Race Report: Mornington Chasers - Regents Park 10K Series 1/6

One week to go to the Centurion Running Autumn 100 race, and what better way to keep things peppy but relaxed than a local 10K race :)

We've entered a couple of race series across the winter and through next year.  A grand slam of 4x 50 mile races, interspersed with 6x 10K races. I ran the last of last winter's 10K race series organised by Mornington Chasers and I really enjoyed it, so when the entries popped up recently for the whole 2018/19 series we got a full series pass each. The first race of which was today.

The mission was "1 hour very very easy" from my training plan, so that fitted nicely with a gentle 10K and we jogged around together, chatting away. The route is a pretty 3.33km x3, mostly through light tree cover around Regents Park with some very very gentle undulations and past the zoo - the residents of which started waking up quite loudly on our second lap. It's a nicely run race with no queueing for registration, free toilets and bag drop, a water station at the end of each lap and a cafe next to the start/finish which is open by the time folks are done running.

We managed to keep things sensible and averaged just over 10mins/mile until I negotiated with my brain that although it wanted to have a bit of a leg stretch, today was not the day for that apart from a little 400m right at the end. So as my watch beeped the 6 mile mark, we opened up the throttle to an easy cruise at 8:20/mile and that felt really good. Bananas (which we declined), flapjack and water at the end before a quick tea from the cafe and a stroll to the tube to go home. Out, raced and home again in plenty of time for a civilised brunch and an afternoon on the sofa.

Race report: Regents Park 10K

First race of 2018; woohoo!

Mornington Chasers run a 10K race series through the winter season and I wanted an early race for this year to kick things off, see where I'm at with my speed work and just have a bit of fun really. At £19 for non-affiliated runners (£17 for affiliated) - chip timed and free bag drop - the February one seemed like a bit of a no-brainer really. Regents Park is so close to where I work and I know the park pretty well so it was easy to get to from where I live and a familiar set of paths and scenery.

Registration and facilities (free toilets, and changing and showers for a fee at the Hub Sports Centre) opened at 8am for a 9am race start, so I had to get up at 6am to get a good coffee in, let that work its magic (*poop*), feed the cats, make a travel mug of tea to drink on the tube and head out. And I nearly didn't get out of bed!

It was *freezing* and I was snuggled up warm in my duvet, really not wanting to get up. But as I checked out how my coach did last night at Rocky Racoon (100 mile trail race in Texas), I saw he'd smashed it and come 3rd. That was the little bit I needed to tip the balance in favour of getting up and out.

Regents Park is quite pretty. I mean, it's a park and quite a big one so it's got a bit of head start on pretty, but there are lots of landmarks (see above), trees, sculptures and the zoo.

The race route was 3 laps of 3.33km each and it's virtually flat - very tiny incline and very tiny decline. My 10K PB was set in 2011, and my most recent quick 10K in 2014 at 52:38 and I was struggling with setting a sensible goal for today. I got a grip in the end and talked myself down from "PB or you may as well not have bothered". Having been building up my speed recently, I took a marker session from 2 weeks ago where I had to run < 9mins/mile for 40 mins after a warm up, and I'd held 08:40/mile for the 40 mins. So what I wanted to do today was to hold 08:40/mile for the whole race, which at that pace would be just under 54 mins. There were pacers for 40, 45, 50, 55 and 60 mins so I wanted to be between the 50 and 55 min pacers and not let the 55 min pacer overtake me.

Knowing my brain, I set my watch to just record and not pipe up every mile with my mile pace. That meant that if I was off pace I wouldn't just throw in the towel and ease off to jog it in. I really am not good at making the best of a pace that's less than my target, so if I remove that information I'm more likely to just keep the effort up. And that worked really well! I ended up in a small group of ladies who were approximately the same speed and just tried to hold on to them as we leap-frogged a few times.

I got a bit grumpy at one point when a "helpful" coach from the running club at around the half way mark let us know that we were on for 54-55 mins finish. NOT HELPFUL! I lost heart momentarily and then spent the next few minutes persuading myself that he was probably a bit out and not very good at maths.

I picked it up at the 2km to go point and hoped I'd not over-cooked it. Having gone a bit too early at the Chase The Sun 10K on Wimbledon Common in the late summer last year, I was a teensy bit worried I'd just fade in the last 800m or so, but I was OK! One of the other ladies had a sprint finish in her and she stormed past the rest of us, which was lovely to see :o)

Over the line for me and BOOM!

