Into November, and feeling even more optimistic about the running winter ahead.
I was going to post this entry on Tuesday evening, and had started with these paragraphs:
Speed of progress has been frustratingly slow, but I’m staying rational. If advancement was instant and easy, without constant self-doubt, it wouldn’t amount to the prize it remains, and I’d still be snuggled up on the sofa.
Since the last entry, and the renewed assault on the lard mountain, a couple more pounds seem to have detached themselves, and the tally now stands at 17½ pounds less than it was 7 weeks ago. This is good enough. It’s easy to lose weight at a faster rate than this, but only in stupid ways. You wonder about the sanity of stomach staplers and those who offer themselves up to the mercy of the LighterLife diet, which seems to involve some sort of brain stapling instead.
I read about the LighterLife diet in the Daily Mail, which is available free of charge at the gym. It’s an appalling rag, but strangely fascinating as it offers an insight into the mysterious thinking of ‘Middle England’. What an intellectual hellhole this turns out to be. Typically, I sit on the static bike for 10-20 minutes at the end of a gym session, leafing through its pages, tutting and wincing. Interestingly, as the exasperation thermostat rises, so apparently does the pedalling cadence. Hmmm. Well done FitnessFirst: perhaps there is method in the Mail madness.
Yesterday I received my first pair of compression socks, from Skins. The name, Powersox, isn’t endearing, but they appealed because they loop under your foot, rather than have a full socky footy bit, to use the presumed jargon of the athletic hosiery industry. Last night I ran in them, with limited success. They kept working their way down my calfs, so perhaps they are the wrong size. Or it could be operator error. Anyway, I think I may use them post-run rather than mid-run, so am not too concerned.
The full moon occasionally slid out from behind the clouds, but for most of the time, I ran my 3.5 miles in the near-pitch black. It was liberating, and almost enjoyable. Saturday’s double 5K has done me good. I felt a bit stronger and more confident than last week. No danger of a walk break. As often happens on dark runs, when I can’t see my watch, I fancied I must be haring along at record speed. But as usual, I arrived home to the realisation that it was only a touch faster than last time out. But I was happy with this. Just getting out there was good enough, but even more cheering was the first evidence of ‘the bounce’ which I’ve written about before. Perhaps it’s just a me-thing. It’s probably what proper runners feel all the time: the sense that they are bounding along with a near-effortless energy. It’s a rare sensation for me, but I have occasionally felt it, when my weight has dropped and I’m feeling strong. It wasn’t really there last night, but its shadow was. Just the remotest hint: a tantalising glimpse of stocking as it vanished behind the curtains.
Today was a beautiful late autumn day — sunny but cool. If ever a day was made for running, this was it. Sadly, I had already decided to resist all such temptation. Three runs in four days (and that’s counting Saturday’s two outings as just one) would have been more than I want to do at present. Last year’s calf injuries would be a double waste of time if they hadn’t forced me to rethink and change some habits, and come up with better methods. There’s no guarantee this will keep me injury-free. In fact, I’m almost assuming that the curse will strike at some point. I hope I’m wrong, but a bit of pessimism could be a good thing if it makes me more cautious than I was last winter.
So instead of a plunge into the sunshine, I locked my own cell door and slipped the key through the barred window. Meagre compensation came this evening, with a congested drive to the shopping precinct in the dark, where the gym awaited. I did my usual porridge: 20 minutes on the cross-trainer, 20 on the treadmill, and 20 on the static bike. It’s enough to get the heart pumping and the sweet sweat flowing, and maintains my target of an hour of aerobic activity a day.
Tomorrow brings a new and potentially embarrassing challenge. The marketing boys at FitnessFirst have come up with a clever ruse, if a bit late in the day: Strictly Fit, some sort of monster child from the union of the gym and the BBC’s Strictly Come Dancing. I will watch dancing if a mouldy tomato is aimed at my forehead, but even a loaded gun wouldn’t induce me to actually do it. M is an addict of the show, and loves to dance. She despairs at my dance stance, often opining that I should think of it as a fitness activity if nothing else. The argument has never washed in the past, but I’ve talked myself into giving this new gym thing a go, in the hope that it really is more about fitness than prancing.
First, I’m happy to report that ‘Strictly Fit’ has been postponed for a week.
Second, I’m even happier to report on yesterday lunchtime’s run. I wasn’t sure what to expect, so I set off along the canal with a wait-and-see approach.
It was another beautiful day, sunny and cool. The path was damp and slippery, reminding me that I really should invest in a decent pair of off-road shoes. I’ll need something better than road shoes for the Cliveden cross-country on December 28. It’s a race I’ve done before with my Asics Gel Guts, a cheap and cheerful workhorse of a shoe. Trouble is, they have no cushioning, and that’s one of those things I’ve grown wary of. Anyway, it’s an excuse to spend more cash on gear, and that makes me grumpily happy.
Apart from a solitary angler, I saw just one sign of human life in the 3 miles of towpath. About two miles in, I had to scrabble round a woman in her 20s, sitting on the damp path, staring at the field alongside the path. Was she OK? What was she peering at? Hard to say. I gave her a wave and a smile, and she smiled back, so I decided not to investigate further. My instincts were to ask if she was alright, but I didn’t want to end up in court accused of harrassment, so ploughed on.
Another mile on the mucky path, and it was time to veer off. I could have simply turned tail and claimed a 10K, but some invisible influence drew me up to, and over, the main road, towards the farm track that meanders back towards RC Towers. It’s the longer way round, and more interesting than a straight out-and-back.
This is a path I know well. Pre-Boston, I ran the 7.25 mile circuit several times. It was a midweek treat during a stressful work period, and good top-up mileage to test my calf. Part of the route takes me through a farmyard, between old barns and milking sheds, and an aroma reminiscent of decent mature claret. It was only recently, while looking at the local Ordnance Survey map, that I realised this isn’t a right of way. Looks like I’ve been trespassing all this time. One of these days, I fear I may hear the clunk of a shotgun being loaded as I race between these quaint outbuildings. Good for speed work.
Talking of trespassing, I recently had the rare treat of discovering a new path across the deer park that forms a part of my staple 3½ mile round-the-block run. Many times I’d passed the locked gate with its KEEP OUT sign, never thinking to investigate. But a couple of weeks ago, while out for a damp Sunday bike ride, I happened to stop by the gate, and thought it worth checking out. It wasn’t locked after all. Like a furtive schoolboy, eager to fill his scrumping pockets with illicit apples, I peered all around, and went through. The combined thrill of discovery and naughtiness never leaves you. Or hasn’t left me, anyway. The gate opens onto a cinder track across a part of the park I’d not explored before. I felt my heart beat slightly faster at the thought of an angry “Oy, you!” ringing out across the lake, followed by the rhythmic clump of size eleven Wellies. But the real treat comes half way along the track, when I get a new view of the great stately home on the hill. With the pheasant in the foreground, the deer in the middle, and Englefield in the distance, it’s about as English a sight as can be imagined.
So yesterday, instead of aiming myself towards home by the normal short route once I’d left the farm, I took a detour and once again, snuck in through the gate and across the park. My Blackberry couldn’t do the scene justice, so I have to fall back on Constable’s grandiose painting instead. The great artist must have been standing in an almost identical spot to me now when he painted the house. A strangely enthralling thought. With the rain now falling steadily, the experience lifted my spirits, and swept me home the final mile.
This was the run I’d been waiting 7 weeks for. 8.03 miles, no walk breaks, and an overall average pace ahead of my recent outings. It’s premature to shout that I’m finally out of that waiting room, but I’m standing in the doorway, sniffing the world beyond. Smells sweet.
