My achilles are my Achilles' Heal

'ow, ow, ow, ow'. That is the sound I make as I walk at the moment. You see, it's all a bit tight down there. NO! Further down, near my ankles. Yep that's it, my Achilles. Today I did what everyone will tell you is a silly idea. I increased my distance by 50% and went for it. I'm alive. Just. It hurt, a lot though.

I didn't managed to hit my timings as I wanted to but I did 7.5km which is more than third distance of the Maas Half marathon which is 12 weeks tomorrow. It's like I'm a complete novice again. Getting that distance up is just painful. Part of me thinks 'why don't I just revert back to my old thick heeled shoes' but i don't wanna. I really want to run this way and I do enjoy it it's just I don't like being a beginner again.

In fact the other reason is this......

This will contain everything I need for 6 days and 5 nights including all running, cycling and general gear. My tiny red 'barefoot' running shoes weigh next to nothing and will take up very little space. If I take my 'normal' running shoes, they'll weight more, they'll take up most of a pannier on their own and quite frankly that's a waste!

I ran the Berlin Marathon only 20 weeks ago with 16 weeks training. This should be a piece of piss right? We'll as long as I'm still able to walk anyway!

Old routes, New times

I HAD to get out and run today. My excuses have completely run out and quite frankly, I was beginning to become a fair weather runner. Or maybe just a lazy one! I also need to shift the spare tyre around my waist as the Belgium trip to the Maas Half Marathon is only 3 months away and my longest run in my barefoot running shoes is 4km. About 17km short of the distance I need then so frankly, the additional weight ain't helping much!

Today I made it 16km short by going out and hitting a 5.14km route I haven't done in a while. Quite frankly it got boring after I ran it around 20 times during Juneathon 2010. I didn't have the Garmin charged (yup, forgot it was in the drawer) so just had a stop watch on my phone and just had to hit stop at the end. It was odd not running to a pace and I didn't feel like I was going fast enough really so had to remind myself to try and keep pushing. The result is the second fastest time I've ever done it in which I'm pretty damn happy with to be honest!

I'm still consistently under the 5min/km pace where I want to be it's just I need to start upping the distance in to be in with a chance of a good HM time although not sure how good it will be after 3 days of single speeding through The Netherlands and Belgium!!

The best yet!

I took The Boy for our pretty regular Sunday morning swim this morning and as I was driving back, I was seeing quite a few runners wrapped up against the elements, pounding the pavement. I was quite proud that I was one of these strange creatures that likes to put a pair of shorts on in 2 degrees and go out for a plod.

At that same moment, I realised that I was trying to give myself an excuse NOT to go out for a run because it was about 2 degrees and I'm a delicate little flower really. This had the instant effect of turning my pride to shame.

With that in mind, I left myself with no choice and once I got home, I got changed and headed out into the cold. I'm still learning my way with my barefoot running and since the beginning of Jan, I've been out a few times with the main intention of staying under 5 min/km and also increasing the distance I'm covering. Today I managed just over 4km which is the longest so far in 4:53's which is my quickest pace of 2013. Chuffed with that and only 1km away from being able to do a park run.

All this on a very limited amount of sleep in the last few days too due to my lovely baby girl who is not quite as lovely at 3am!

Running with sugar

Now the pins and needles have finally died down after the Berlin Marathon (it took 3 and a half weeks!!), I finally got to go out for a run a couple of weeks ago which was bloody lovely I can tell you. You know how long I had to run? As long as I wanted! You know what pace I had to run at? Whatever I liked! The horrendous monotony of the training schedule is done. Bring on enjoying my running again!!

Although being me, I need something to focus on. If I don't have it, I tend to let me training slip and get fat(er) and lazy(er). So, what to do. After plenty of aches and pains in knees and hips etc during the training, I've decided to pick up with my barefoot running again. It's something I looked at very briefly in the summer after seeing eatingtrees convert and enjoy it but then there was no way I could train my body to run differently that quickly so I quickly cast it aside.

I now have the time to learn again and the best thing about learning from scratch is that I'm going to teach myself to run quicker too. Just lace up the shoes, step outside and run as fast as I feel I can for a set distance. That distance is currently 2km. I want to run that in 9:00. 4:30 km pace. Once I do that, I'll add half a km to the route until I achieve that pace for the longer distance and so on and so forth until I hit the 10km or HM. That's the plan anyway. I have no idea whether this plan will work and whether there's any science to back it up but I have a logical argument in my head and I'm sticking with it. It is going OK. My first attempt came in at 9:04 when I hadn't run for 3 and a half weeks and the second attempt was 9:07 when snotty and wheezing like a good 'un.

