Therefore, 3 miles in, I certainly didn’t feel like I needed any water (and possibly more to the point, did feel a little like I needed a wee!) So while everyone else made their pit-stops, I continued down the middle, picking up positions like a driver attempting a one-stop strategy (sorry, obligatory Formula 1 analogy.)

Just over a mile later, I was filled with dread when my left knee started to hurt. Throughout my training I’ve had problems with my knee on longer runs, though never before quite so early. Thankfully either the pain subsided, or the adrenaline of a race just overtook it, and within half a mile it was out of my mind again.

The next drinks stop was just past the 5 mile marker, and this time I did take a bottle of the offered Lucozade. I figured that being a long time since breakfast, the energy would be useful, even if I didn’t need the hydration. Unfortunately, I did ignore the shouts of “there’s more further on, keep going” and lost precious seconds waiting for a bottle to be ripped out of a new bag.

Definitely the highlight of the course.

Shortly after the Lucozade, the race took us down the “International Pits”, and for me this was unquestionably the coolest part of the course. We’d already ran along the racing straight around 2 miles in, but actually running down the pit lane itself was awesome. It was around this point that I decided to kick on, and I started to ease away from the 1:58 pacer. This gave me an amazing boost: because most of the other runners had settled into more or less the right pace, I spent more or less the last 6 miles of the race passing people. Despite the fact that all this actually means is that I started in the wrong place, what it felt like was “Wooo, go me, I’m sooooo fast!”

I again opted against taking any water at 8 miles, and by this point of the race, there seemed to be toilets every few hundred metres. Although my bladder was really starting to feel quite full, I wasn’t willing to sacrifice any time unless things got really urgent! The course felt like it was one long uphill from roughly 7.5 miles to 9.5 miles, although RunKeeper claims there was a drop in the middle: I don’t remember it! I took on some more Lucozade at 9.5 miles, and taking stock, realised I felt pretty good.

From the look of the course, I realised that I was coming around towards where my wife said she would probably be. My eyes were scanning the crowds for quite a while along the straight, and I was concerned that I might miss her (she really is quite short), but then I spotted her bright blue rain-coat. Although I was feeling good in the race, seeing her, and my daughter in her buggy, gave me a huge boost for the last 3 and a bit miles.

As I ran past the 10 miles marker, the gun-time flashed to 1:30. Just a parkrun left: 3.1 miles, 5 kilometres, I run that almost every week. I consciously upped my pace again, and passed the next mile marker at just outside 1:38. I continued to push, but my pace dropped a little over the next mile, I simply didn’t have as much left as I thought I might. Despite that, as I passed the 13 mile marker, I hit a flat sprint. Actually, it was a little bit after the mile marker, as initially I was confused that no one else seemed to be speeding up much. The gun-time as I passed the finish line was just over 1:55, meaning that I had ran the last 5 km of my half-marathon in 25 minutes, which I was pretty happy with. More importantly, I smashed my target, finishing in an official time of 1:52:58.

I know she doesn’t look impressed, but she is really…

The medal is unquestionably the best in my small collection, but the t-shirt, whilst decent enough, was a little bit of a let-down for me personally. In general, I really enjoyed running around the Silverstone course, but although it was great in places where the course was particularly recognisable, the parts of the course away from the spectators were very, very quiet for a race of that size. The course, which was advertised as “very flat”, actually had some quite significant hills in places, especially where it rose to a bridge over the track. The weather was pretty awful, but although I’ve read a fair bit complaining about it, I didn’t find it too bad once we got running. But then, once I’m running, I tend to be in a world of my own!

As a final thought, the copious amount of runners that I saw peeling off for a quick toilet break were put into some context when we were walking back to the car park. The marshal driving the tail-car stopped, jumped out, and made use of a nearby tree to relieve himself. Runners: you are not alone!

Fortnight’s Training Review: 17 Feb – 1 Mar

by Ben

This post originally appeared on Ben’s old blog, Running From the Physio.

Due to various goings on, I didn’t run as often as normal in the fortnight leading up to my half marathon. This was partly planned, as I was scheduled to taper before the race, and partly unplanned, as I missed a number of the scheduled runs for a few reasons: mostly laziness. Therefore, rather than post two pretty short posts, I’ve gathered them together into one.