Thank you very much; I'll take that! 53:25 (race results official time 53:21, so even better! Though it's currently incorrectly showing me as FV35 category rather than FV45.) And the first time I've seen a VO2 Max of 50 :o) 54s off my PB, but so much has changed since then!

08:35/mile average for 6.1 miles (though Garmin and Strava say it was 6.24 miles and 08:34/mile). Very happy with that! And finishing right at The Hub cafe meant tea and some eggs were immediately available for brekkie. Perfect! (The Hub is also a sports facility with free toilets and changing rooms/showers for a fee.)

So glad I got out of bed! Thank you Mornington Chasers! This is a lovely, small and low key race. 330ish runners and a good distance to spread out over so no congestion on the course. I'll likely be back for some more :o)

Little bit of post-race stats analysis:

• Cadence was nice and high, but started a bit too high and dropped off over the 10K (pink line in the middle)
• Heart rate was a bit wrong for much of the race; optical monitors don't do well in the cold, especially if you're carrying some insulation. (red line at the bottom)
• Pace (graded average, taking into consideration the elevation changes) actually increased across the 10K. (So either my warm up wasn't long/good enough, or I actually undercooked the pace from the start by a few s/mile.) (purple line at the top)

Twickenham 10K

Lapchallenge brought me another unexpected race late in the year - run by a fellow Thames Turbo club member - a lovely 10km loop around Twickenham.  Mostly along the river and with a couple of obstacles; some steps, a couple of bridges with bike barriers at each end and a kissing gate that really slowed the flow of runners for a while (I just hopped over the railings).  The start and finish are at the White Swan pretty much on the river banks and there are loos right there, which is handy, and the pub were laying on a barbecue for after the race; even nicer!

Having run the Thames Turbo half marathon a couple of weekends ago, and run it pretty hard only to have a relatively slow time as a result, I wasn't particularly positive going in to this 10K race.  I've not been having the quickest 5km runs either and the level of effort I've had to put in to get a time that's more than 2 minutes slower than my 5K PB is just demoralising.

Registration

Sunday morning of the race and I still wasn't feeling all that confident in my speed, having been putting in silly slow 5K times with large effort for the last couple of months.  We got up and had bacon and scrambled eggs with coffee and cream for breakfast then ambled into Twickenham to park and walk down to registration/start/finish at the White Swan by the river.  It was pretty quiet and a good time to arrive for Mr TOTKat to be shown his marshalling spot and get a lovely hi-vis tabard to wear.  A great big red inflatable start/finish hoop clearly marked where things were at, which was nice.  What was a pleasant surprise was the 463 registered runners - about double what I was expecting.

Start/Finish hoop and timing tent

I was ready for a slippery mudfest for some of the course, having been warned of that, and had on my £24 New Balance MT101s which are fabulously light, grippy and surprisingly good on concrete too.  And we were off on the dot of 10am.  After a few seconds I made it through the start hoop; I'd started a bit down the field with my pessimistic 1 hour or more predicted time.  And we trotted down through a park, past Mr TOTKat's turn point *wave* and the tide of runners went out.  I let it.  Early on in a race, many people go out too hard, don't pace well and you'll reel them in again later.  Kitted out in my new club strip, I got a "GO TURBO!" from a couple of ladies by the path; which was nice :o)

Go Turbo!

Having felt pretty perky in the morning, I also didn't really experience the usual "Oh, I could stop now. There's no reason to push so hard, is there?" feelings in an appreciable way.  As Noakes says, they usually kick in about 2/3rds the way into a race regardless of length, but today they didn't.  I did, however, get a nasty stitch at about 32 minutes in and had to slow and walk through it for a minute before it was gone sufficiently to pick up to run again.  In that minute about 8-10 people passed me (one helpfully checking I was OK "yep, just a stitch thanks!"), and I thought how annoyed I would be if I were them passing someone walking only to be overtaken by that person in a couple of minutes.  Sorry!  I had a bad stitch, I'm not one of those annoying people who run/walk shorter distances in races*.

