Friday 30 January 2009

Guess how long I will take to complete the Bath Half

OK, I reached the fundraising minimum a while ago, but now is time to
completely, proudly and undoubtedly blast it
.
And here's where you can help.
I'm going to follow one of the fundraising ideas suggested by
Shelter, my charity of choice for the Bath Half.

Here's what you have to do.
1/ go to www.justgiving.com/karencaille
2/ donate a minimum of £2 (or the equivalent in your local currency, my faraway friends! :)
3/ add in the comments the time you think I will take to complete the Bath Half Marathon, to the second - for example, 1 hour 39 minutes and 12 seconds. Make sure you don't suggest the same time as somebody else!

If you need clues, all you have to do is read through the blog and check out how long I took the last time I run the same distance...

I will bake an incredibly delicious cake for the person whose guess is closest to my time on the 15th March. If you live far away, fear not, I will bake something that can take a few hours of plane transit...

Good luck, and thank you for your support in making the lives of homeless people more comfortable.

Karen

PS - the image is courtesy of Cyril, who has talent, as you can see.

Day 117: logging the last few days

Well, life's been pretty hectic this week, what with a ton of time and energy spent developing Caille Consulting Ltd and also looking at job openings all around. So, I've logged fewer of my running efforts, and here are the latest events in my journey towards the Bath Half.

Two days ago - skipped the 45 min Fartlek. With Stephen still struggling with a moody ankle, I'm running solo, and this kind of more 'complex' training is a little out of the question. I guess I don't have it in my heart to find the motivation :) I did intend to have a run during the day, but got caught up in service definition activities for my business and therefore didn't stick to that. So, I decided that I should stick to the morning runs from now on, as I'm less likely to skip them...

Yesterday - 10 min jog, 10 run, 10 min jog. The first jog was sweet: there was a heron standing lonely and perfectly motionless, knee-deep in the Canal on my way to the park. No one else around. The run was good and fast. I didn't try the two laps of the Shadwell Basin, so couldn't compare distances with the last 10-min session I had, but I reckon I was rather swift.

Today - didn't do the scheduled interval training, but did treat myself to a gorgeous jog punctuated by two sprints. I was alone and had the North Bank of the river for myself all the way to Blackfriars Bridge. From that point I started to see a few more runners, but nowhere near as many as in the last few days (Friday laziness?), and I feasted my eyes on one of the most incredibly beautiful sunrises I have seen over Tower Bridge in a long while (and they are usually stunning). Canary Wharf towers bathed in a light mist, soft pink sky, swollen waters, a couple of lonely little boats patrolling on the Thames, and the contours of the dolphin-and-woman statue near the bridge darkening against the sky. Sweet!

I also received my number for the Ashford & District 10K race (I am number 195!), which is next week, and sent my exepected-time form to Shelter for the Bath Half. I'm excited!

Have a wonderful weekend y'all.

Tuesday 27 January 2009

Day 114: time beaten!!!

I am just back from a much-needed run in the sun, and took my Wapping-Canary Wharf route along the river, starting at the small park behind Shadwell Basin. And, I managed to beat my time! It took me 1 minute and 20 seconds less than last time :) So, I finished my 30 min run a little further... I must have been faster on the second half, because I still took 15 min to reach the Canary Wharf level - a time which I would really love to beat some day soon! But that's for another day. Off to a long, warm bath and a glass of chocolate milk now...

Friday 23 January 2009

Day 110: a good jog-run again.

Considering that last night I completely indulged in a three-course meal, together with my share of a good bottle of French red, a complimentary glass of bubbly, chocolate truffles and a glass of one of my favourite-ever wines (Pacherenc), I feel rather proud to have taken advantage of an oddly early awakening today, to jog-run for 30 min, all the way from Tower Bridge to London Bridge on the South Bank, and then across on the North side. The programme said I should run, but again I am going my own way on this these days, and jog-running is perfectly acceptable as far as I'm concerned!

Thursday 22 January 2009

Day 109: feels good to have a real run.

The training programme was starting to bore me a bit. We are at a phase of it where it's all speed work, and quite frankly, at this time of year and in this weather, getting up in the morning for a 5 min run (even if at full speed) feels a bit iffy.

Coach Stephen and I agreed: no more than one interval training session a week from now on. And with this mind, I finally got myself to get out of the house this afternoon to jog-run for one hour. I say jog-run, because I find that with practice, the distinction between the two becomes blurry, and I have sometimes a hard time knowing if I'm fast-jogging or slow-running, or even fast-jogging and running full stop. Anyway, a frank run feels gooooood :)

I think competition may be a strong motivator for me to go faster as well, judging by how I made a point of running faster than the other woman who trained for a few minutes on the other side of the road...

