Monthly Recap - March

New Years Goals
Running/conditioning
Complete half marathon (current 4 miles) As of end of March longest run/jog still 8 miles but I've competed in my first race!
One mile in >7.30 (current 7.55) from 7.28 to 7.16 - New goal to get it under 7 minutes
Two miles in >15.30 minutes (current 16.23) 15.24 - new goal >15
Three miles in >24.30 minutes (current 25.25) 24.33 - so close!!
Four miles in >35 minutes (current 35.47) Not tested

Strength

Hold a plank for 3.30 minutes (current 2.30) 2.47

3 pull-ups in a row (current 0) Not tested as not been working on pull ups this month, must remember them next month!
5 chin-ups in a row (current 1) As of end of January 4 but from 90 degree not dead hang, from dead hang can do 1.
30 push-ups in a row (current 10) Can now do 30! - new goal, 50!

Boxing
Improve hooks and uppercuts – practice in sparring
Improve stance so weight is spread more evenly
Angle off – don't stand square
Win my first fight!
The boxing goals have not been going too well since the upset at the gym and consequent lack of gym.. I'm hoping to get to a new gym soon but Mike's not too keen so we're keeping it up at home together. I miss the gym, it's not the same at home but it's something we started together and do together so I won't go to a new gym without him, hopefully he will want to start again soon!

New Years Resolutions
Do core workouts twice a week Done at least one a week some weeks have not managed two.
Neck exercises once a week Done except for one week.
Wrist curls once a week Done except for one week.
Isometric punches once a week Done except for one week.
Boxing three times a week See above!
Running three times a week (distance, sprints and intervals) Getting there!
Follow pull-up/chin-up plan Done the chin-ups, pull-ups need work

Monthly Totals - March
Miles -56.05
Push-ups - 325 (25 weighted)
Chin-ups -16 (25 on assisted machine) (5 weighted)
Pull-ups - 8 (45 on assisted machine) (14 bar hangs)
Neck exercises - 5
Isometric punches - 2
Wrist curls - 4
Core work - 6

I haven't included my new plank time from yesterday since technically that's an April acheivement since I'm a bit late posting this! My strength work needs the most work, I've really slipped on my push-ups and chin-ups.

3.33 Plank Hold

I was going to run intervals today, I like running intervals at the beginning of the week but my legs just didn't feel powerful enough so I decided to swap them with my 'long' run. My prescribed pace for the 6 miles was 8.58, I was ok for 5 miles but I dropped right off in the last mile.. I really need to better my aerobic endurance. I've decided I'm going to switch up the long runs and try and run a bit longer but slower and try and be a bit more consistent with my pacing over them. I'm intending on trying to start slow finish strong in my next one. I'm starting to get really worried about my pacing for the half and also about reaching my time goals. The more I run the more ridiculous the goal I set myself seems..

Today I ran 6 miles in 53.57. I beat my old 4 mile and 5 mile records along the way and ran 2 seconds faster than my 6 mile time.. this is one good thing about being a new runner, I'm still improving my times a lot! My average heartrate was 181 though, I really wish I could get that down, my legs still feel strong when my lungs and heart let me down. Anyway here are the splits.

Mile 1 - 8.58 HR 168
Mile 2 - 8.51 HR 181
Mile 3 - 8.52 HR 182
Mile 4 - 8.51 HR 184
Mile 5 - 9.00 HR 186
Mile 6 - 9.28 HR 185

Gahhh that last mile was so frustrating. I really wanted to quit, my finger was poised above the pause button more than once. But finishing slow is better than quitting so I'll take it! My new 5 and 4 mile times save this run a little bit!

5 miles in 44.32
4 miles in 35.32

I just hope I can sort my endurance and pacing problems out. I'll be so upset if I mess up my pace and burn out early on in the half marathon.