During that time I also had a lovely run with a friend who I've hardly ever run with which was a pleasant 10k around a lovely undulating route although I had to revert back to the old trainers and style which I could feel the difference instantly. The barefoot, although only shorter distances so far, feels more springy and bouncy which is good.

Having, last night, finished 'Running with the Kenyans' by Adharanand Finn, it bought my new plans into context and made a reasonable amount of sense. Recommended by @LongJogRoz on twitter, whether you're for or against barefoot running, it really is a good read. Mind you, I really could do with losing a stone in weight to really feel the benefit and I will attempt to lose some but quite frankly, I have the Christmas season coming which is never useful as well as a baby due in December which will set new standards in lack of sleep, lack of exercise and too many biscuits! This I'm confident of BUT I do know that to get quicker, I need to stop carrying the equivalent of 6 and a bit bags of sugar tied round my waste. Shit! Really?? That's mental. 1 stone equals 6.35kg. No wonder I'm slower than last year!! That's depressing, I'm off to have some sweet Pumpkin Tart to cheer myself up!

Golf balls and barefoot

8:47am on Monday morning and I'm sitting at my desk rolling a golf ball under my arch to stretch the tendons/muscles/stuff (I don't actually know what's down there) as I've heard it's the right thing to do. Calves and arches. Thems the things to stretch too make sure they're in good condition when you start running 'barefoot'. Or minimalist as I'll call it.

I blame 2 people for this foray into minimalist running, eatingtrees and New Balance. eatingtrees as he's been doing it a couple of years, raves about it and I've seen the improvements in his times and New Balance as the replacement for the faithful 1063's and 1064's that I've worn since day dot, was the the 1080 and quite frankly, it feels like you're running on pillows and last time I checked, running on pillows wasn't very efficient!

Not very efficient

Efficiency... I guess that's what I'm looking for with this new direction. Less wasted energy. A way of running that gives me the ability to run the same distance with less energy used and less impact on the legs and knees.

Slightly more efficient

Now the science of 'minimalist' running is a bit woolly to stay the least. It seems there are as many advocates as there are detractors and the old saying that you can prove anything with stats seems to apply. I've kind of gone with the logic that I can comprehend which is that forefoot runners have a softer impact with the ground than that of heel strikers and because of the springy nature of a persons arch, we don't put as much weight and impact through the knees and hips. That's my theory and I'm sticking to it.

So Saturday was my first trip out in the brand new BRIGHT RED beauties! Knowing how my feet swell when I run, I thought I should go out first in the cushioned shoes to warm up so I went for a lovely run with @MrsSophieHMC. As I run slower when I'm with Mrs HMC, I did a few extra bits, like pushing myself round the lake twice at a quicker pace and then catching her back up but it was a very pleasant 7 ish km which at the end of, I changed into the new shoes and went back out around the block. With all the advice being don't overdo it, I planned to run just a kilometre at a 5 min/km pace but it was feeling good and torn between turning home early or going that little bit extra, I pushed on and ended up doing 1.5km in which the shoes felt fine and I had no awkward aches or pains. Result! 2 days later and still the calves, arches and achilles are all fine. Tomorrow has run number 2 written all over it.

Juneathon. Day 11. Out of the way

An early start again today for my 5.14km loop as I couldn't face getting home from work again and having to go out to exercise on a Friday night. It wasn't a fun run but it wasn't a bad run either. To make it a bit different, I tried running in smaller, faster steps more akin to if I was running barefoot. Eatingtress was talking a lot about it the other night with a shisha pipe in his hand so I did it to try and break the monotony. I don't actually  have anything to report about it except my calves hurt more but that could be more to do with the 11 days consecutive exercise or maybe just the fact I was using different muscles. The thing I can say is that if my mind wandered and I thought of anything else, I went back to my heavy, lumpy style immediately. Also I found it harder when going uphill.

It's Friday, I've just had a sausage sandwich, the world cup starts today, I have BBQ plans at the weekend (possibly under a brolly) and I won't have to get up at 5.20am for a whole 2 days! Where's a bank holiday when you need one? Enjoy your Juneathon weekends people, only 19 days to go!

June 1st: RUN 5.95km (31:48)
June 2nd: RUN 4.46km (22:31)
June 3rd: BIKE 11.31km (??:??)
June 4th: RUN 5.14km (26:05)
June 5th: BIKE 8.61km (??:??)
June 6th: RUN 5.14km (26:15)
June 7th: RUN 5.14km (25:02)
June 8th: RUN 5.14km (28:33)
June 9th: BIKE 21.65km (approx 53 mins)
June 10th: RUN 2.83km (15:16)
June 11th: RUN 5.14km (25:48)