From Couch to 5k to...who knows? About This Page:

[disneyallday]

This is a huge step!!! Go get 'em.

[OhToodles!]

That's so great!!! You will be great for your 5k. I'm trying to decide which one to sign up for - there are too many choices!

And yes, it will get hotter here - we reach 100s in July/August for days at a time. Don't ask why I decided to start this back up in summer!

[Tim Sullivan]

Famous? Well...I dunno about that Guested on a podcast? Yes, definitely that

Tim

[Tinkerboo]

Week 8 Run 3
When: Wednesday 25th June, 12.30pm
Where: Private road by 'our' beach, with Andy doing week 5
Weather: Cloudy and warmish, wind blowing in the opposite direction to usual!
How long: read on...
How far: read on...
What's the plan?: 5m (mins) warm-up walk - run 30 - 5m cooldown.
How'd I feel?: We didn't get out over the weekend for various reasons, then between Andy's shifts and yesterday being my birthday (and much food being consumed ), today was the first available day for our next - and my final! - session. I was confident, having achieved the 30m last Friday, plus because a bunch of things I'd ordered from ebay arrived this morning: new Ron Hill capri pants, a longer looser (cooler) vest top and an armband for my phone so I don't have to carry it. All togged up, I totally felt like a Proper Runner.

Sunday's race is drawing ever closer, so my plan today was to see whether I could possibly run the whole distance with no walking. Short answer: yes I can. Conversely to normal, I actually felt brilliant for the first ten minutes, then felt increasingly sluggish as I went on (I think because I got hot). It was nothing precise, though my quads were aching a little as well as my knees, but I put it to one side and just kept going. Runkeeper did an admirable job of keeping me posted at every 5 minute mark and every half mile mark, and other than that there was nothing too remarkable to report...it just kind of happened! I kept the pace slow and when it told me I was at the 2.5 mile mark I did let out a kind of half-muted "come on, I can do this" grrr (hope I didn't scare any dog walkers ). And then when the 3 mile mark was announced, the music shuffled to Beyonce doing "Who run da world? Girls. GIRLS! Who run da world? Girls. GIRLS! Who run dis run dis?" etc. Motivational! I couldn't quite manage a sprint finish, but I imagine that with the atmosphere on Sunday I may well manage to do so then...

So...

How long: A few seconds under 45 minutes (45 MINUTES! WITHOUT WALKING!! )
How far: 3.23 miles (I couldn't get it to alert me at exactly 3.1 so I just ran back to the car after the 3 mile announcement, hoping it would cover the necessary 0.1)

Andy clearly isn't really following the programme as he did loads of running and hardly any walking - he says the app keeps glitching and by the time he's realised it hasn't told him to stop running/start walking, he might as well carry on running. I warned him to be careful not to push too hard, but he's happy with how he's doing and is so motivated right now that I haven't the heart to sound too negative. Altogether running + walking he also did 45 minutes and covered slightly more distance than I did. So there's a possibility we might be able to finish together on Sunday after all!

PS We got home and were both aching a bit, despite stretching post-run. I suspect that it might be a good idea to book a massage for next Monday some time!

to you all again for your encouragement

[disney_duke]

Sounds like you are READY! What a successful run today. 30 minutes, no walking? Zoinks. Maybe I should try this some day..... you know what? Now you've inspired me to run my entire 5K I have next month. That's right - I'm not gonna take any walking breaks. You did awesome! And congrats to Andy as well. Even if he's not following the program completely, at least he's out there doing something. Well done, both of you!

Oh, and happy belated birthday!!!

[Tinkerboo]

Originally Posted by disney_duke

Sounds like you are READY! What a successful run today. 30 minutes, no walking? Zoinks. Maybe I should try this some day..... you know what? Now you've inspired me to run my entire 5K I have next month. That's right - I'm not gonna take any walking breaks. You did awesome! And congrats to Andy as well. Even if he's not following the program completely, at least he's out there doing something. Well done, both of you!

Oh, and happy belated birthday!!!

