Feeling Good

 Hello blog readers.

What can I say about this past week or so.  It's been brilliant!  Busy, but brilliant.  I had a full week work last week, starting at 7 finishing at 6, but I still got up and lead group 0 last week.  I just feel so good knowing that I am encouraging others back to fitness, while also getting myself back to fitness!

As you know, this last year my running has been virtually on hold!  I'm just no good running by myself, I know me and Naggy did some socially distancing runs together, but we did do as much as we should have, or indeed could have!  I think my mojo is in encouraging others, so I shall just have to keep at it.

Of course that leads me nicely to my other leading role, that of leading the beginners!  We started back on  Saturday with our free beginners group. With the other leaders, RefMichael, ZippySherry and Hannah, and a smattering of PWR helpers, we saw over 40 people join up for our own beginners to runners session!  And amazing amount.  I can't tell you how excited we all were to see so many.  With the new booking on line system most of them were already registered.  We still have some who turn up and register, that's fine, we don't want to turn anyone away.  Our Nicola had a table set up, hand santiser, pens and registration forms at the ready!  It all went like clockwork.  Pity about the leader who went first...but I'll shall get to that in a sec.

DiscoRich welcomed all the newbies, introduced us four leaders and all the PWR's that came to help and encourage them.  Did the little bit of 'housekeeping' that needed doing, i.e, making sure no COVID symptoms, explaining about the loo situation etc, and then it was on to the session.

The first leader up.....well that was me!  "Ok, so we warm up first, need to raise heart rate and warm those muscles, so everyone show me a Burpee" Hmm, somehow I don't think they believed me!  Just as well, because that is not how we roll at PWR Beginners, it's all about easing into it, letting things creep on you so that you don't even notice that you're doing it!  

Of course I slightly went off the rails and tried to get them to do the dynamic stretches first rather than do the walking around the green for two laps, but RefMichael soon reminded me of what we needed to do first. After that it was plain sailing.  I was smiling all the way through our session.  I really enjoyed it!

Just the beginning!

This week has been a bit quiet in the old exercises corner, but for real good reasons. Monday it was my long awaited for hairdresser appointment!  Oh my goodness, you can't understand how good I felt when I walked out of Clare's salon!  I felt like a million dollars, 5 months after the last time! Today I had things to do in the morning then I got stuck into some work stuff which seem to take up quite a bit of time.

But this evening it is Running Time!  That is all I have to say about the evenings that used to be Tuesday evenings! It is running time, end of!  Nothing must stop me from getting back out there with me group 0's to do some running.  This evening we took our fist steps into the woods.  Something we haven't done for maybe a year!  We were slow, but so what!  It felt good to be back in the woods.  It just smells so much different than on the streets, (of course it does Old Girl, it's called fresh air!)     The terrain is different (Again Old Girl, it's called earth and roots) with that up hill section (Tut, Old Girl it's called the up hill section....oh well, yes) Well, it feels different running up hill in the woods than it does on the streets.  There is so much more to look out for, roots, dips, holes, bricks, knobbly, bobbly path ways.  So yes we were a little slower.

But it was so good!  I can't wait for next week, we are heading back into to the woods, we are just going to run, we are going to get better, faster, back to the original group one pace!  We are going to do it, because we love it so much!  Hello mojo, I knew you were around!

In the Woods

We finished

Week 2 Toopalarde On The Road Again

 Hello blog readers.

Club night again!  I'm lead Toopalarde!  There were 6 of us this evening, J.J. Snappy, Tracy, Wendimoo and Dee.  All of us have let lockdown boredom get the better of us, instead of us using it to get fitter!  I think it's because we all do like to 'flock together'.  We are no good on our own.  We try as hard as we could but without the support of our crew we just didn't do our running.....well not much of it anyway.

I am sticking to the same route, we are not ready for the woods yet,  we need to concentrate on our stamina first.  I am so looking forward to going through the woods but we need to be able to run for at least 15 minutes straight!  It's all hills and roots and branches in the woods, we can't look out for them while trying to remember how to breathe and run at the same time!

I have 'upped' our running to 2 minutes running and 4 minutes walking.  Yes, I kept to the 4 minutes of walking, next week that goes down!  We got this, we can do it!  It really is tough, the weather has changed, we had our 'false' spring on Saturday and Sunday, with the beautiful sunshine, tee-shirt wearing weather, family enjoying an Easter egg hunt around the estate, then yesterday, snow and freezing winds! Welly boots, hats, scarfs and gloves!  I think this is why it felt tougher for some of our runners in group 0 today, it's harder trying to run in the cold weather!

After the short sharp shock of the little hill we continued with the rest of the flat route, just like last week.  It took longer for us to warm up!  How crazy is our weather, eh!?  But we are all so very pleased to be here.  Tracy was finding it a bit of a struggle.  The thing is, we have all let us selves go, we just need to be kind to our selves, 'saying it's ok to be slower' but then kick our own arses and say 'Now get out there and work it".  I think the fact that we are all there is the 'kicking of own personal bottoms'.  Now that we are there, running, well, you might as well do it and do it well!  We can and we will!  That is our motto at the moment, something that we kept reminding everyone, 'we can and we will'  We will not hear or accept 'I can't!'

