Loads of stuff to babble about.
Here’s an interesting read: How Oprah ruined the marathon. It made me think – perhaps too much. I was even tempted to allow it to depress me slightly, but I read some of the responses, and was once again cheered.
My week followed a faintly similar pattern. After the boost of last Saturday’s run, and a hearty hour in the gym the next day, I was once again drawn, moth-like, to the flaming pub on Monday night, and to the well-concealed thrills of Wigan v Everton. Later, at home, I sought contemplative solace in the cheeseboard and wine rack.
Fun while it was lasted, but it was always going to be For One Night Only. And it was. It’s the fall-out that lingers, and gets in the way. So Monday and Tuesday were blank-calendar days as far as running goes. This time, I chose not to batter myself in public, but to lie low for a day or two, and quietly re-sync by mid-week. I was back out there on Wednesday for 3½ workmanlike miles, repeated on Friday. Sandwiched between them, another sweaty hour in the gym.
And yesterday? Yesterday was a repeat of my hilly run of last Saturday, but with knobs on. The aim was 9 or 9½ miles, but I ended up banking a startling 11.02 miles. The distance was gratifying, but the experience wasn’t quite as uplifting as last weekend’s outing. There was no wintry sunshine to gild the puddles along the canal towpath, and spread a little extra warmth through the running universe.
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Again, I left my music at home. Various reasons:
Safety. Only the first and the last mile of this route is on roads with a pavement. There’s a long central stretch that is narrow, twisting lanes. To run without being able to hear the occasional cars, and without total concentration, would literally be suicide.
Declutter. For long weekend runs, I have to take extra stuff on board to ward off the runner’s demons. A water-belt with large bottle of sweet fluid; and something carbohydraulic to nibble on. This week, for the first time in more than a year, I wore my heart-rate monitor chest strap. And then there’s all the usual stuff: GPS watch, phone and keys and ‘just in case’ money. It’s enough to organise all this stuff, without adding superfluous body clutter. I find the more complex the preparations are for a run, and the longer it takes me to get sorted, the greater the sense of techno-claustrophobia, and the less likely the run will work. Leading on from that is…
Purity. Running is supposed to be simple and natural. It’s one of the things that draws us to it. Apart from the logistical inconvenience of arranging it all, excessive running luggage destroys the innocence at the heart of this activity.
Race practice. One of the purposes of a long run is to prepare for long races. As we all know… wearing an iPod in a race is a catastrophic blow against good running etiquette, and shrivels the runner into nothing but a pre-programmed, glassy-eyed robot with painfully sharp elbows and a bad attitude. So if a long run is a rehearsal, why should I wear one? (I probably won’t always stick to this, but I need to be accustomed to it.)
Er, that’s it…
Here are some often-seen training slogans that I will nod in agreement at, but never actually follow:
- Less is more
- Quality not quantity
- Make each session count
- Run smarter, not harder
… You know the sort of thing.
It’s time to give them a go. I’ve been reading a lot recently about FIRST, the programme created by the Furman Institute– a college in South Carolina that I suspect no one had ever heard of until they publicised the results of their running research. The pivotal notion is that a marathon training plan need consist of only three runs a week, rather than the usual 4 or 5. Not only that, but the claim is that times are likely to be improved, because there’s less danger of injury and overtaining, and greater motivation from fewer, better quality runs. The three days are topped up with another two (sometimes three) of cross-training. Another vital ingredient is to increase the intensity of the sessions: one interval, one tempo, and one long run that’s faster than usual.
I’m going to try it out. It’s been on the radar for weeks, but I needed proof that I’d be able to do it justice. I think I can. After nine weeks of preliminary, or base, training, I’ve decided I’m definitely up for the Boston Marathon in April, and that I’m definitely up for having a proper crack at improving. I’ll avoid the traditional RunningCommentary bluster that’s dumped so much egg on my face in recent years. This time feels different. A variety of reasons contribute to this feeling, but the main practical one is that I’ve managed to maintain my interest in the gym. I’ve not just managed to keep going, but I’ve started to look forward to it. This morning, less than 24 hours after my 11 miles, I couldn’t wait to get round to the gym for my usual 50 or 60 minutes of sweaty cardio-vascular. It was my 24th visit in 9 weeks: an average of more than 2½ sessions per week. The extra training effect is a boost to motivation and momentum. I feel fitter and more enthusiastic. It’s become a routine that will fit in nicely with the Furman FIRST plan, that calls for regular cross training to separate the three runs.
Oh god, I’ve become a training bore. That’s all I’ll say about this for the moment.
Other big news of the week (for me) is that I’ve finally been able to move on to volume 4 of A Dance to the Music of Time. My attempt to read the 12-volume cycle of novels by Anthony Powell is just as much a saga as the work itself. I read volume 1 in Sicily last year, and number 2 a few months later. It’s the third volume that’s been problematical. I started reading it in Estonia about 3 months ago, but managed to lose it somewhere. I didn’t want to have to buy it again, so I’ve spent the last 3 months popping into London bookshops on a Saturday afternoon, and reading as many pages as I could before I had to get off to the match. It was a slow process. Last week, we were in Bournemouth for a few days. We went to see M’s faves, the Mighty Boosh, and decided to hang on for a couple of days. This gave me the perfect opportunity. While M shopped, I spent two complete afternoons in Borders, drinking decent coffee and polishing off part 3 of the cycle. So this week, it’s on to the 4th volume. Books 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 and 9 are said to be the best, so I’m thoroughly excited. The first hundred pages have lived up their exalted billing.
Another news item: Garmin have come up trumps. I’ve been critical of these fellows more than once, but this week they redeemed themselves. I’d had an intermittent power problem with my Forerunner 305 for some weeks. Rather like its owner, it would flare into life, then switch off again during a run. Expecting to hear a chorus of cackling geeks demanding a 3-figure sum to repair it, I put off phoning Garmin until Monday of this week, by which time the thought of another disrupted run had finally become worse than the thought of those cackling geeks.
Much to my surprise, what I found was a helpful, friendly guy who reassured me that despite the watch being several centuries old, they would be happy to replace it free of charge as it was “probably part of a faulty batch”. Fearful that he might change his mind, I croaked my gratitude and ran to the post office at a pace that would have got me to Beijing this year. Just 4 days later, a brand new Forerunner 305 arrives by registered post. Thank you, Garmin.
And thank you, Oprah.