Race organisation beavering away

 So I overtook most of them again, maybe even all I didn't really notice.  Having noticed 6km bleep on my Garmin, I was waiting for the 7km marker but it never came and the course headed into the town centre for a bit so there wasn't a convenient spot for the markers any more.

Pretty, riverside route.

The 8km marker turned up way before expected (and my Garmin said it was at 7.34km).  There were a fair few people without GPS watches who thought they were flying when they saw that; oops!  I was pretty pleased that my pacing had been wonderfully even through the run to that point and thought I'd try a little extra speed soonish to get that last km knocked out faster.

Nice even pace (km 7 was stitch time)

And, lookit!  With a nicely evenly paced preceding 9km (apart from 7th km where I had to walk out the stitch), I threw in a final km that was 20s+ quicker.  Very nice!  But my happiness turned to huge disappointment as I approached the finish hoop (feeling like now was a good time to be able to stop running so hard) and I saw the timer saying 1:05:xx (or so I thought).  How could I have put in a 65 minute 10km!?  Not fair at all, seeing how well I'd paced!  And then I looked down at my heart rate monitor to stop it and saw it saying 00:54:xx and I looked up at the timer again to realise it was showing the time and was awfully formatted - it was, in fact, 10:54:xx 6 minutes to 11am :o)  Muuuuch better!

Nice cadence :o)

Spot the stile and stitch

Spot the stile and stitch

All in all a lovely race and I'm pleased with how it went.  Nice, even pacing, worked through the stitch, ran straight through the mud and puddles (rather than mincing around the sides of them), shoes were perfectly grippy on all of the surfaces, and I put in a cracking effort at the end.  Job done.

More pace/speed improvements to come as I work on stuff over the coming few months and I've got every confidence in putting in a sub 50 minute 10km at some point in the not too distant future.

* - If run/walk is your strategy for distances less than a (standalone) marathon, I mean you.  Yes, you.  You're ANNOYING!  If you can't run the whole distance, don't race; or... man up in the race and force yourself.  Train more/better and finish a race in an honourable way!  (Any courses with appreciably evil hills are exempt from this - walk all you need to!)

Running flats...

I -think-.  These running flats make something for a difference.

With no training (honestly, I've done bugger all running), I've pulled 30s off my 5K and 120s off my 10K PBs and the only real difference is the shoes.  They're last season (SS11)'s Saucony A3...

...and they weigh nothing at all.  That's not where the big win comes from (for me, for now), though.  It's the lack of hugely built-up heel, which forces me to strike mid-foot to front-foot and not with my heel.  You just can't heel strike in these 'cause it jars your foot, ankle and knee and there's instant feedback of "Bad" to your brain so you stop it pretty quickly.

The really good thing was that because they were last season's design, they cost a princely sum of £29.99 (list price £72).

British 10K

Having specifically asked the orthopaedic surgeon whether I could safely train/exercise and not been told it was a bad idea, I decided to run the British 10K last weekend.

Having not run at all for a month (the last run was 4 weeks earlier and only 5km) and done naff all running at all in the last 4 months, it was always a bit of a stretch to consider even finishing a 10km run in any reasonable time (or, if you're being sensible about it, to go that far one one go).  But I'm nothing if not bloody-minded and pretty fed up about not being able to compete in sports events properly/at all at the moment.

It was an earlyish start and the tubes were quiet.  A good bowl of porridge in our bellies, we made our way in to town for the run.  There were a few runners on the tube, but nothing that gave any idea of the scale of this event even slightly.  It was only really apparent when we were lined up, queueing up the road to cross the start line.  We weren't all that far from the front and turning around to look behind us, the number behind us was phenomenal.  Around 25,000 people ran the British 10K - I say "ran", there were an awful lot of walkers.  People who walked from start to finish and never had intended to run (it's called the "British 10K run", the clue is in the title!), people who were just doing it for charity and that's where I went wrong.