Thanks very much (for all of that!)...45 minutes though, not 30, 45!! (I'm not going to be able to stop telling people )

[Fortissimo]

Awesome job!!! You are going have a great race!

[Big Baloo]

Sounds like you have given yourself a really nice belated birthday present! Good for you, go get 'em this weekend!

[Angela531]

45 minute!!! That is great!

Happy belated birthday as well!

[DISNEYGOOF]

45 minutes is very impressive. Good Luck with the 5K, have fun!

[OhToodles!]

That's great! So proud of you and I think of you when I had to run 5 minutes at a time today - helped me through it. You're going to be great on Sunday!!

[disney_duke]

45!!!!!!

[Tinkerboo]

RunFest Wales
Sunday 29th June, 9.30am
Rhyl promenade

(Apologies for the largeness of some of the photos - despite me editing them in Photobucket multiple times it refuses to use the saved version for some stupid reason. I'll try and sort it out, but wanted to tell you about our day asap!)

My parents picked us up at 8.15, under the impression we were starting at 9, despite me having said many times that it was 9.30 . However it turned out to our advantage as Andy’s race bib had not arrived in the mail in time, so he had to pick it up from Race HQ (aka a cafe) and there was a huge queue. Once we were all safety-pinned up we milled about and waited for them to tell us to line up.




The marathoners and halfers had gone off at 9 and were already passing back through the start area, having done the loop that was our entire 5k race! At about 9.25 the speaker system finally said us 5kers and 10kers could line up, so I relinquished my hoodie to my mum (it was freezing!) and we found our way to the back...and I mean literally. I had expected more people to be honest – I couldn’t estimate, but Andy’s number was 96 and I don’t recall seeing anything higher. I imagine there might have been more 10kers than that so altogether we maybe numbered 250? But it didn’t look like that many. Either way, it was only a couple of minutes after the start gun fired that the throng had moved forward and we were crossing the start line.




Being coastal, there was the compulsory offshore wind which – as you will know – I am quite used to by now! It was sunny and blue skies but there were some epic big puffy clouds looming. I’d said that I’d have liked rain, but now I was there I think I’d changed my mind. Although the website had promised ‘we are organising entertainment along the routes to keep you motivated along the way’, this turned out to be a big fat lie. There was a live band at the start/finish area but they only played one full song (Johnny Be Good – a favourite of mine) as we were waiting to start and we never heard them again. My parents told us after that every time they had tried to start playing, the person on the speaker system had told them to stop so they could announce something. Very weird. And there was absolutely nothing along the rest of our route whatsoever. Disappointing. I was so glad I’d ignored the warning that “Please note that it is NWRAC policy that headphones must not be worn during a race, RunWales do not encourage participants to wear them whilst taking part.” and taken mine anyway (so I could hear the pacing from MapMyRun). As soon as it became apparent they were providing zero entertainment, I fired up the 45 minute ‘5k’ playlist I made last night – phew!

So I set off at my usual pace and the first five minute marker saw me cover my usual distance (0.4 miles) – hurrah for not going off too fast! Andy and I had decided to do our own thing, so he pulled away pretty much from the start, while I was kind of shadowing a group of ladies whose shirts announced they were ‘Chorlton Runners’, Chorlton being a town in the north of England. Which reminds me that there were people wearing vests and T shirts with all sorts of different place names on – I was surprised that so many would travel so far for our little old event. But I’m glad they did as it might have felt lonely if it was down to just locals! I tagged along with them for about 1.5k until they split up – some of the ladies were more...Pooh-sized...and had started to struggle so the guy who was with them dropped back with them and I carried on behind the two smaller ladies who were running ever so slightly faster than my own pace. I actually overtook a couple of people who I think may have been doing the run-walk-run method. We went all the way along the promenade, sea waves crashing to our right, then over a bridge, round a corner, over another (newly built) foot bridge and back the way we came, sea to our left. There had been a marker at 1k but none at 2k and I was beginning to despair that I STILL hadn’t got to 2k and why on earth was it taking so long, but then I saw the 3k board. Why not put a 2 board up as well?? By this point I was struggling with a stitch – I tried to breathe it away, tried exhaling on the opposite foot, but it lingered and I had to give in and walk for about two minutes. When I got to the 2 miles board (put up for the purposes of the marathon/HM people I assume) I started running again but it was hard going. Us back-of-the-fielders had spread out so much that I was essentially on my own. I could see people ahead but I think that had more people been around me, I might have kicked my own butt and started running again sooner. This is at about the 4k mark:




The route takes you back through the start/finish zone, then we 5k people continue on a little way to a turning point and come back into it again. Ugh – that last bit to the turning point got to me and again I had to walk. But I could SEE the point, and then I saw Andy coming towards me on his way back...”don’t wait for me!” I cried dramatically, as we had wanted to cross the line together but his time would have been wrecked if he’d waited for me. I ran on to the turning point and the marshal there helpfully told me that I had the wind with me now (like he knew me or something!) and it did seem a little easier, especially knowing how far it was back to the finish (i.e. not as far as it had looked from there to the turning point!). So I put in all the effort I could find and when I got to the last couple of hundred metres I really went for it with long strong strides to cross the line.




The official chip time is 40.46 (MapMyRun claims it was 41.44, though it also thinks I did an extra 0.09 miles somewhere?). So despite the walking, it was technically a PB! I came 133rd out of 141 - hurrah for not being last!! These are my stats – you can see the two walk breaks at about 25 and 36 minutes...





And here I am with my bling!




And here is Andy – you will never believe it, but he ran THE WHOLE THING and did it in 38 MINUTES!! I am soooo super-proud (and a little jealous) of him!




This is the medal:



And this is the back of it:



Would you believe it, it was the very last ‘5k’ one...so poor Andy didn’t get one. And they’d run out of all the 5k T shirts except for Small (luckily what I wanted) so he didn’t get one of those either. They took his details though, and will be sending them in the mail...but he was a bit gutted that we couldn’t pose together in our medals. This is the T shirt:



A friend of mine from work was doing the HM and expected to come in around 10.40, so we hung around to see him cross the line. After what seemed like ages, I spotted him – looking very red – and we cheered him in. He got a PB of 1 hour 39 so was dead pleased. Having done that, mum and dad ran us home so we could shower, but before we did we took a couple more posey photos:







Then when we were clean again, Andy and I went out for lunch – I had a birthday voucher for a free meal at a place we like, plus another for £5 off so it seemed like a good time to use them! No pictures of the main meal (we were too hungry), but this was my strawberry sundae dessert:



It was lovely. Then we came home because the poor dog had been home alone during the race, got excited when we got back, only to be left alone again because he can’t come to the restaurant. He was so full of beans this afternoon as a result!! We totally needed to nap but it didn’t really pan out as Andy had to work this evening and the only way to de-energise the dog is to walk him, so I had to do that. I think it might have helped ease the achiness of my knees though, so I can’t complain.

And that, dear PassPorters, was our day. I still can’t believe that Andy is so natural a runner that even without graduating C25K, or even doing any of the long non-interval sessions within it, he can run a 5k in less than 40 minutes. So. Proud. And he had somehow left a ‘Congratulations’ card on the fireplace for when we got back –from himself and the dog, saying how proud they are of me. It’s just one big pridefest here right now! I am totally taking my medal to work tomorrow, and am dithering over whether I can get away with wearing the T shirt...

[DISNEYGOOF]

WTG Toyah and Andy! I really enjoyed reading your training and race day posts. Let us know if you start training for another.

[disney_duke]

Oh, Toyah, I'm so happy for you!! And Andy too!! You both did AWESOME!!!!!
I still remember my first 5K and what an accomplishment it was. Enjoy that feeling, it is an amazing one.
And I'm totally jealous of your medal. I've run enough 5K's locally around Milwaukee and all I get is beer at the finish line. I'd love a medal for a 5K! What a bummer that Andy didn't get one right away though.
Your dessert was well deserved. Congratulations Toyah, what a great day!!

What race is next?