Tuesday: 3.01 miles @ 8:31 min/mile
Back to the evening for this Tuesday run. I had some issues with my left knee (as always), but they really only bothered me towards the start of the run, and faded away as I was going. The pace was pretty easy over this distance.

Wednesday: 2 miles planned
I dropped this run, due to a combination of long hours at work, and some sort of a bug. I would obviously have preferred to have run it, and stuck to my schedule, but being the shortest of my runs, I wasn’t too bothered to lose it.

Thursday: 6.35 miles @ 8:29 min/mile
Having missed the run the day before, I was briefly tempted to lengthen this one to seven miles, but given that I was feeling a bit down because of the bug, I resisted the temptation. The run itself felt pretty good, pretty easy.

Saturday: Parkrun, 5km (3.11 miles) @ 8:38 min/mile
I had always intended to run this one relatively easily. Being the weekend before my inaugural half, I didn’t want to suddenly injure anything, and I also wanted to make sure that I my legs weren’t too tired. My slower pace was further enforced when I found myself running with my friend’s 10 year old son. To be fair to him, he normally tears around the course at a pretty good lick, certainly sub-8 minute miles, but today he didn’t seem to be feeling too good. His Dad got stuck further back with another child, and it was actually a very good excuse to take it easy!

Sunday: 8 miles planned
I would love to blame this entirely on some sort of a bug, but mostly I just felt tired and lazy, and didn’t go for a run. The tiredness might have been caused by a bug, but really? Lazy.

Tuesday: 2 miles planned
Lazy, lazy, lazy.

Wednesday: 4.06 miles @ 9:40 min/mile (unplanned)
Lazy… oh no, hang on! I missed Tuesday’s two miles, and decided that I would get whatever mileage I could face done and Wednesday and call that it. I knew I had a busy day planned on Thursday (I worked over 12 hours in the end) and so couldn’t rely on getting anything further done. I took a nice, easy, slow trot around the block.

Thursday: 5 miles planned
As mentioned, my long day at work saw for this run!

Weekly Training Review: 10 Feb – 16 Feb

by Ben

This post originally appeared on Ben’s old blog, Running From the Physio.

Something of a return to form for me this week. After only completing three of my scheduled five runs in the previous week, I hit 100% again this time around. But that said, all was not quite as rosy as it might have looked: Tuesday and Wednesday were two of the least enjoyable runs I’ve done. I can’t really pinpoint a specific reason, but I just did not enjoy them in the slightest. Over the weekend, we were up in Telford for a wedding, so I completed the Telford parkrun with my wife, before a shortened “long” run on Sunday after travelling home. That said, the mileage for the week was still in excess of 20 miles, so although I never ran more than 7 miles in one go, I guess it was okay.

Tuesday: 2.20 miles @ 9:31 min/mile
This run did not particularly start well! Having played football the night before, I didn’t want to get out of bed. Having achieved that, I then discovered that it was raining and horrible outside, and wanted to curl back up in bed again. Somehow, I overcame that too, and found myself actually outside and going for a run. Which was something of a surprise! So much of a surprise in fact that I forgot which way I was meant to go. As a result, rather than a 3 mile run, this turned out to be a 2 mile run. Still, other than that it was… well… horrible. I basically spent the whole run wishing I was anywhere other than out in the rain and cold running. (Yes, yes, I know… world’s smallest violin etc. etc.) Anyway, I did it, the miles are recorded, and sometimes that just has to be enough.

Wednesday: 3.09 miles @ 9:25 min/mile
On the bright side, I managed two runs pre-work in a single week for the first time ever. On the negative side, I found this run about as enjoyable as Tuesday’s. On the bright side, I remembered to effectively go the wrong way again, and therefore cancel out the previous day’s mistake.

Thursday: 6.35 miles @ 8:39 min/mile
After a couple of pretty miserable runs, I decided midway through this one that I was just going to push and run a bit faster. For most of my half-marathon training, I’ve been plodding around at a pace around 9:30, in order to minimise the risk of injury. I hate running within myself though: I love running quickly. And so, I decided that all things considered, I wanted to enjoy this run. I did. I meant to slow down again for the last mile or so, but I didn’t really manage it.