Don't get me wrong, I'm all for people raising money for charity.  But I think it absolutely ruins a lot of sport events; the London marathon is two events now, the elite runners and then people who raise money for charity by titting about in a banana costume.  It's not a sport event for anyone who isn't an elite because it's so hard to get a place without raising money for charity.  And, to be honest, I think that really really sucks.  Yes, there are people who are trying really hard, for them.  And there are people who simply can't run 10km.  But it's just frustrating for people who actually just want to enter a 10km running race and not be made to feel guilty for not raising money for charity.  Seriously, if I had to raise money for every race I entered I'd only be able to enter one per year because, you know what, people get charity fatigue and you can't just keep asking for sponsorship all of the time.  It's a sad state of affairs that a large proportion of the population equates "normal" people doing sporting events with raising money for charity and that there's no other reason you'd be doing it.  Oh I'm not sure where I'm going with this, it's just frustrating.

Anyway.  Race started, we ran.  We ran around everyone who was walking, and by god there were a -lot- of those all through the race.  I needed a wee from about 20 minutes before the start (yes there were loos but we were "kettled" for over 40 minutes before the start and I needed to go again) so spent a lot of time considering exactly how endurance runners deal with this sort of thing until the 4.5km mark where there were loos - yay!  I stopped my watch while I queued and weed and started it up again when I was done.  And it was rather warm.  I don't deal with warm very well.  Felt a lot better after the comfort break, but not long after that (around 7km) my knee decided to say something.  And it got noisier and noisier, but there was no point in not finishing, so I did.  57:something on the watch.  And then we went to find food and instant ice-packs.  And accidentally had awful burger and chips and beer...

...followed by a total fail when we got home when we ended up having takeaway pizza.  *sigh*

OK, so I managed to finish a 10km run, but I'm not feeling enthusiasm or a sense of achievement.  Mostly because my knee is still in indeterminate state, but that aside, the time was cack and the official time awful due to the pee stop (01:04!  Yes, the loo queue was looooong!).  How can that be something to even be OK about, never mind proud?

Two race weekend

Work has been crazy.  I've over-indulged and not done much (any) training.

We had an open water swim session on Sunday, set up by the Virgin Active London Triathlon organisation, but run by NOWCA (a really great organisation who have noticed that open water swimming is really taking off but there are problems around it in terms of finding safe places to swim and safe ways to organise swims and are looking to regulate things - founded by Martin Allen and the infamous Rick Kiddle (truly lovely guy, great coach, great athlete)).  The idea with the Virgin sponsorship of the triathlon is to expand the sport even more, bring it to more first timers and these open water swim training sessions are designed to help people get to grips with the differences and techniques associated and gain confidence in open water.

I don't pretend to be an expert at open water swimming, but I do (so far) seem to be not totally shite at it and I've had no problems with confidence or the rather physical nature of the mass starts you often hear about.  So I was there mostly to pick up any tips and keep Mr TOTKat company.  I enjoyed myself, got a little bit competitive and the group we were in weren't shrinking violets (though all rather British about physical contact in the water - heh, they'll learn soon enough :o)) which added to my enjoyment.  The end of the session was a bit of fun as we all raced to the bank to get out and strip off our wetsuits first, as was the challenge, to find when we decided to stand in the water to wade the last few feet, we were all more than waist deep in a soup of thick silt and mud and needed to get a lot closer to the bank before really trying to stand up and wade out.  Mmmm, sludgey!

Then on Sunday I had a hard session with Geoff the Awesome, who gave me a nicely confidence boosting workout of more old-school weight training where I still failed to really get the snatch technique even remotely right, but came away feeling worked really hard which I've really missed.  After that, we had roast chicken and drank waaaaay more than is a good idea for a Sunday night.

Monday, no exercise - planned no gym as I'd gymmed the day before, but I was supposed to cycle to work and decided it was a bad idea in the morning given the amount I'd had the night before.  Tuesday, no exercise - we were out for dinner, so I wasn't going to cycle in and leave my bike at work - I hate doing that.  And we went for dinner.  And drank waaaay too much again.  Today, no exercise.  I had no gym kit with me but thought I might get a swim in today; work denied me that due to being insanely busy.

So.  I have a race on Saturday - Shock Absorber Women's Triathlon - and one on Sunday - Clapham Common 10K.  And I really can't go to the gym on Friday as that would be foolish the day before a race.   The plan is to cycle and gym tomorrow and rest on Friday before the races.  Sub-optimal, but I don't want a whole 7 days with no resistance training at all.

First race of the year

First race of the year - Clapham Common 10K Series Race #1.  With a scheduled start for the race of 10:05, registration opening at 08:45, we decided the time to set off from home was... 08:45.  So we set an alarm for 07:30 to give us plenty of time to have a shower, breakfast, tea, second breakfast and get there in good time to register and queue for the loos before the 10K race start.

