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  • Damien NagleDamien Nagle ✭✭✭
    edited September 2019
    I got another park run P.B today which surprised me.
    On friday I jogged 8k after my son on his bicyle and then 15 hours later I did the park run.
    I still run 2 times a week but in the last month I have changed it to two full out decent runs plus 2/7k walks as fast as I can do (I aim to walk 7k in 64 mins).

    Have any of you guys found that walking helps?

  • Good morning all,

    Despite not running much at the moment WtnMel you’re still managing to maintain a good pace, did you manage to fit in another run yesterday? I hope you and Margaret your holiday in the chilly north, especially your skinny dip next Sunday.

    Damien I don’t walk long distances very often so I don’t really know if it is particularly beneficial for improving your running, but I expect any regular exercise would help, and at least with walking you don’t have impact concerns. 

    Last Tuesday the Tour of Britain bike race came through our part of the world. I’d checked their race route and saw they would be riding past the Derwent Reservoir, so I decided a good spot to watch them pass by would be on a corner by a narrow bridge, close to the reservoir. The leaders came through a good couple of minutes before the rest of the peloton, then the remaining mass of cyclists flew past in a blur. A couple of riders threw their empty water bottles to the side of the road and I was fortunate enough to “rescue” one of the discarded water bottles. Steve gave it a good wash out and used it on his bike ride yesterday (I don’t think it made him any faster though). :)

    Up until yesterday I hadn’t been out for a run since last Sunday. That was partly because I wanted to rest my back and partly because I’d had a busy week. Yesterday though I went over to the reservoir again and had a chilly 6 mile run to test my back out. I’m pleased to say it was fine, no pain at all. I also noticed that I felt a lot stronger in my legs and upper body when I was running, which I can only put down to the yoga I’ve been doing lately. I’m pleased about that as our cross country season starts in a couple of weeks and I struggle on some of the tougher courses. I hope I can take that feeling of strength into those races now. 


  • Morning,

    Damien - I think any exercise helps with general fitness and must have a side-effect of helping with running. I'm planning to walk the Dales High Way next July (90 miles) with the people I did the Coast2Coast with in 2014. That will entail plenty of long hilly walks over the coming months as preparation, so I'll be able to put my theory into practise.

    Aquarius - I didn't run yesterday as I had to go and see my eldest son. I'm heading into town shortly to get Margaret's birthday present (it's her birthday the day after the dip) so I'm hoping to get out for a run this afternoon. But as I was out yesterday, I'll need to have run and recovered before heading to the kitchen later this afternoon as I've promised to cook a Sunday roast today instead. What a treat seeing the cyclists and 'rescuing' a water bottle - we went to see the TDF when it started in London a few years ago. Glad to hear your back has recovered and you're feeling strong thanks to the yoga.
  • WtnMel I imagine that you don't get to see Margaret's Uncle very often?
    Sarah is doing very well, getting quicker all the time. 

    Damien,  well done for another parkrun PB. I never do long walks but do walk 1.5 miles most days, to and from Supermarket. I suppose that helps as it uses different muscles from running. 

    Aquarius, Steve was lucky rescuing a water bottle, a souvenir which he can also use. I watched the TDF many years ago,  when a stage started in Southsea.  I took lots of photos with "a real camera,  not digital, and before mobile phones. 
    Good news that your back is feeling better and that yoga is strengthening your upper body. 

    WtnMel again, hope you got home in good time to cook "The Sunday Roast!"

    I ran 6 miles this morning at tempo pace and 9 miles yesterday at steady pace. 
    Here is a photo I took yesterday with my phone. 

  • Afternoon (already!),

    HS - you're correct. With us in Gloucs and Margaret's Uncle in Gateshead, get-togethers are few and far between. Well done re your two recent runs. I didn't run yesterday in the end so Margaret's 24-hour delayed Sunday roast was served up without any further timing issues. Nice photo btw ..

    I ran this morning and did my usual 4.6ml route around town. Instead of a steady session like last time, I set off at a faster pace and tried to keep it going. The pace did get slower but overall, it was a faster run than recent ones on the same route.


  • Aquarius/WtnMel, thanks.

    WtnMel, good to hear that the delayed Sunday Roast went off without a hitch.
    Well done improving on the time for your 4.6 mile route around town.

    This morning was a spin session, comprising a mixture of flat and hill work.
  • I’ve had a cold hanging about for a few days (and had my flu jab this morning) so thought I’d take it easy, and made do with a gentle 4 mile jog this afternoon along the Derwent Walk (keeping an eye out for any dogs off the lead). To be honest I haven’t a lot of energy as a tickley cough is keeping me awake at nights, so 4 miles was about as much as I could manage. Still, I feel better for having made the effort to get out for a run.
    There's definitely an autumnal feel to the weather today, I succumbed to leggings and a long sleeve top for my run as I was pretty chilled after my walk to the shop this morning. 

    Good to see you are still keeping up the spin classes HS.

    It’s pretty quiet on here at the moment, I know WtnMel is away but where is everyone else? I hope everyone is keeping well and possibly just too busy with other things to post just now.

  • Aquarius, sorry to hear that your cold is still hanging on. I was wondering whether they had started the flu jabs this September, so I'll make an appointment tomorrow. 
    Very wise taking it easy after your jab, and good to hear that the run made you feel better.
    It was quite chilly here too, this morning, when I set off at 8.30 for a 5.6 miles steady forest run with Sarah H. It was her first run since she ran the New Forest Marathon on September 8th.
    I'm only doing spin class once a week now, and occasionally missing class altogether.

