Week 1...DONE

So week 1 of the training plan is done and dusted so I thought I’d update you on how I’m feeling and how the runs have been.

Since updating the blog last Monday I had 3 trips to the gym for weight training, 2 further 3 milers and a long run on Sunday. I am still playing around with clothing to find the right balance and have read that you should dress as though the temperature is 10 degrees Celsius warmer when dressing for a run. This made the average ‘run’ temperature about 14 degrees Celsius last week. Unfortunately it’s the initial blast of cold air before your body warms that means I am running with 3 layers including a long sleeved top, but I find that once I hit about 2km I’m almost too warm and having to roll up the sleeves. I’m getting there though and this week has snow, sleet, rain and ice forecast so it could be interesting.

Another thing I am working on is when I run, I had a busy weekend so I had to do my Friday run in the morning, whilst initially it was hard work (as my body was tight) I actually felt great afterwards and it was nice to have it ‘out the way’. The weekly long runs fall on a Sunday and at the moment I am trying to decide when I want to run these, Sundays are always tough because if you want to run in the mornings it is goodbye lie in but if you run in the evening there is no lunchtime drinks/steak etc (a luxury). This weekend I ran at around 6.30pm which was ok but at this stage the long runs will be less than an hour, at the peak of training I will be running for 4 hours…. Again this is something I need to focus on

My long run was relatively pain free but I need to remember to take it slow. Having felt good at mile 4 of 5 I sped up significantly and had a great finish…… unfortunately my body paid for it the next day, thankfully it was rest day and only had to undergo a gym review. Next week is 6 miles so I’ll see how that goes.

Following my gym review I now have a very focussed weights programme which I tried out this morning (ouch). It’s a tough regime but I’ll have a lot more things to mix up! It involves lunges of which always bear comical value to me, lord knows why but I cant help sniggering as I’m lunging! In the next few weeks the trainer will be adding free weights into the programme (clear the decks people, clumsy Gemma is waving weights around)! I am a firm believer in a precise weights programme as part of training for a race so to me this is just as important as going out for a run 4 times a week and thankfully my trainer agrees! All in all I have a very clean bill of health. Body fat percentage has dropped 10 % since March (when I got back to the gym and started running again) and I rate at 2 on the Visceral fat scale which is exceptional. On top of that I have lost around 2 stone and am now carrying 7 odd stone of muscle on my 10 Stone frame.

Hopefully this will all help with training and slowly will improve further. Focussing a lot on the core muscles too so I can get that ‘Runners World front cover model’ stomach…. I plan on running the marathon in as little as possible (crop top, shorts and token tutu) and I want to look like I’ve worked hard because so far…. I have!