I had a bowl of Dorset Cereals - Tasty Toasted Spelt with semi-skimmed milk and then a slice of toasted home-made malt loaf with peanut butter just before we left the house.  It wasn't too cold on the way to Clapham Common, but cool enough for a nice run so that boded well for a good race for me (I really don't like the heat!).

When we got there, Chris was already registered, quaffing a hot coffee (wise move as it was a bit nippy) and a bit amused to have race number "4".  We faffed a bit then registered and... hah!... ended up with race numbers "5" and "6". 

Yes, it was cold enough to need gloves!

No, we didn't decide to be colour co-ordinated, it just happened that way, OK!

Having dropped our bags off, the final runner (Ibrahim) we were going to meet up with was spotted queueing for registration and the competitiveness got off to a rollocking start.

Group warmup was, as ever at these events, a bit annoying.  Static stretching is not a good idea before running and it really peeves me that the organised warm up staff still encourage people to do it.  *grouch*  Anyhoo... the 2km kiddies had run their race and looked like they'd had fun with a couple of them clocking up times only just over 10 minutes.  The 5km race guys gathered around the start for their 5 minute head-start to do 1 lap while those of us doing 10km waited a bit longer to start our 2 convoluted and wiggly laps of the park.  10am came and went and then we were off!  Mr TOTKat was just in front of me and pulled ahead quite early on, to be swiftly followed by Ibrahim who overtook me around the 1km mark.

Just around the 1.5km mark I passed a couple of girls encouraging each other on, then at the 2km mark someone had obviously fallen over and was being consoled at the side of the track.  All props to the organisers for going around the course and not only marking it clearly with tape, cones and signs but they'd sprayed orange fluorescent paint on any trip hazards like pot holes, tree roots and the odd manhole cover with a raised or dropped edge.  The course is a mixed surface course between mostly paved and grass with a little bit of gravel towards the end of the laps.  There are a couple of little undulating grassy bits, one of which was really quite muddy.

Towards the end of the first lap, around the 4km mark my left knee started to hurt a bit.  I thought I'd run through it and see if it went away.

It didn't.

Through muttering about people slowing down where the course narrowed to pinch points and the odd person running, walking and being over-taken and then running again and overtaking the "proper runners" back again, I gritted my teeth and kept on through the increasing pain levels.  There was no way I was going to have my first DNF.  No.  Way.

Crossing the finish line for the first time (end of the first lap), I checked my watch.  It was 27:00.  Dead.  This was Not Good.  My target was to get a 10km time in the 55 minute range.  Given a usually faster first 5km than second, it wasn't looking good at all for a 55:xx finish time, especially with my knee talking to me quite loudly already.  The race entertainer/encourager on the PA gave me a shout out as I crossed the line "nice low race number there, well done Kate!" so I gave them a wave and a smile.

Around 6km I realised I'd slowed down a bit as a few people I'd just overtaken had overtaken me back.  Checking my watch my heart rate had dropped a good 6bpm which, at that point in a race, means I'm well off pace.  So I wound up the pace again and ploughed on, my knee getting more and more painful.

Somewhere around 7km I was at the point of vocalising a little on each strike of my left foot.  With the constant thought of "run your own race", "run your own race" I was running through calculations of what my finish time might be if I managed a 6minutes/km pace.  8km came and went and my focus was more and more on finishing, keeping the pace high enough to have a semi-respectable time but low enough not to run the risk of having to pull up before the end.  I then couldn't remember if there was a 9km marker or not, convinced myself that there wasn't one and almost cried when it came as I thought I was closer to the finish than that when it did.  Rounding the final corner, a guy to the left of me groaned loudly, so I said "you can say that again!".  Roughly 100m to go and I tried to lift the pace for the last little bit but there wasn't much I could do with my knee on fire.  With about 20m to go, Chris passed me!  I swore.  Loudly.  Twice.  And threw myself over the line.  Stopped my watch and dared to look at the time.  54:27!!!  Well under target and with a knee that had been increasingly painful for most of the race!

Mr TOTKat and Ibrahim were waiting for us, but only by a couple of minutes...

