When mañana arrives - you'd better be ready!!

#TrailTuesday - nightime trail runs

I get so distracted that I forget to update this little thing of a blog that is supposed to keep my training honest.

It's so easy to let it slip, slide away. Skipping a day leads so easily to a week or 4 of doing little or nothing.

"Mañana, mañana" so easily becomes the refrain.

I'm often always motivated by what others are doing and it helps if I do something to motivate them to motivate me kinda like a Gerry Maguire senario :)

This is how #TrailTuesday, #AKWRunstreak and #Zero25k came about. By organising a group event I 'encourage' myself to not back down. I know I have to organise my Tuesday so I meet the group, I get my exercise. I know with Runstreak I have to help motivate others and by default motivate myself. 

Zero25k I get a great kick out of it. By encouraging others to begin  I get to reaffirm the realisation of how fortunate I am that I run. 

I choose to run. How I motivate myself to run comes across as selfish but we all need different tricks to keep going sometimes.

So for the past month I have been training away and now I am building my base mileage through to the New Year when the next generation of Zero25k runners will start and my next group challenge begins for the experienced runners.

Will you be ready for it?

#Runstreak Week 1 in Review

A week can seem like a long time.

 It doesn't seem like a week since I was running in the dark with a dead headlamp
or indeed running around in circles like a hamster but as the week went on myself and Edel fell into a pattern of pushing each other to get out and complete the daily run task.

There were no records set. I'm definitely struggling with elevated HR and slow pace at the moment. I have been snuffling and coughing for the past fortnight or so, so there is a bit of seasonal adjustment and dietary adjustment going on. I've cut back on the junk and processed stuff now that the training mojo is coming back and a couple of those ill-gained kilograms have shifted again, so happy days.

#Day1 - 6.5k, PaceAvg 05:23/km
#Day2 - 5.3k, PaceAvg 05:40/km
#Day3 - 5.0k, PaceAvg 06:00/km (treadmill preset, hill interval)
#Day4 - 6.95k, PaceAvg 05:45/km
#Day5 - 6.11k, PaceAvg 05:01/km, HRAvg 146bpm (treadmill)
#Day6 - 6.95k, PaceAvg 05:20/km, HRAvg 148bpm
#Day7 - 12.13k, PaceAvg 05:38/km, HRAvg 142bpm 

Total for the week 55.76km

Now onto Week 2 and more of the same though I might stretch this week to a 45 minute minimum for myself.

#Runstreak #Day1 - Until the Lights Go Out

My Kilcornan training ground

Now I'm not going to bore you with #Day1, #Day2 etc for the next 31 days.

It'll be a weekly summary at most, unless something worthwhile happens.

We've started a Runstreak for the month of December and invited everyone to join us for 30 mins (minimum) every day. Its a great way to get yourself in the habit of time-out everyday and does wonders for clearing your head of life's stresses.

Out yesterday with the family to see Santa in Oranmore, the kids loved it too! It was getting dark when Edel headed out so I was persuading her to bring a light. It was only afterwards when I caught the kids playing shadow puppets that I realised she'd only the flashy red lamp which would be useless in the dark for running Kilcornan.

Cue loading the car to go find mum. She arrived back as we went out the gate, typical!

My turn.

Gear grabbed, light on and out the door I went. As I went down the avenue through Kilcornan ready to start the first loop back around my lamp suddenly dimmed. 

Oh dear! Of all the running I'd done through the evenings it had to be this evening that my batteries run out!! I'll never live this down!!

That was the end of that, 18 mins down the avenue turn around and head right back where I started. No way was I chancing the woods with low batteries as I'd be stumbling around with a broken ankle in no time.

Home with my 'wear a headlamp' tail firmly between my legs for a brief 36min run.

Ah well, run 1 done, another one makes a #runstreak.