Saturday: Parkrun, 5km (3.11 miles) @ 12:19 min/mile
As I mentioned at the top, it was a bit of parkrun tourism for me this week. Not only that, but it was my wife’s first parkrun! Normally, my wife has the task of looking after our baby daughter during the parkrun, but as we were staying in a hotel full of our family this weekend, we were both free to run together. As an added bonus, it was Telford parkrun’s first birthday, so we got to sing “Happy Birthday” at the start line, and had cake at the finish! Although the pace was obviously less than I would usually run, I actually think it did my legs a bit of good, flushing them out a little bit. Most of all, I was extremely proud of my wife for running the whole course, the furtherest she has managed since pregnancy.

Sunday: 6.27 miles @ 8:44 min/mil
We spent Sunday morning driving back from Telford to Taunton. As a result of that drive, and the weekend itself, which was pretty stressful and tiring, I didn’t feel that I could face a proper long run on Sunday. I headed out on my four mile route, but turned off towards the end, and did something that I very rarely do: just ran where I felt like! Ah: turn right here, how about through that park there, ooo: let’s go that way. It was fun, maybe not very practical to do very often in a proper training plan, but something I might try and repeat when I’m not so precious about getting everything as scheduled. I enjoyed the run in general, and my pace reflects (and maybe causes) that.

Weekly Training Review: 3 Feb – 9 Feb

by Ben

This post originally appeared on Ben’s old blog, Running From the Physio.

After a few weeks of solidly getting all of my runs achieved, and being genuinely enthusiastic about getting out for them, this week has come as a bit of a shock, and is the first real blip. All told, I only completed three of my scheduled five runs, which is disappointing, but it could be worse: I did my longer distances, so in terms of building for my half-marathon I should be okay, I just need to be wary of letting my body sufficiently recover.

Tuesday: 3.09 miles @ 9:35 min/mile
Amazingly, this is three weeks in a row now that I’ve managed a run before work on a Tuesday. Despite just being 3 miles at a slow pace, this was a pretty tough circuit. I played 5-a-side football on Monday night for the first time in a few weeks, and so my body was still trying to recover from that when I hurled it into this. It also meant that this was the fourth day in a row of exercise. But all that aside, the run was a pretty solid one, and I got around.

Wednesday: 2 miles
Missed a run for the first time in just under a month. I got quite down-heartened about this in the evening, but the fact is, the weather was horrible and I wasn’t feeling particularly well. It’s always a shame to miss a run, but I’m a bit more philosophical about it now!

Thursday: 6.35 miles @ 8:58 min/mile
The important thing was that I got back out again on Thursday. Despite missing the run the day before, I felt very tired during this run. I definitely had the edge of a cold or something, and working 22 hours across Monday and Tuesday probably didn’t set me up particularly well for an energetic week. Pretty happy with the pace around this, considering how I was feeling.

Saturday: Parkrun, 5km (3.11 miles)
Amazingly, given the horrible weather that has been with us more or less constantly since mid-December, this was the first time that the Longrun Meadow parkrun has had to be cancelled. I would have liked to have got out and done some miles anyway, but the weather was pretty terrible, and I had things to do around the house, so it never happened.

Sunday: 11.38 miles @ 9:39 min/mile
The furthest I have ever run – again! While last week I crept over my previous distance record, this time I surpassed it by over a mile. I got out pretty early, hoping to avoid the worst of the weather, but in the end the day was a lot better than forecast, so I probably was out in more rain than I needed to be! Still, it certainly wasn’t bad weather, and I felt pretty good. My left knee was a bit painful during the run, and certainly gave me trouble through the rest of day, but it doesn’t feel too bad. Worryingly, I was quite short of breath at the end, which is not something I’ve ever really experienced while running before, especially at this sort of pace. It might be connected to the edge of a cold I have – hopefully it isn’t anything more serious than that.

Weekly Training Review: 27 Jan – 2 Feb

by Ben

This post originally appeared on Ben’s old blog, Running From the Physio.

Late yet again for my training review. This week (not the week I’m writing about) has been pretty difficult and tiring, so there was no mid-week topic blog either. Bit gutted, but hopefully I’ll keep on top of it better next week.