Me, Mr TOTKat, Chris and Ibrahim

Great race.  Really enjoyed it despite the painful knee.  Really enjoyed the pub burger and chips with a lovely 3.4% ale (Adnams Lighthouse) at The Avalon just down the road from the common.

Today, however, my knee still hurts.  Just walking.  So I'm on rest, ice and ibuprofen for a day or two.  On the up side, the official timing results give me a time of 54:22 which is even better than I thought.

Coming up this year...

Enough talk of injury, here's what's on the plan for this year:-

• 15th January - The Grim Original (deferred entry to the 2011 Grim due to injury)
• 20th February - Hell of The Ashdown (support, not racing)
• 20th March - Clapham Common 10K
• 8th-10th April - Swimathon (distance undecided)
• 25th April - Thames Turbo Sprint Triathlon #1
• 2nd May - Thames Turbo Sprint Triathlon #2
• 8th May - Sheffield Half Marathon
• 30th May - Thames Turbo Sprint Triathlon #3
• 5th June - British Triathlon Super Series, Blenheim Triathlon (sprint distance)
• 12th June - British Triathlon Super Series, Windsor Triathlon (sprint distance - awaiting availability of places)
• 3rd July - Clapham Common 10K (not yet entered)
• 31st July - British Triathlon Super Series, London Triathlon (Olympic distance)
• 29th August - Thames Turbo Sprint Triathlon #4
• 18th September - Clapham Common 10K (not yet entered)
• 16th October - Clapham Common 10K (not yet entered)

• TBC - British Triathlon Super Series, Strathclyde Park Triathlon (probably sprint)
• TBC - British Triathlon Super Series, Parc Bryn Bach Triathlon (probably sprint)
• TBC - The Grim Original 2011

Most of this was the product of one night of booking frenzy just before Christmas.  Not sure when we get to go on holiday amongst that lot, and there's a patch with races 3 weekends in a row which is a teeeeensy bit exciting and will mean an interesting period of resting and fuelling which might be a bit difficult.

Anybody else doing any of these?   And does anybody else do crazy things like sign up for loads of races all at once?

I shouldn't be allowed!

Mad busy week again (and will be again next week too due to impending intergalactic deadline of the century being next weekend) so not been around online a great deal and won't be again next week and certainly not over the weekend.

Anyhoo, we went for a run today - a tentative 10K around the area and the aim was to just not stop.  The upshot was that about 1km from home, I tripped on a manhole cover and went flying.  Left knee has a hole in my running tights and a small graze, right knee is pretty impressively skinned and sporting two large lumps.   Can't wait for the bruise to come up!  Same bloody knee I bruised quite spectacularly when I hit that car last Friday.  I really shouldn't be allowed to do anything physical out in the wild ;o)  Still. Even though I tried to throw myself face-first into the concrete, we finished in 56:33, a whole minute faster than my 10K race in November 2009.  A new personal best!  *pleased*

My knee really hurts though.  Lots of tea, leftover Christmas cake and sympathy might help.

Envigorated - and an incredible milestone

Today marks 4 years since I took the decision to lose weight and turn my health around.  4 years on and I'm still maintaining a 30kg weight loss (which took 6 months to effect purely through diet change and calorie deficit), having had a little hiccup part way through when my scales stopped working properly and I put on a good half stone.  That was worked off again and I've been working on lowering my body fat %, taken up running and got back into swimming.  I've done my first 10km running race (2 minutes faster than I wanted to do it), my first sprint triathlon (10 minutes faster than I wanted to do it; and 2 more tris to come through the year), done a 5km swim for charity (in less than 2 hours despite no training) and signed up for a 2 mile swim down the Thames later in the summer.  I've come a long way and am still moving forward.  I may well be very hard on myself most of the time, but I have done well and continue to do so.  So it calls for a little celebration.  Dinner out tonight!