It is tough though, of course it's tough, we are all that little bit heavier, we are all that little bit less fit than we used to be a year ago.  We really have to start back at the beginning, only this time we know what the end results can be!  We know what we are capable of, the miles we used to run, the speed we used to do!  We know we can get back there! And who knows, we could even improve on our best performances that we have done in the past!  We should not let anything convince us that we can't do it!  We can and we will!

I forgot to take pictures, again!  I should do it first thing!  SnappyHannah needs to back to her routes I think!  Anyway, this is our route with the geeky stats.  I took them a little further than last week, just a little further, and next week I shall take them to the next road.  With the little extra distance and a cheeky little hill, it will be a bit of a challenge!  

Make Way for the Toopalarde!

Hello blog readers. 

 It's been a while since I last wrote anything, I know but I am here now! I haven't been sitting around doing nothing though! Me and Tracy have been doing our thing while there has been no running with our club!  This blimmin lockdown is really just getting us all down now, but we shall continue to do what our government says, in spite of what some dimwits think, that it's all a conspiracy, ffs! But let's not talk about the numbnuts that refuse to wear masks in shops, decide to meet hundreds and hundreds of people, not wearing a mask, while counting how much bloody toilet rolls they STILL have from the very first hoarding session!

Tracy and I have been doing Team Body Project, YouTube videos together.  If nothing else it has helped to keep us mentally okish!  It hasn't help with the love affair with the fridge and the biscuit barrel, but hey ho!  At least we have been moving, which is all that Daniel says we need to do!  Oh if only!

But last night! Oh my goodness, last night!  It was sheer pleasure!  Just driving to the rec last night I had a huge smile on my face!  There was also a huge knot in my stomach as well (or that could quite easily have been the chocolate digestive that I had eaten 30 mins before hand)  PWR's were meeting up for the first time in what seems like......forever!  It truly feels like we have not run for the past year.  I know we had a few meet ups here and there, but really, it has been lock down for an entire year!  Not a lot of running has happened at all, well not for me!

But last night it happened.  I was leading a new group 0!  It's for all the people who have not run, or not run much in this past year.  And from listening to most of us, we are all toopalardes!  Most of us have a couple of extra pounds or two, those extra inches showing through our very close fitting running clothes, or even hiding under brand new run stuff!  But there was one thing that we all was agreeing on.....it's just great to be back!  

The park had 6 to 8 groups of people all saying "Hi, great to see you" or "My goodness I've missed you".  There was a sense of excitement and frenzied screeching  of  "Hi" from one group to another, of course keeping to our own groups of 6 runners.  In my group, because there are so any of us who have not been running, we had a special dispensation and had 8 of us.    

There were the usual crowd, J.J. Wendimoo and Tracy, but there was also a new person as well.  She has done our beginners course but has not done an awful lot of running since!  It just make sense to start our group from the very beginnings again.  I am thinking, "At least I should be two or three steps in front of the new beginners when we start again in 3 weeks".  This is my theory any way!  I need at least to look like I am not dying after the first minute run!  

I chose a flatish route, it will be shorter than our usual 3 miles, but that will increase over the weeks.  And no going into the woods just yet!  My goodness, I think I will have enough to contend with learning to breath and run again let alone look out for the sneaky tree roots and low hanging branches!  Them trees can be deadly sometimes!  The roads will have to do, I am sure everyone will understand.

Let me tell you, readers, if you could hear the sound of the voices of, not just of group 0, but all the groups that were there in the rec, it would really have lifted you up so much.  It was such a happy sound, seemed such a shame to spoil it with some hard work!  But we are a running, club, not a chatting club, and there are hills everywhere of course!  I had to get our one out of the way as soon as possible, so we headed for Kingsway, towards Petts Wood, its a short sharp shock to the system, but you know that after that its all plain sailing!  Hmmm, well, sort of!

We did the briefest of warm up before hitting the hill, brisk walk and some side stepping, then hit the hill running!  I kept us to the 1 minute of running and 4 minutes walking, (Shhhh, don't tell group 0 we usually do 5 minutes of walking during the first week of beginners!)  Everyone did well for the first run, even up hill.  There were a couple of people that I think are going to do exceptionally well, and will probably be moving up a group very soon, or at least go into the original group 1!  And from then on, it was run 1, walk 4 all the way around a short flatish route.

So, the run done, the noises on route were slightly different from when we were in the rec....but then after our stretches, the sound was as cheerful and happy as when we first arrived only 45-50 minutes before!  Fan-blimmin-tastic!  Loved it,.....hated it.....well maybe not quite as harsh as that.....but loved it all at the same time!  This toopalarde is well happy to be back to having the discipline of belonging toa run club!  

Toopalarde?  Oh, well, that is a name I heard my sister in law use, it's a very posh way of saying......tub of lard!  I will be Supairlite one day!