Before tea Mike and I decided to test our max push-ups, pull-ups and plank. My push-ups were 27, 3 less than my max of 30 which is suggesting I ought to be doing them more often, and I think my weekly totals would agree with that statement. I still can't do a full pull-up from dead hang so they were a bit of a non-starter too, but from dead hang I can get higher up, I was close but just didn't quite have the strength needed. My plank, however, as you might have guessed from the title was pretty damn good! I lasted 3.33 what a fun number haha. I don't know how I stayed up so long, I remember looking at the timer at 1.44 thinking I can never hold this another minute but I put it out of the way and tried not to think about it. I was thinking about Mike doing a 5+ minute plank (he is strong!!) and I thought if he can do more than 5 minutes I can do 3! I was shaking so much when I dropped.

Oh yeah.. and then like a complete crazy lady I did a core workout with Mike, straight after the mega plank... I'm gonna be sore tomorrow!! We did 20 minutes of core and called it a night. I'd meant to do all these tests before the end of March so I could put them on my monthly recap.. which is still to come, but they'll start April off nicely at least!

Weekly Totals

Weekly Totals
Miles - 17.4
Push-ups - 25 (weighted)
Chin-ups - 5 (weighted)
Pull-ups - 0
Neck Exercises - 1
Isometric Punches - 0
Wrist Curls - 1
Core -1

Fairly embarrassing totals this week, I've dropped off a bit on some of the stuff since we haven't been at the gym but I need to not let the lack of gym and lack of imminent fight mean my training drops!

I took an extra rest day on Sunday. My legs were so sore after Fridays race and I was hungover. Three drinks at a family party and I'm in bed all day. Must stick to two in future.. It must be my lightweight limit! By the way, I figured out how to look at the elevation on Mike's garmin readout, I've included a picture of the hilliest route we had done before Fridays race. There's quite a stark difference!

The hilliest route we had done before the race

The race elevation.

Mike accidentally hit pause a few times cause he was wearing the garmin on the inside of his wrist so he knocked it, but you can still get the idea. The highest hill we had run before was about 150 feet, these hills were all around 300-400 feet! I need to get to this area to train again a few times before the race next year, and I will run it again next year, even though my legs still hurt now!

I Did It!!

Oh my gosh I didn't realise just how hilly the hill race was going to be...haha maybe that's naive but I don't think there was any flat land! I expected it to include hills but not to be all hills.. I was wrong! It was all on trails as well which I'm not too used to but I enjoyed, there were some lovely views and I loved the race atmosphere the speedy runners at the front crossed by us at one point and were cheering the slower ones on and I got to see Mike briefly so it was nice for us both to know we were both doing ok.

I can't even begin to describe how tough and steep the hills were though, I ended up having to walk up a lot of them. I felt like such a fish out of water at the start, although my bib number says 383 the numbers must have carried on from a previous race, there were 54 runners and Mike and I were the only runners not affiliated to a club! I was ahead of a few runners for most of the race but they passed me right near the end so unfortunately I came last. The competitive side of me hates that, but I didn't drop out, and a few people did, I'm happy I finished it and I was only 30 seconds behind the women who passed me, I just couldn't quite keep up at the end. I was chatting to them at the beginning of the race and one of them had been running for 10 years and run in national cross country championships so that made me feel better about coming last, there was really tough competition on a tough course. Everyone who we spoke to at the start about it being our first race looked at us like we were insane! They were all saying, you do realise how hilly it is don't you... It was probably good that we didn't realise just how hilly it was until we were doing it else we might well have chickened out!

Anyway I'm going to have to leave you with that very brief race report as Mike's little sister is on her way from down south and we don't get to see her very often so I'll be off the computer for a while. I will leave you with a few pictures! I think my final time for the run was 7.3 miles in 1.20 the official results aren't up yet.. please don't judge the time it was soo hilly!

Ready to go

Outside the registration area.

That's me in the distance.

Almost there...

It's over!! Phew!

Have I Gone Mad?!

I might have done something crazy....