Tuesday: 3.09 miles @ 9:07 min/mile
I managed to get out before work again, for the second week in a row, and had a pretty good run. I still don’t find it easy to wake up that bit earlier to get myself out, but it is definitely nice to then have the evening free. On this occasion, it was even more important to make sure I ran in the morning, as I had a sports massage booked for the early evening, and I figured I was unlikely to want to go straight out for a run after that!

Wednesday: 2.20 miles @ 8:10 min/mile
This was one of those odd, and rare, runs in which I felt like I was running slowly, but in fact when I looked at my time, it turned out that I had run pretty quick! The sports massage from the day before only really showed in terms of highlighting how much my calf muscles ache (massage was limited to quads and hamstrings!)

Thursday: 6.35 miles @ 9:24 min/mile
On a cold Thursday evening, I managed to drag myself out, wearing three layers on top, and gloves! I generally don’t like wearing gloves (or a hat) to run, but on this occasion I needed them. I consciously slowed myself down a couple of times during the run, as it felt like I was running away from myself a little. My knee niggled a little bit, but nothing serious. This was my last run in January, and for the third month in a row, I set a new record for distance: in total I clocked up 89 miles during the month.

Saturday: Parkrun, 5km (3.11 miles) @ 7:48 min/mile
For the first time in quite a long time, I ran with someone else at the parkrun. One of my mates from football came along for his first time (though he ran two or three half marathons last year, so he’s no newbie to running). He hadn’t run for a few months over the winter, and doesn’t generally run such a short distance, so it was a little bit slower than I had been running recently, but it was fun to run with someone else. I peeled off halfway through the second lap and finished the run on my own, and given that the time was still under eight-minute miles, I can’t complain that it was slow!

Sunday: 10.20 miles @ 9:25 min/mile
The furthest I have ever run! My previous furthest was 10.1, and when I initially mapped this route out planning it, this was also going to be about 10.1. But, given that I was feeling okay at the end, I added on a small stretch to just give myself that little boost of knowing that it was the furthest! Okay, so the next weekend has 11 miles planned anyway, but still. I was aching pretty badly for a lot of this run, but beyond that I was actually surprisingly okay. Maybe my body is really starting to learn to keep itself together.

Weekly Training Review: 20 Jan

by Ben

This post originally appeared on Ben’s old blog, Running From the Physio.

A week in which I probably certainly ran too fast…

Tuesday: 3.09 miles @ 8:53 min/mile
For the first time in a while, I went for a run before work. I am very much not a morning person, so this is usually a big no no. However, juggling running, baby duties and my wife’s exercise regime is becoming increasingly difficult, so I thought I had better try and compromise. I’m aiming to do all of my two and three mile weekday runs in the mornings, but it might take a while to convince my body to agree. The run itself was reasonably good, my calf muscles suffered a little bit due to the lack of a warm-up in the cold morning air.

Wednesday: 2.20 miles @ 8:32 min/mile
This run was also meant to be before work. It wasn’t. I’d struggled to get to sleep, and as a result I was unwilling to give up my duvet in the morning. In retrospect I guess I could have taken it with me, but I guess my wife would have been less than happy with this arrangement! I then had a pretty long, full-on, day at work and had absolutely no desire to go for a run. Given all of that, I was not expecting good things. But running can surprise, and this run was like a little hug bubble. I slipped into a “zone” and just ran, shaking off all of my daytime worries. This so rarely happens that I was sorely tempted to keep running after my two-mile lap, but I resisted, figuring that my training plan works both ways.

Thursday: 5.97 miles @ 8:37 min/mile
As I described on my RunKeeper description for this run: “Either my recovery week has worked miracles, or it’s really messed up my timing.” This was the fifth run in a row in which I ran sub-9 minute miles. Which isn’t particularly fast, but it is certainly faster than I’m meant to be running on my training runs. Still, the run was injury- and niggle-free, so I’m not complaining.

Saturday: 3.14 miles @ 7:15 min/mile
Not a parkrun. As I was volunteering at my parkrun this week, I had to run later in the day. I uhmmed and ahhhed for a while over whether I should go at my normal training plod, or push along at a parkrun-esque pace. I chose the latter. I’ve been carefully making sure that I don’t push too hard during my half-marathon training, mostly because the emphasis is on keeping myself in one piece and just getting the damn thing done. As a result, I’ve not just let myself run hard outside of a few races and parkruns. So this was fun! I was pretty chuffed with my time, especially as I was running alone.

