2012, Week 1...

Is it like this every winter? Do I always wake up every single morning with a stuffed up head and a runny nose, in need of another 5 hours' sleep? Possibly, I really can't remember, but that's what it's been like this winter since about November. I realise I'm not helping to solve this problem as I can't seem to get to bed early. For Christmas I got a beautiful kindle, and a large pile of actual books too, and I keep reading until I doze off, instead of closing my eyes when I should.

Anyway, I think I had a bit of a cold last week. I felt ok most of the time, but my running was pretty shabby. I think my body was fighting off some evil bug, which took away some of the energy I apparently needed to run.

On Monday it was still school holidays, but luckily it was Pete's holiday too, so I was able to go for a morning run. I'd planned about 6 miles, but felt so lacking in energy that I dropped to 5m. I got a stitch just after 2miles, and struggled to complete the distance, it was rubbish.

The following day I felt quite achey, and ran the slowest 3-miler I've done for a long time. My average mile pace was 9m27s! I decided to call it a recovery run, although I didn't feel very recovered afterwards.

Wednesday was Emma's 4th birthday! We spent most of the day mooching round the shops and sitting in cafes waiting for Robbie to finish school, and after picking him up we went home to play with new toys, dance to music and eat birthday cake. I can't believe she's 4, my baby girl!




















Posing


On Thursday I ran with the local club in the evening. I still didn't feel good, and after a 1mile warm up I was already wheezy, despite having taken my inhaler as usual. We ran 6 x 600metres with 2min recovery after each lap. I took it steady and tried not to wreck myself.

Friday was a glorious sunny day and I had my first bike ride in 4 weeks. It was really lovely feeling the sun on my face, I'd almost forgotten what sun felt like. I had a great 10 miles.















Sunny views

On Saturday we celebrated Emma's birthday further with a trip to a local zoo and play park. There were lots of cool small animals, and plenty of activities for the kids, as well as a great play area. I decided to leave a run until Sunday. I thought I ought to try to up my speed for this week, and used a foolproof method to do so - put some music on my ipod.

I usually listen to podcasts (or nothing), but I often find that some fast music can help me increase my speed almost unknowingly. I ran 3 miles at 8.30min/mile pace this time - much better!

So I ran 4 times, totalling 14.7 miles. Not a bad start to the year, but I need to get some longer runs in if I'm going to run a half marathon, and I really need to do something about my speed...