Mike and I were just looking for local races as neither of us have ever raced before and we'd like some race experience before our half marathon.. I spotted a race for tomorrow... The Good Friday Hill Race!! 7.3 miles of hilly fun! Here's the route. Look at those scary contour lines! I vaguely know the area as somewhere we used to go sledging as children for the steep hills haha, I don't think this is going to be easy but I'm really excited! It's a really low key race, only £2 to enter, I think it's only going to be the really speedy dedicated local runners running it so I think I'm probably going to be the slowest runner but I'm just going to finish it, I'm not going to worry about timings. I won't be able to wear the garmin anyway so I'm just going to run and keep running.

Aaargh! Wish me luck!

It's Not Supposed To Be Easy!

I did my tempo run today, good news, no soreness from the deadlift... guess that means I should add more weight next time ;-)

Tempo run 4.1 miles in 36.38, average pace 8.58, average heart rate179.

Mile 1 (warm up) 9.41 HR 167
The warm up mile was no fun! It started raining seconds after I left my house and a minute in to the run it started hailing!! Erm where did spring go? A few minutes in and I contemplated going back home to pick up my gloves and hat cause it was cold and those nasty hail stones were stinging my face. Decided this would mess up my planned route so it was easier to stick at it and brave the cold! I ended up running the warm up a bit faster than I intended cause at this point I wanted to get home ASAP!

Mile 2 (tempo @ 8.28) 8.24 HR 183
The first tempo mile I started far too fast, I looked down at the garmin a few minutes in and realised I was running a 7.30 pace. I slowed right down cause I knew I was not keeping that up for two miles. It got tough quickly even with my slowed pace and I just kept repeating to myself, it's not supposed to be easy, it will be worth it in the long run, push through it!

Mile 3 (tempo @ 8.28) 8.28 HR 186
After the first mile it got really tough! I hit a bit of a wall and could not make my legs go faster than an 8.40 pace. This went on for the first few minutes so I tried slowing a little to hopefully get a new burst of energy from somewhere... It worked.. I slowly sped up back to an 8.30 then and 8.24 then finished exactly on my prescribed pace of 8.28. This mile was horrible! I kept thinking you're no runner, it's never going to work, but then I kept saying quit whining it's not supposed to be easy - hence the title! And I just kept repeating that. Once I was back at the right pace I thought come on, only .25 of a mile left you can keep this up for that long, pull yourself together! I was so glad when the mile ended!

Mile 4 (cool down) 9.25 HR 182 (+.1 to get home)
It was soo tempting to stop the watch and let my HR slow a little before I started the cool down but I decided that felt like cheating so I just started off reeeeally slowly, caught my breath a bit and then picked it up to a comfortable pace. Boy was I glad to see my front door! This tempo was tough!

I made Apple and Raspberry Crumble tonight, the recipe isn't as indulgent as conventional versions as I lowered the fat content by quite a lot, I'm going to experiment with it a bit maybe adding part margerine part applesauce to get a better topping but it's pretty good for a healthy version so I thought I'd share the recipe. It tastes better with custard!

Crumble Base
5 Apples chopped into 2cm dice
1 Tbs xylitol or sugar
1/4 cup water
1/2 Tbs cornflour mixed with 1 Tbs cold water
Sprinkle of cinnamon and nutmeg
1 cup of frozen raspberries

Crumble Topping
2/3 cup oats
1 and 1/3 cup wholemeal flour
3/4 cup xylitol or sugar
1/4 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 cup margerine

Directions
Preheat oven to 180c
Cut apples and cook with xylitol, water and spices.

Once the apple has softened add the cornflour and water mixture gradually until the appley liquid is thickened, add raspberries and stir in.

Mix all the dry crumble ingredients then add in the melted margerine, mix with fingers, top apple and raspberry mixture

My kitchen after baking!! eeek! Look at Tia trying to climb up the drawers, I think she likes crumble!

Bake the crumble in the oven for 30 minutes, enjoy with custard.... maybe let your cat try a little custard too... this kitty is spoilt!

Bondi band giveaway here.

Strength Training and Deadlift

I wasn't planning on a strength workout today but after reading this on Ross Enamait's blog with my morning cuppa I decided I really wanted to do one! It's a great story about a 70 year old grandmother who can bench press 188 pounds/85.2 kg and deadlift 288 pounds/130.6kg. I decided to try the deadlift for the first time, I went on the side of caution and lifted light 'cause it's easy to injure yourself deadlifting and I have a tempo run planned for tomorrow which I don't want to be too sore for.

