Blogging About Running

Being a big sports fan from an early age, I have always enjoyed athletics. I’ve always had an interest in the day-to-day training of elite athletes, especially runners, and that interest has grown even larger since taking up running regularly a couple of years ago. Being able to compare and relate one’s training to that of the best runners in the world is one of the most awesome things about the internet.

After watching the London Marathon last Sunday, I found myself looking up the various elite athletics near the front of the field. I was reading a couple of blogs (including Steve Way’s and Aly Dixon’s), and the thought struck me that, given that running is one of my main hobbies and I have been looking for something to write about for while, why not give “running blogging” a go myself? Obviously my experiences are a lot less interesting (and a lot more pathetic) than that of an elite athlete, but at the very least I think writing about running will help me understand myself better. And who knows, it might even be of interest to someone out there.

Initially, I’m going to try and post once a week about the previous week’s running. I’m not going to bother talking about the everyday, run-of-the-mill runs – since they are the same most weeks and not very interesting – I’ll try and stick to the “highlights”. I’ll probably do separate write-ups for any races I enter, and possibly write about any new gear I acquire (let’s be honest – the only reason I actually run is for the swag). So, here goes!

Total: 24.2 miles, 3 hours 22 minutes

The intervals session felt fairly good – we did 2 repetitions of 800, 600, 400 and 200 metres, with 2 minutes recovery. I completed all the laps in under 90 seconds, which is what I was hoping for. The 400s were around 82 seconds. Unfortunately, there was a torrential downpour just as we started the last 200 rep, which led to me running way too hard and not doing a proper warm down, in a desperate attempt to avoid getting soaked. I managed to get back to the car, but regretted the lack of warm down on Friday!

Making up for lost time. Photo credit Andy Robbins on Flikr

Parkrun on Saturday was a bit of a disaster. Due to some roadworks and heavy traffic, the journey to the south end of Salisbury took far longer than expected, and we missed the 9am start. I was thoroughly annoyed by this, and sprinted to the start line from the car park (not the smartest thing I’ve ever done) and proceeded to overtake the hundreds of people that I usually start in front of. Lots of weaving around and heaving legs from Thursday (I should probably start doing some recovery running on Fridays to counteract that) meant that I ended up with a pretty slow time.

That just about covers this week. Next week I’ll be running Parkrun again (as I do pretty much every week), and I’m planning on doing a longer endurence run. Should be fun! Check out my Strava profile for more details on my runs this week and previous weeks.