Groundhog Day!

I am pretty sure that most of you will have seen this movie. You know, the one where Bill Murray's character lives the same day over and over, until he gets Andie MacDowell's character to fall in love with him.

That's what life feels like at the moment, at least for the now anyway. As I have mentioned before, my boy has gone to Sweden to work at Below Zero Ice Driving. Which sounds fun if you are a participant out for the day, getting to drive Porsche 911's round on a frozen lake. However, is apparently mind numbingly boring if you are part of the support team, working 11hour days, not getting a day off and all you see is the same frozen lake every day. 

As the boy is living some kind of Groundhog Day out in Sweden, I am living a variation of my own crazy 'run, work, sleep, work, gym, sleep, run, work, sleep' and so on. I have a training plan for my marathon which I intend to stick to, but I don't know whether doing the same routine week in and week out is having an affect on me and my training is becoming stagnated as a result, or like poor Bill I am destined to feel like I am living a Groundhog Day, feeling as if I am in some kind of mental stasis, until the boy gets home.

I think the question is then; when you have no choice but to stick to a rigorous training plan, because you are preparing for a marathon, what can I do to not make it feel like repetition?

I'm sorry NYC but the answer is no...

Yesterday marked the start of registration for this years NYC Marathon.

I have only been to NYC once, in 2006, and I loved it, such a great place. I had heard about the marathon and thought it would be a good one to aim for. 

I am doing my first marathon in April this year. I picked the UK's Manchester Marathon because I am a Mancunian and although, for now, I have moved away, Manchester will always be home to me.

The entrance fee was extremely reasonable at £48, which is just slightly over half of what they are asking for the London Marathon.

Anyway, back to my original point. When I heard that the NYC Marathon was opening registration I decided to sign up.

I went on the the registration page and was informed that I would be charged a $11 admin fee for registering, which I thought was reasonable, but before I went through the process I decided to look at the entry fee if I was to be successful. Now, there are 3 separate prices and I completely agree with the slight discount for those who actually live in the city, I think that is a nice gesture. What blew me away however, is that if you are not a US Citizen, you have to pay an extra $100?! This I find quite offensive, why do I have to pay more? Am I going to drink more water, use more portaloo's and need a bigger medal?! Therefore on principle I will not be entering and I may look at doing Paris in 2016 instead.

This all led me to think about entrance fees in general and how expensive things are becoming in the world of running. I do appreciate that there needs to be a cost, especially with a marathon due to roads etc. being closed, but some of them are ridiculous. When will it reach a point where people start to say, 'actually no, I am not prepared to pay that!'

I apologise if today's post is a little ranty, but I love running, I love entering things and being with other runners. It's just getting to a point where I have to think carefully about what I enter as these days it has to be worth it to me and paying an unjustified fee for being a foreigner is not something worth doing.

Back on track... but with some issues!

This week I have hit my training hard, with only one slip up, which was not my fault... but we'll get to that.

So here is how my training week has been...

Monday

I got up at 04:00 and was off by around 04:30. Monday is one of my shorter runs of the week and therefore you would think a little easier. However, it's normally the first day after my distance run at the weekends so I can be a little stiff. I did 4.31km...

Tuesday

First gym day of the week and it is leg strengthening. I try to keep this early on it the week so as it's not too close to my distance run at the weekend. I tend to do a little cardio to warm up, but as I run so much I do not need to do a lot. Tuesday is certainly more about the weights.

Wednesday

Up and out early again! Not so early on a Wesnesday though, about 05:00, as I work out of an office closer to home... which is nice. Mid week route is a little longer than Monday, but not by much; I did...

Thursday

Thursday is back to the gym time, but on Thursdays I concentrate on upperbody. Oh, I forgot to mention that on both gym days I also do core.

Friday

Ah... this is where it went wrong. Friday should be the same distance as Monday. However, I live in the town center and at 02:00 Friday morning I was awoken by drunk people fighting in the alley behind my flat... lovely! By the time I managed to get back to sleep, I was that tired I must've turned my alarm off. No running for me on Friday as I was far too busy after work.

Saturday

Distance run day! I managed 10 miles on Saturday...

There was however some issues when I returned home. After I had been home for around 20mins, I started to get severe pain in my abdomen, so painful I was doubled over in the kitchen. I went to bed in an attempt to sleep it off, but was not 100% for the rest of the day. I had a brief look online for some answers and found that this is a common problem for distance runners. Apparently, because certain areas of you body need more oxygen and blood whilst running, your body starves other areas of it. In this case my bowels!! It's not a pleasant subject but one that needs to be mentioned. Obviously I am not a Dr so if anyone suffers for the same thing then it's referred to as runners GI. When I have more time I will research this properly and update as there was a lot of advice around diet and things.

Sunday

Lastly, today I went snowboarding. Indoors as there is currently no snow and is never enough even when there is. It was my first time and I absolutely loved It! However, attempting a 3 hour lesson the day after a 10 mile run was probably not the best idea, but I am ok and my legs are working fine!

Back to some level of normality!

I feel like I have not posted anything for weeks and that is probably because I haven't! Although I enjoy the festive season it always throws my routine off. Not being in work as much, reduced hours at work too, all resulting in later get ups. We have had the wee one quite a lot over the holidays and I suppose I have placed more importance on spending time with those that are important to me than on myself, which I do not consider to be a bad thing overall.

This does not mean to say that I have not been running, I have, it's just that I have been attempting to squeeze it in amongst all the family get togethers and trips away.

Last week I attempted to do a 9.5 mile run. It was hard work and I could certainly tell that the party season had taken it's toll. So much so that as I approached home and should have branched off to complete my last mile, I actually just ran home, meaning that I only completed 8.5miles. It's ok though, it was a bad run, they are expected and I will not allow them to get me down.

Yesterday Pete left for Sweden, he is working at the Below Zero Ice Driving Experience. Where he will be part of the support team for those who want to spend a day driving Classic Porsche 911's round a frozen lake. 

http://www.belowzeroicedriving.com/#

He will be gone for 7 weeks so this will give me a great opportunity to train hard. I have put a concrete plan in place, a plan which starts today!

I got up early this morning, again it wasn't a great run. It was short, slow and I was fighting against the wind. I got home and had scrambled eggs and peppermint tea. However, I got to work and was asked to travel to another site to cover sickness, this means that I do not have anything with me for lunch as all my healthy food is in the work fridge. Ah well, I will just have to improvise at some point.

There have been other adventures recently. We went to the Forest of Dean for a long weekend and had a long trek along the sculpture trail. Here are some of the pretty things we saw...