Grinding

Did my 10k loop round through the villages on tarmac this morning. Took almost exactly 60 minutes. Bit of a grind, hard work, but need to start building the miles back up. Have done this loop before but in the other direction. Doesn’t matter which way round I go, there always seems to be more uphill than down. Saw a fox.

Had intended to do this run last Thursday, but having got 2k down the road, I realised I’d left the doorkeys on the dustbin outside the front door! So had to go back and ended up running down to the beach and along the sand for a bit as it was low tide. Should be a pic of the beach below with Stonebarrow Hill in the background and Golden Cap in the distance.

So that run ended up at a fiddly 5 point something km.

Tried using some sorbothane insoles in my road running shoes recently. They seem to stop the knee pain, but the price is that the shoes need to be a size bigger to accomodate them. So that’s no good. Took them out today and shoes felt much more comfortable, but then knee started hurting again after 8km. Seems like I need a new pair (shoes not knees) with some really good arch support. Need to start saving.

The boy’s back in town!

Ok, I’m back. It’s been a while, and I’ve defnitely been slacking, but now I’m back with the full intention of doing the 2011 Charmouth Challenge, and beating last year’s  time by at least five minutes.

Went to see a physio late last year. Basically she just said I was way too tight and needed to loosen up a bit. And then we talked about my leg problems, boom boom! The daily stretching exercises that she gave me seems to be calming it down.

I’ve done a few odd runs over the last few months, had a bit of knee pain (pinching pain outside left knee) but that’s pretty much down to lack of fitness/form/leg strength. Went for a run from home (Charmouth) up the the end of Stonebarrow car park and back on Sunday and was really pleased with how it went. So once a week in March, twice a week in April, and after that we’ll see.

Summer Run

Well it certainly felt like summer. Something like 15 degrees according to the BBC.

Had planned a short hilly run from the school and up Stonebarrow Lane, but after warming up by jogging down to the beach I realised that it was low tide. So decided to head off along the beach to St Gabriel’s and then back overland from there.

Started off all right; running along the damp but firm golden sands is guaranteed to lift the spirits. But when the sand ran out and I was onto the shingle and pebbles it got a lot tougher. Especially as running East the beach is always going to slope from left to right, which in turn meant my right foot constantly slipping away putting extra strain on an already sore inner thigh muscle. Got so hard I had to slow down to a walk for the last few hundred yards up to the almost vertical set of steps that leads off the beach. At least they were still there. The last set got washed/carried away when another chunk of cliff disappeared last year.

Which reminds me, the coastguard have been pretty busy recently on our bit of beach. I ran past a number of cliff falls this morning where they’ve been hauling people out who get stuck up the waist in the mud that comes down. In fact there was a coastguard type guy being interviewed by a camera crew down there this morning.

After clambering up to St Gabriels I was conscious that I might be overdoing it, so took the shortest route I could think of back to the top of Stonebarrow Lane, then down there and back round to home. Nice run back. Not too muddy and lots of birds to listen to. Past a woodpecker somewhere hammering away.

8.31km,   1h 2m 27s,   average of 7m 31s per km

Off to Jersey tomorrow. Definitely taking running gear.

Sunshine after the Rain

Decided to stay away from my normal routes after another 48 hours of intermittent rain, would have been a complete mudfest. So ran from home instead. Down the hill into and through Charmouth, up Stonebarrow Lane and then back along the same route. 7km with 300m of climbing in 46m 23s. Hard work, especially on the shins going down and the calves going up.

Not much else to report. Although I did see a seal off Charmouth beach yesterday.

Only one more run before Southbourne and my assault on a new PB. About 250 entrants so far with a week and a half to go. Late entries are accepted.

Short midweek run

Short run from home as wife has the car. Really just down to the beach, round the block and back. Very cold, ice on the picnic bench by the front door, so wore gloves today. Nice and sunny though, so did a kilometer on the beach as it’s low tide. Worth getting out in the cold just for that. Smooth sand exposed by the low tide, sunny morning, waves gently lapping in. Doesn’t get any better than that.

Felt ok, right calf a aching a bit. Shins will be sore tomorrow as I seem to be running a bit flat-footed judging by the amount of noise I make as my feet hit the pavement, especially (but not exclusively) on the downhill bits. Need to remedy that, or else I’ll get really sore shins.

4.39km, 26m 2s, 126m of ascent. 5m 56s per kilo not particularly quick, but it’s winter and for me it’s just about keeping going, getting out when it’s cold and wet. Plenty of time in the Spring to get serious before The Challenge.

Longer run planned for Saturday, weather and mud permitting.

Sun-day

Much better day today. Charmouth was bathed in beautiful autumn sunshine, and mobbed by all and sundry trying to get to the coast for one last time before winter sets in. The car parks in the village were absolutely packed, it could have been the middle of summer all over again. Roll on the winter when I can go for a nice lonely wander on the beach before walking the kids home from school.

Even though the weather was good, I found my run difficult. Legs felt really heavy for some reason and I was quite a bit slower than usual (48m 19s for the 7.21km loop). The only reason that I could think of was that I was out running about two hours after I got up instead of my usual four hours.

I don’t think I’ll be setting any more PB’s for a while either. Some sections of my run are getting very slippery with the autumn rain, and some are downright muddy. Add to that slippery stiles and rocky paths lurking under a light covering of leaves, it all means I have to start taking it easy in places.

The weather brought out all the dog walkers too. I wasn’t in a great mood as it was hard work, so when the first dog charged up to me and nearly tripped me up I got cross. When it happened again with a different dog twenty minutes later I lost it a bit and tried to give him a kick. Something I regretted instantly. In future I’ll just slow down to a walk, there’s no point in either getting angry or risking another fall by running past them.

I’ll do a shorter run mid-week, then it’s Ilminster 10k next Sunday. Hope my legs feel up to the task by then.

Update

It’s windy, it’s raining, it’s a running day. Oh well, at least I’m not overheating!

Had an extra day gap to fit in with the family schedule – kid’s are home for the next seven weeks – so did a longer run today. Very wet and slippery again. Decided to do the loop from Stonebarrow down to the school and back. Not recommended. I knew the coast path was closed but thought I could cut across the bottom of one of the fields to the gate like they did in the race earlier in the month. Got to that point only to find a barbed wire fence all the way down the side of the field. Either have to go over the fence, or clamber down and up through part of the latest cliff fall. Took the dodgy option of the clamber. Nothing gave way so successfully completed the descent. Then managed to jog all the way up Stonebarrow Lane without stopping which was a major achievement. Time for the loop 29m 0s.

Followed this with the Stonebarrow loop including the detour behind Westhay Farm. 38m 25s. Total time 1hr 7m 25s.

Thoroughly knackered by the end of that. Not helped by the lining in my left trainer rucking up and causing a bit of discomfort. Need to find a way to stop that happening. Knees ache a bit. Had a pain in the outside of my right knee the day after last weeks longer run. Hopefully be ok tomorrow.