Things seemed to have stalled a little these past few weeks.
I think this is because I'd sort of lost my confidence after my last training run. So much so in fact, that it has taken me until today - 20 whole days - to attempt another one.
I haven't been being *completely* lazy in all that time and have done a bit of cross-training to try and 'keep my hand in' (for want of a better phrase) but I have felt quite guilty that I have effectively been neglecting my training. Especially since so many lovely, kind people have gone to the trouble and expense of sponsoring me.
There has been the odd opportunity to go out and run but I have kept finding reasons - it's raining, I think I'm coming down with a cold, it'll be getting dark soon (to name but a few) - to talk myself out of going.
Today, however, I figured that enough was enough. My lovely boys had gone off to watch the football, leaving me a few hours alone and providing me with an excellent opportunity to take myself off for a 'getting-myself-back-into-the-swing-of-things' training run.
If I'm honest, I wasn't feeling hugely enthusiastic or confident and I set off with a bit of an anxious feeling in the pit of my stomach. I think I was worried a) that I would feel ill again and be forced to stop *again* and b) that I would feel stupid/embarrassed running on my own without Mark and that the whole experience would just be an exercise in public humiliation*.
In the end, it wasn't bad at all. I don't know how far I went, as I didn't take Mark's magic stop-watch with me, but I would guess it was around the 3K mark. I was back home within half an hour and, apart from my face going bright red and my head feeling like it was full of fast-flowing lava, I don't seem to have suffered any ill effects.
True, this sort of distance is hardly making the same sort of headway as my 5-miler a few weeks back but that wasn't really the point. I did this run as a way of getting over my anxiety and lack of confidence and proving to myself that I could carry on even when things get tough.
Happily, I think it might have worked :-).
*Yes, I can be pretty melodramatic about these things sometimes!
2 comments:
Hi Hayley. I can totally empathise with this article. I ran my first race a month ago, and was pleasantly surprised at the result. I then started training for my next race at the end of May, which I'm being sponsored for, and it all seems to be going wrong since then.
I took a break after the race, but didn't stretch or cross-train in the break, so as soon as I ran my first long run (9k) after that, I started to suffer with groin strain. I rested for a while again, but the same happened again. I was then advised to rest completely for 2 weeks.
I'm halfway through that rest now and I have a streaming cold and a recurrence of what I think is IBS. I know the cold will go, but it just seems that everything is conspiring to scupper my race.
Your post has helped, just knowing that there are others in the same boat. Good luck with everything; I'll keep following to see how you do.
Hi Steve. Thanks for your comment :-).
Well done on completing your first race! I'm sorry to hear that things are a bit difficult with your training at the moment though - that all sounds very frustrating.
I hope your period of rest has the desired effect and you're back up and running soon. I'm so glad that my blog has helped you to feel a little better :-).
Good luck for your race at the end of May!
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