I left out the weighted lungess but did the rest of my strength workout as usual, I've been seeing good results doing this strength routine once a week, proof that you don't have to do masses of sets or lift really frequently to see improvements. I'm going to post the weights I used the first time I did this workout and the weights I used now to show the comparison. It would not be ideal if I were just training for strength but I have to fit it in around boxing and running and make all the types of training I want to do work together, I wouldn't have the time to strength train three times a week and I'm guessing I'm not the only one out there who cannot strength train that frequently so I just want to show people that it's possible to see improvements without huge amounts of time dedicated to strength work.

My first deadlift.

Todays workout 30/03/10
Barbell Deadlift 30kg 2 x 6
Dumbell Clean and Press 10kg 1 x 5, 1 x 4 (last time I could only do 1 x 2 and 1 x 1 with 10kg yay!)

Dumbell Bent Over Row 15kg 2 x 8
Dumbell Bench Press 10kg 2 x 5
Dumbell Curl 7.5kg 1 x 2 then 7kg 2 x 6 (amazing what difference .5kg can make!)
Barbell Wrist Curls 22kg 40 reps (I wondered why I couldn't get to 50 then I realised I'd misread my own handwriting and add 2kg by mistake...didn't feel so bad when I realised that)
Barbell Reverse Wrist Curls 11kg 40 reps
Neck Curls 10kg 40 reps

03/01/10
DB clean and press (2x8) 7.5kg +2.5kg
DB bent over row (1x8, 1x6) 12.5kg +2.5kg
DB bench press (1x6, 1x8) 6kg +4 kg
DB lunges (2x12) 22kg +3kg
DB curls (1x6) 6kg, (1x8) 5kg +2-2.5kg
BB wrist curls (1x10) 20kg, (1x40) 17.5kg +4.5kg
BB reverse wrist curls (1x50) 10kg +1kg

So I've made improvements in every area doing it at best once a week sometimes I don't do a strength workout, I usually don't do one in backoff weeks, for example.

I can't wait to go running tomorrow, even though the weather forecast is awful, spring seems to have disappeared again, come back spring! I really wanted to go running today but I thought it was probably best to give my legs a day off since I'm supposed to be doing the runs on alternate days. Tomorrow I have a tempo run planned, 1 mile easy, 2 miles short tempo and 1 mile easy. Hope I don't regret trying the deadlift out!

Happy Intervals!

I ran intervals today and I'm so glad they went well, my last horrible run knocked my confidence a bit so I needed a strong run to get back in the swing of things! My heart rate managed to stay really low throughout the intervals, my highest average for an interval was 160 which I was really surprised about! I expected it to be a lot higher for intervals but I felt strong today and that seems to be reflected in the lower heart rate. My planned workout today was 10-20 minute warm up then 8 x 400m intervals at 1.52 with 8 x 400m recovery in between ending with a 10 minute cool down, (I didn't time the recovery intervals just did a slow jog round the track) I did;

1 mile warm up in 10.25 (average HR 120)

Repeats
1: 1.51 HR 117
2: 1.50 HR 135
3: 1.50 HR 132
4: 1.52 HR 130
5: 1.53 HR 153
6: 1.47 HR 138
7: 1.46 HR 144
8: 1.38 HR 160

1.1 mile cool down in 12.39 (average HR 117)

Total: 6.1 miles

I was really craving something sweet after my lunch today, a cheese and cucumber sandwhich just didn't cut it after the run! On a side note I think Mike's friend might have thought I was a little odd when I disappeared upstairs with my lunch and a bag of frozen green beans to ice my knees! I've decided to make a more concentrated effort to ice my legs since I do seem a bit injury prone and I don't want to take any more time off this half marathon training! Anyway back on to the sweets! I remembered I had a Trek protein flapjack left from my goody pack, I also had a not too great chocolate yoghurt in the fridge which I thought the flapjack could make taste a bit more interesting. They went really well together and definately hit the spot, I wasn't hungry again for ages! That's really unlike me after running, normally I could eat anything and everything after I've run longer than a few miles.