Sunday: 8.96 miles @ 8:47 min/mile
The downside of running hard at half past four on a Saturday afternoon is that I was really aching before I even went out for my long run on Sunday! Again, my pace was quicker than 9 minute miles. My left knee pain returned during this run at various stages, and at points was very painful. That said, towards the end it was almost non-existent, and it was gone completely within a few minutes of finishing. I also suffered from some pain in my left foot itself. It felt like my shoe-lace was too tight, but it might also be due to the loop lacing that I have tried since getting these shoes. I’m considering whether to lace the left shoe normally while leaving the right shoe looped, but I don’t know if that would feel weird.

2014: The year of the half marathon?

by Ben

This post originally appeared on Ben’s old blog, Running From the Physio.

For a while now, I’ve wanted to run a half marathon.

In 2010, my brother and I signed up for the Bristol half. I got shin splints, and he got lazy.
In 2011, I didn’t do a lot of very much.
In 2012, having run the Bristol 10 km with my wife, I again targeted the Bristol half, but injuries decimated my training, and I signed up for the Taunton 10 km instead. Which I wasn’t able to run anyway because of flu.
In 2013, I was convinced I would do it. I looked up some of the local ones: the Bath half, Taunton half and Bristol half. I noted them in my diary. And then, injury after injury took its toll, and by the end of the year, I had only completed two races, both 10 km.

Okay, maybe I’ll try crocheting.

A normal person would have decided that maybe running wasn’t for them, and taken up something safer, like crochet… or cage fighting. I, on the other hand, signed up for another half-marathon. On 2 March, I will be running the adidas Silverstone half marathon.

Given my previous struggles to step up to this distance, I had to make sure that I did something different this time. I made two decisions to improve my motivation. None of Bath, Bristol or Taunton half marathons particularly excited me. Don’t get me wrong, I may well end up doing all of them at some stage, and my opinion might then change. But none of them made me think “Yeah, I wanna go there and do that!” I figured that the Silverstone race was something a little different, something I can get more excited about. Secondly, just to make sure that I took the training seriously, and didn’t use a small injury niggle as an excuse to slack off, and then not be able to complete the race, or at least not complete it at a pace I’m happy with, I decided to sign up for a charity place. By committing myself to raising a certain amount of money for charity, if I don’t do the race, I’m letting more than just myself down.

As a result of all that, here I am, leashed to my training plan. In the ten weeks of preparation so far, I have completed all but two of the scheduled runs, which is a far better success rate than previously, when generally I have completed only two of the scheduled runs ten weeks into a plan!

Since I’ve mentioned a fair bit about one of my targets for 2014, I may as well give a bit of rationale for the other two: running a sub-45 minute 10 km, and running 500 miles during the year. They’re both pretty self-explanatory, especially given my targets last year. I’ve been pretty comfortable with running and racing the 10 km distance for a while now, but I think part of that has come because I haven’t really pushed myself hard enough. Doing the parkruns this year has shown me how much faster I can make myself run, and I feel pretty confident that I should be able to transfer this speed to a 10 km race too. Our parkrun course is currently quite muddy, and I’ve brought my PB down to 22:27, so with a few months speed training and a road course, I think I’ve got a fair crack at running a 10 km under 45 minutes. Not the Wellington 10 though, that’s far too hilly!

Running 500 miles should be a doddle: I’ve already done 60 this year, and we’re less than a fifteenth of the way through. In fact, if I kept going at more or less the same rate as I am at the moment, then I have a fair chance of running 500 miles, and 500 more. But then I’d probably fall down at the door.

Sorry.

Where was I? Oh yes, running 500 miles. Essentially, it should be easy, but as much as anything else, it is just there to make sure that I keep running, and it’s set at a number that should still be attainable even if I have to take a while out because of an injury.

And now, a short beg for money. I’m running for the Multiple Sclerosis Society. It’s a horribly complicated neurological condition that can be difficult to diagnose, and has various forms, all of which have a serious impact on people’s lives. Please, please sponsor me: https://www.justgiving.com/BenTimmo-Silverstone. Thank you!