Running On Empty

The 2023 stretch goals I made for myself back at the end of July have been looking like a bit much of a stretch recently. The 'new parkruns' goal is being scuppered by the distances I now need to travel. The 3-times-a-week goal has been set back massively by two or three weeks of very little running in holiday season. Pulling it back from that deficit is going to take some doing, especially given that I very rarely manage more than 3 runs a week. But at least the fortnightly 7.5km runs goal is feeling achievable. In fact, longer runs are becoming more of a focus for me, full-stop. 7.5km runs don't take that much longer than a 5km run when you factor in the fixed cost of warm-up, warm-down and shower time. They also mean that when I come to do parkruns, they feel a bit shorter than they used to; and I'm hoping that means I'll feel able to run them faster. Beyond that, I'm also itching to get myself signed up for another 10K race — specifically the North Tyneside...

I'm always in two minds about how I feel when I have a training run that's slower than intended. Or slower than it feels for the effort I put in. On the one hand, it's good that's it's not on a parkrun day, as that would be depressing. But on the other hand, I'm always left thinking "I should be getting past this kind of thing". As in, even my bad days should be what I used to think of as quick. Burradon Pond, which I looped around. Photo courtesy of Burradon Farm House & Cottages Today was one such run. Feeling that I'd set off at about a 5:20/km pace, the first kilometre announcement from Google was about 5:45. And the second kilometre just started to feel hard as my lungs actually had to start working. In fact, the whole run just felt a bit underwhelming, even though my pace trended in the right direction. That may, in part, be down to the fact it was in the middle of a work day and work itself has been a bit depressing lately. But at least...

No sooner so I write a post about how it's been ages since I last did any orienteering, and I only go and do a spot of orienteering the next day. Not your traditional orienteering with white and orange kites, mind you; Shaun the Sheep orienteering. 😂 There's one! Shaun the Sheep outside St Nick's. For the past month or two, 115 Shaun the Sheep sculptures have been dotted around Newcastle, each with a unique code on its base. The idea was that kiddies and their parents would wander the city, collecting all the codes on an app on their phone and getting various "rewards" as they go. All for charity (and marketing), of course. On Saturday, while killing time with Daughter the Second, I finally decided to get the app and join in. We followed it up with a bit more on Sunday and got ourselves up to 22 out of 115 collected. I suggested to the girls that I could collect more for them on my lunchtime runs from the office and so that's how I came to be doing wh...

It's been a looong time since I last posted about anything orienteering-related and there's a good reason for that: I've not done any for AGES. Daughter the 1st has given up on it and we've even handed back the club top she was borrowing (that was very cringe). I've also been putting all of my efforts into parkrunning instead, as those events are typically closer to home, start and end earlier, and so consume less of a weekend for me (and the family). So... yeah... no orienteering. 😢 No offence meant to this guy, but it's impossible to look cool while orienteering, isn't it? While I suspect this means I won't renew my club or BOF membership for 2024, I do still miss getting out for it occasionally. Maybe next year, I'll try to run once or twice as an independent. Also, 2023 isn't over yet and, looking ahead on the NATO future events page , I see that there's another urban event happening in Cramlington at the start of November. Let's...

Feels like a bit of a miracle that I even got out to a parkrun today. This is the first week in a long, long time that I've felt like I could quite happily get by without running at all. I suspect that's down to various things occupying my mind, both at work and at home, but I really wasn't in the mood for getting up and out early(ish) on a Saturday morning. I just knew that if I didn't, the self-loathing would come later and it was a downward spiral from there. I couldn't afford to spend too long away from home with the car today — not least because it was in for a new windscreen at 11am — so instead of going for a new venue, I instead consulted my post-it note listing the venues that would extend my tourist streak. And Leazes Park won. A gloomy Leazes Park before the start, with the finish funnel in the foreground. Last time I visited, I came away really down about how slowly I'd run it, clocking up a 27:38. Given my first visit, on only my second ever parkru...

Today's route in pink; well, the Gateshead half of it anyway. Seems a bit OTT to call this a training run, but I popped out for a quick 5-ish kilometre run at lunch, creating a loop that would see me wind up at Central Station to pick up train tickets for a work trip tomorrow. By that point, having crossed the High Level bridge and returned via the Redheugh Bridge, I'd racked up a little over 4K, with the final bit towards 5K coming on the run back to the office from the station. GPS botched the start, but I'd guess my average pace was about 5:15 to 5:20/km. This was also a brilliant display of how not to run. I ate lunch immediately before going out, didn't go to the loo before running, and didn't do any stretches at all. Never mind, though; I got away with it. Next run is likely to be Friday at the earliest, as I'm away on a work trip midweek.

Last time I attended Jesmond Dene parkrun , it was in the knowledge that it was the last remaining venue I'd been to where my PB was over 28 minutes. Consequently, the goal was to get under 28 minutes, something I definitely felt I was capable of. But I failed. 😞 To say I was disappointed would be to put it mildly. Funnily enough, ever since then — just as with Newbiggin and its disappointment — I'd been reluctant to return. Fear of failure strikes again. However, circumstances conspired today to see me return to Jesmond Dene. Of course, I went with the same goal to get under 28 minutes, but this time I had a bit more of a focused plan: I would start much nearer the front; closer to the front than my pace warranted, as it turned out. The Jesmond Dene run gets pretty congested at the start, so I didn't want to get stuck behind anyone. I would focus on the section in Paddy Freeman Park i.e. after the punishing hill. Knowing how I've been able to push myself on the flat e...