Nutritional info and ingredients

Crumbled into the yoghurt

Yoghurt mess
I liked this trek flapjack almost as much as the cherry flavour, I think the ingredients were the same except for the cherry raisins. I will get it again it was really nice and filling.

Curry, Tia and weighted exercises

I had to share this picture of Tia our kitty! She will eat anything, she always comes begging when we're cooking or eating, today she decided she liked the toffee yoghurt I was eating and she got it everywhere in her whiskers, eyelashes and on her nose! That's her licking it off Mike's finger after he scraped the tub out for her... she did try and fit her head in but it was a bit big!I didn't get much work done today, my parents were over an hour late coming round so my schedule got all messed up! I should have known really my mum is never on time! Anyway I got a small workout in.

I did some weighted chin-ups, push-ups and ab roll outs, it was the first time I'd done any of these exercises with a weight and it was surprisingly hard! I used a 2.5kg plate in a rucksack and it really made things a lot harder! I enjoyed the added weight for a change though.

1 chin-up
5 push-ups
5 ab roll outs

x 5 rounds

We had a lazy curry night last night, we bought a load of bits from Waitrose, we ate half the breads and half the snacks and most of the curry dishes. It was a lot of food for the money we spent but I have to say takeaway is my favourite still! But this saved some money and was probably marginally healthier.

Breads

I thought this was interesting on the packet!

Our little spread, I could barely snap a picture before Mike dug in!

Masala dal

Bombay potatoes

Pakora, bhaji and samosa
My plate + more bread!
Hope everyone's had a good weekend, how did Monday come around so quick!?

Weekly totals and first barbeque of the year!

I'll get the boring weekly totals out of the way first!

Weekly Totals
Miles - 7.25
Push-ups - 92
Chin-ups - 5
Pull-ups - 14 bar hangs
Neck Exercises - 0
Isometric Punches - 0
Wrist Curls - 0
Core -1

My gran baked apple crumble yesterday while Mike and I were at my mum and dad's for lunch, she brought it round still hot so of course we dug in and had desert first oh yeah!

I had to take some pictures of the garden, there are lots of pretty spring flowers in my mum and dad's garden! Unfortunately I didn't get my mum's gardening ability passed down, plants die if I look at them! I'm still hoping to have a veg patch in the garden but Mike's going to be doing most of the plant care since every house plant I've had has died, I really don't know why I don't forget to water them and I keep them in the places they're supposed to be in.. oh well!

My dad and Mike love having barbeques as soon as there's even vaguely enough sun they're wanting to be in the garden cooking! We had the first one of the year yesterday. We started off by going to choose a new bbq for my mum and dad since their old one was a bit worse for wear. Mum and dad also got Mike and I our own instead of easter eggs since we now have a garden for the first time and will be able to do our own bbqs, exciting! I love having a garden, we're so much freer than we were living in flats when we wouldn't have our own space to enjoy the sunshine in. We've had breakfast in the garden for two days on the run now, it's so nice in the sun - even though we had a ten minute massive hail storm on Friday... where did that come from?!

Anyway I have some bbq pics! Must apologise for the bluriness of some of them, not sure what was going on there!

The salad and bread, bit too cold still to be all set up outside!

Sightly demolished salad station... note to self.. remember to take pictures before eating/plating (!)

Mike's giant bread and salad

The only pic of me... need to give Mike the camera more then there will be more chance of getting a good picture!

We made a smiley face on my dad's plate....

My bread and salad, there are lots of gherkins hiding under the cheese!
Dad on the new barbeque, it's a cool shape isn't it, ours is a more traditional shape

My burger, a mediteranean chickpea burger.

Not sure how it got so big..couldn't get my mouth round it!!
Mike's giant half pounder burger
Mega burger!
NommmSo there is my weekend in pictures, hope everyone's been having lots of fun too!