It also helped today that a few people sent me some encouragement on Facebook, and that Cyril even built a banner for the same purpose! Check it out on his site: http://www.poisson-chat.fr/FTP/KAREN.jpg.

Tuesday 20 January 2009

Day 107: the last few days...

Our first full run since before Xmas was 45 min on Sunday. Not our fastest by all means, but pretty good considering that my Mum & Dad were here and we had indulged together in a couple of bottles of good wine, a few aperitifs, a lunch roast and a gigantic spicy pizza the day before... Clearly, not the committed healthy lifestyle of 2008 :) :)

I still started this week with a mighty fast 10 min run, which took me further than last week's equivalent, so I was rather pleased with myself. We skipped this morning's session but we'll do tomorrow's, promise!

Sunday 18 January 2009

Another Sunday Map

For some reason, the GPS does not currently like to begin for the first five minutes of a run ... but here's the last 40:

Jan 18 at EveryTrail

Map created by EveryTrail:GPS Geotagging

Friday 16 January 2009

A brilliant idea...

If ever you find yourself in a new city and would like to jog, then here's a good way to find the good routes: sightjogging! Cheers Stephen!

Day 103: longest jog since before xmas

45 min jog this morning. My knees felt it. That being said, the most significant impact of this week's "back on track" theme is that my appetite is again soaring... I am constantly and belly-twistingly hungry...

Thursday 15 January 2009

Day 102: how far can you get in 5 seconds?

The answer is: as far as you can! Today was interval training day again, and the last interval was for an all-out 5 seconds run. It was fun!

I've also at last started to attend the gym again, thanks to Arnaud who provided much needed company and motivation. One thing for sure: we are rusty! 15 min of cycling hurt quite a bit and, disappointingly but not unexpectedly, I can't quite lift as much as I did the last time I had a work-out (weeks ago). But at least the wheels are in motion!

Wednesday 14 January 2009

Day 101: wizzing past traffic in Wapping.

Today we woke up at 8:00. We'll never know if the alarm did or did not work. I have no memory of hearing it, and neither does Stephen.

Anyway, I ended up running solo this morning - clearly this week the programme is all about speed work, as I was scheduled to run only 10 min (plus 20 min jog). So, I took this opportunity to impress all the city employees who were busy cleaning Wapping High St, by running past them at the speed of light (or as close as possible to said speed).

It was a lot of fun, and so was enjoying a strange view of Tower Bridge in the fog -- you couldn't see the top of the towers...

Tuesday 13 January 2009

Day 100 (yes it is!): laziness strikes.

Today, 6 times 75 sec sprint + 3 min walk intervals. It was dire. I felt lazy.

Monday 12 January 2009

Day 99: ride like (or against) the wind.

The cold snap has ended. This morning was mild again, and we run our 30 min against the wind, yet fast (especially towards the end, with 10-12 min or near-sprinting). I am feeling rather good about myself, particularly after oversleeping (= staying in the warm bed instead of running in below-zero temperatures) a couple of times last week, and skipping this Sunday's planned Fartlek to spend most of my afternoon at hospital after a kettle incident. Oh dear...

Wednesday 7 January 2009

Day 94: fast run.

This morning, we run in 20 min the distance that we covered in 30 min on Monday. Perhaps it was the cold encouraging us to move faster!!! :) Certainly the canal near our place is not thawing very fast: there is now a rather thick and shiny layer of ice on it...

Tuesday 6 January 2009

I am running another 10K race soon...

I've just registered for the Ashford & District 10K race in February, which gets some very good reviews. Let's see if training in the snow and frost will increase my time! :)

Day 93: on the road again.

Well, it had been a while since the half-marathon premiere. And here I am, back on the run after a wonderful, relaxing and indulgent Christmas holiday, where I did almost no running at all, except for a post-Christmas long jog along the river. Stephen and I started week 1 of the "sub 3 hours" marathon training programme, by getting up at 5.45 yesterday and running 30 min on snowy grounds. And this morning, it was even colder!!! Temperatures were below zero Celsius as we were getting back into the motions of interval training. I don't remember such a cold spell in London for a while...

When it's that cold, it's actually rather tough to breathe through your nose, as the air freezes your throat as it comes in :) Plus, you break back into a jog much quicker during recovery periods, otherwise your legs start freezing too! But we're doing this, and so far feeling OK. I still have a black toe from the half-marathon two weeks ago though -- how long can it take for a toe to recover?!?

Also during the holiday, this blog was accessed from far-away locations by my friends Maria and Laura, who helped me expand its reach to two more continents. Now, there are dots in South Africa, Argentina and sunny Hawaii... Any volunteers to visit Antarctica for me???