Ugh... such a long time since I posted

With the house move and everything else its been a long time since I posted.

To cut a long story short, I haven't been running for ages, but I have been hitting the gym pretty hard.

I started some Body Pump classes and had a personal trainer session - I'll be increasing my weights work while I'm not running.

Recovering from injury

In the middle of last year Rick and I started Badminton and during the course of the games we played my back started to hurt quite a bit which also aggravated the muscles at the top of my legs (in my bottom basically!).

When I started running this year and increasing my exercise I badly aggravated this injury and during a spinning class basically caused some damage. For the days after (when I was on a break!) I started to have back spasms which were not pleasant. All of this was during my training for the BUPA Great Manchester run where I posted the terrible 1:09 10K. I had to stop running and pretty much all training for about 8 weeks :(

Thankfully I am getting *much* better now. I rarely have any back ache at all now - just some slight twinges. I still have problems with the muscles in my leg, mainly, I think, the piriformis which causes me some sciatic pain but that is also much better. I can now manage to run at least 20k a week with little to no problem.

I wanted to write this post to encourage others who are having injury problems and to point out my solution - I got an amazing osteopath - Cyril Irvine from the Soothe Clinic in Manchester. Cyril is amazingly knowledgeable and despite being a total b**tard when he pounds the hell out me during treatment he has really helped me to get past the injury and to understand how to prevent it from coming back.

What's nice about the approach Cyril took is that he focuses heavily on stretching and strengthening the affected muscles and muscles around the outside. I have some excellent leg stretches that I do throughout the day to stretch out the ITB and piriformis to really loosen me up. Cyril's co-worker Coby Langford is also one hell of a yoga tutor and her back pain CD is invaluable - I did it for about 8 weeks and I have visibly different muscle tone in my back now and it really got rid of my aches.

I recommend anyone who is suffering from injuries of back, neck or legs to get out and see an osteopath - if you're in Manchester look no further than Soothe - they really are the business.

Progress this week

I didn't get quite get the mileage I wanted this week since I'm still a little fragile in the lower back/upper leg area. However, I did manage to get around my average:

Sunday - 10K
Monday - 1.6K (slooow day)
Tuesday - 3.5K
Thursday - 4K
Friday - 4k

So about 23K this week. Kicked off the new week today with a 4.3K. Good news is my legs were much better as a result of all the stretching but I was genuinely tired - I always struggle to run early morning if I haven't eaten, although I was only slightly slower than my fastest 5k pace so that's good.

Strange week this week - moving to Southampton on Friday and day off on Thursday to handle the final packing mess. So hopefully, I'll be running Mon,Tues,Weds and Thurs. I plan to try and do 5/6/5/6 if I can, but I'll settle for 4 each day provided my legs stay nice and loose.

Wahay! Kayaking!

I booked myself on a kayaking course for August 19th. With all the running, my legs are getting lean and mean, but my upper body is totally neglected so I decided to take up kayaking. Once I get the basic qualifications, I think I'll have to get out and buy my own kayak.

Oooh sore legs

I did a quick gym session yesterday and included a mile run, which was pretty gentle, but when I got out on the run today... crikey my legs were sore.

I had planned an easy 5k at 6 min/km pace and I went the first 3k without too much trouble. After that my legs just refused to cooperate and I had to jog/walk the last 1.5k, cutting the route short. What was nice was that I was barely breathing heavier than normal at that pace - a stark contrast from when I started and encouraging for when I really up the distance.

I need to focus on getting my weekly distance up now. I have been doing about 20-25K per week, but I really want to get that to about 50K per week before the end of the year. So my focus until the end of July is to get to 30K per week - I'll be posting my weekly breakdown from now on.

Of course, next week I'm moving house so not a great week to go in to.

Happily, tomorrow is a rest day and by Thursday I hope to have working legs again.

City of Manchester 10K

As Keith might say "Yee Haw!". After the terrible 1:09:x x I posted at the Great Manchester Run, I was determined to get sub-hour this time - and..... 54:39! Oh yeah! Wasn't exactly flat either - some nice bumps along the way. Super pleased, especially since I could have carried on. I think I might look for a 10 mile race to do in 6-8 weeks time.

Sally and my parents came to watch, and Sally took some great pics, including the one in this post.

The Road So Far

After realising in January that I was becoming a bona fide chunker, I decided it was time to start on the fitness wagon - and this time not just to play at it.

Rick and I took up running with the specific aim of entering the BUPA Manchester 10K - which we both did. Unfortunately, I had been injured right up until two days before the race and I posted a rather disappointing time of 1:09. I did, however, raise £500 for the Cystic Fibrosis Trust, so it wasn't all bad.

Thankfully, training is back on track and I ran a 6K trail race at Castle Howard this weekend in 32:28. The coming weekend I am running in the City of Manchester 10K and I'll be getting under 60 minutes if it kills me :)

On a very positive note, I have lost 24lbs so far and I am not quite the bloater that I was!