Despite still aching quite a bit, I went to the gym with Mr TOTKat this morning.  And I really went for it.  Full body weights session with a good 15 minutes cardio at the end.  I feel great!   Mr TOTKat's trainer even commented on my walking lunges with kettlebells, which was pleasing!  My thighs ought to calm down a bit by the morning too. :o)

B - greek yogurt with 1 scoop, maca root and some Dorset Cereals fruity muesli
*gym*
S - 1 scoop in semi-skimmed milk with water (we ran out of milk!)
L - sandwich; Sainsburys wholemeal crusty roll with ham, Philadelphia and lettuce
S - cottage cheese with pineapple and maca root
D - hot smoked salmon with beetroot and watercress, duck breast with pureed cauliflower and spinach and a portobello mushroom, chocolate brownie with vanilla ice-cream and chocolate sauce, champagne, dessert wine and coffee with Amaretto

Exercise - 65 minutes gym

Calories (kcal) [kcals to maintain weight (inc. exercise)	2570 2303]
Protein (g)	159.2 (25.9%)
Carbohydrate (g)	234.4 (35.8%)
Fat (g)	67.5 (24.7%)
Alcohol (g)	47.6 (13.6%)
Fruit & Veg	6.6

Virgin Active anyone...?

Anyone else seen the 10 minute challenge at the Virgin Active gyms this week?

I noticed it while I was doing intervals on the cross-trainer (having done 10 minutes on the wave machine - oh my god that hurts my thighs!) and cut them short to have a look. And I'm -so- glad I did!

Choose 2 out of 4 fitness challenges; bike, row, run and cross-train (different intensities and distances for each, e.g. 1.5km scramble on the bike or 100m climb on the cross-trainer); and either an easy (takes 15% off your total time if you get it right) or hard (takes 30% off your total time if you get it right) mental challenge. A trainer sets up the machine and times you, you answer the mental challenge whilst slogging away. Total time minus any bonus from the mental challenge enters you into a competition for Amazon vouchers and a bicycle.

So I did it. And picked bike, cross-trainer and hard mental challenge. In 05:05! And I got the mental challenge wrong (oh the shame of it!); it was weird, my brain just refused to work while my body was being punished so hard. No idea if that was a good time or not until the trainer looked up "the next fastest woman"! (who did it in 07:25 so I was over the moon!) Plenty of week left for someone to beat me, but still WOOOOOO! It was FUN! (and I had to slow right down at the end of the cross-trainer challenge 'cause I was going so hard I was about to barf!)

So, if you're a Virgin Active member, check out your local gym to see if they're doing the challenge and HAVE A GO! Its brilliant! (and you get a free t-shirt for having a go anyway)

*waddle*

Bit on the lardy side this morning and after the weekend I just had, it's no surprise! Last week ended around the lower 67kgs and this week starts around the lower 68kgs.

Felt coldy on the back half of last week, head cold and finding it hard to get enough air in to run up stairs etc. Still. Saturday we went out shopping a bit and ended up having a wee drinkie in Claridges bar while waiting to see if we could get afternoon tea in the tea room. 3.30pm deadline for that possiblity came and went so we carried on drinking and decide to get a bottle and some sarnies sent through from the tea room. by 7pm we were a touch sozzled and decided to nip home, via one of the local Italian restaurants for a bit to eat in the evening (having agreed we'd just get some toast when we got home *cough*). 2am, I woke up feeling iffy. After half an hour went back to sleep. 4am; woke up with cold sweats and dinner decided to make a swift exit via all available routes. 5am; back to sleep. 6am woke up for another half an hour then back to sleep. 8am,;woke up and considered breakfast as I was starving. Had porridge made for me and ate it with gusto. 9.15am we were changed and off out to the Clapham 10K.

Ran the 10K (furthest I've ever run) in 57:37! Having said I'd like to do it in under 60 minutes and I'd be chuffed with a time in the 58s. Cue huge grins and a race back home to get showered and changed and back out into town to run an errand before heading for lunch at the nice French place in the village. A nice, extended lunch with wine and then home to snuggle and snooze in front of the TV.

Last week's numbers:-
Exercise count: 4
Exercise duration: 03:02
Exercise kcals: 1,883

Numbers from 15th July 2009:-
Exercise count: 127
Exercise duration: 68:03
Exercise kcals: 37,328

Gentle week

Only 2 gym sessions this week (Tuesday and Thursday) - partly due to the office move and partly due to wanting a gentle week in advance of my race on Sunday. I did, however, up the weight for my squats with shoulder presses today to 15kg. Which was nice.

I'm hoping this burgeoning cold doesn't actually develop or if it does, not before Sunday 'cause i want to put in a good time (for me), dammit!