    It's a bit worrying how quiet it is on here now, and I also hope everyone is ok and not suffering with injuries.
  • Where has the nice events list gone to? It seems that "let's do this " has taken over. I cant filter for 10ks or the south east. Very annoying!!
  • Antony, I've just looked at EVENTS and had no problems searching for races at all distances and regions. I always use the race finder on "fetcheveryone"though.

    I ran 7.6 miles in the forest this morning at a good pace. Was chased by two dogs that were friendly, and had to dodge galloping ponies during the last mile. They have released pigs into the forest again to eat the acorns which are poisonous to the ponies. Every forest run is a bit of an adventure. :fearful:
  • HS - dogs, ponies and pigs, that sounds like quite an obstacle course! At least the dogs were friendly ones. Galloping ponies are a bit more scary though.

    Antony I’m afraid I don’t use RW for race listings, we have a great site in the northeast for local races so I tend to use that, and I keep an eye on various Facebook running groups for any other races.


    No running for me today, I’m not sure if it’s a consequence of my flu jab yesterday but my cold was back with a vengeance today. As it’s been such a surprisingly warm day we made the most of it by sitting in the garden this afternoon. Tomorrow I have another physio session to see how my back is doing, so I won’t try to run tomorrow. Depending on my cold I’m hoping to do a hilly parkrun on Saturday in preparation for next week’s first cross country meeting. I wear trail shoes (Inov8 talon) for XC rather than spikes, so for yesterday’s run I wore my trail shoes because I wanted to check their condition and make sure they’ll still be ok for this season. Fortunately they were really comfortable and look good as new, so it looks like I’ll get another season out of them. (I know I need to change my road shoes roughly every 500 miles, but I’m not sure whether there’s a similar rule of thumb for trail shoes - any ideas HS?)

    One really irritating aspect I’ve noticed lately on this site - every time I open it up I have to accept cookies before it will give me access. This has just started happening the last few days. I tried to just select the cookies I was happy with (actually I’d rather not have any) but a huge list came up with loads of different companies, so I started with the first one and to opt out it meant visiting their site and registering with them, which seems to defeat the object surely? Why would I want to register with a company that I don’t want to have access to my personal information? In the end I just accepted all cookies and now I’m inundated with adverts 😖

  • Further to my cookies rant above. I’ve just gone back into the forum and had a message asking if I wanted to withdraw my consent to cookies - so of course I clicked on “yes”. We’ll see what happens....
  • Aquarius, sorry to hear that your cold has returned. It is possible that the flu jab may have had something to do with it. Regarding duration of trail shoes, as far as I know, there is no rule of thumb for them. I wear mine until either the rubber spikes have worn down, or the uppers start to split. I wear Salomon Speedcross 4 shoes and they definitely last for further than 500 miles. 

    That's very odd regarding the cookies, I've never had that problem. I was wondering whether you had accidentally clicked on the "cookies choices" button in the bottom right hand corner of the screen. It will be interesting to find out what happens now that you have withdrawn your consent to cookies. By the way, do you post on a laptop, tablet, or on your phone? I do most of my RW posts on my laptop, unless I am downloading a photo to the forum, where I use my phone.

    PS your mention of the flu jab has reminded me that I forgot to phone for an appointment today, so will have to wait until next week now.
  • Greetings from Gateshead (well, Team Valley to be precise) We arrived here yesterday having stopped off overnight in Sheffield. Today we caught the bus to Gateshead Interchange and walked to the Baltic Centre and after crossing the Millennium Bridge and wandering along the river and crossing back, also had a look at the Sage Centre. Tomorrow we're hoping to fit in another trip into town to go on an open-top "Toon" bus tour before we head to Ashington ready for Sunday's dip. Then after the dip, we'll be heading south and stopping in York for a couple of days.

    HS - would prefer friendly dogs over ponies any day.

    Aquarius - I've had a text in the last day or so inviting me to get my flu jab.

    On my phone so just a flying visit - will try and catch up again in the next few days.

  • Stop press: Over dinner this evening we decided we didn't fancy walking around Gateshead again tomorrow. We're thinking of coming back again sometime anyway and will do the "toon bus tour" then.

    So instead, we're going to drive to Druridge Bay tomorrow and have a walk on the beach instead before checking into the hotel. And it's quite possible we'll have a paddle in the sea to see how cold the water is ;-)
  • WtnMel I was shopping at the Team Valley today! Were you staying at the Premier Inn?

    What did you think of the Gateshead Millennium Bridge? That was Steve’s major claim to fame (as the principle civil engineer on that project). We’ve got a lovely photo of him being introduced to the queen at the official opening. I’m not a big fan of the Baltic Arts Centre, it always feels like a big building with very little inside, but then I’m not much of a fan of modern art anyway. I do like The Sage though, and have been to some great classical concerts there.

    I hope you’re not expecting too many cultural delights on your bus tour tomorrow. Fingers crossed that the weather holds for your dip on Sunday. 

    It’s a pity you couldn’t have fitted Harrogate in to your plans and taken in a bit of the cycling World Road Championships. Btw we were also in London for the TdeF a couple of years ago. I remember we took up our position by the side of the road and settled down to wait (ages) for the bikes to arrive. At last they came, after loads of support vehicles, police motorbikes etc, and at the critical moment as they swept past a girl next to me suddenly produced an enormous flag that she held up, arms stretched wide, and completely obscured my view! I was not happy.


    HS, thanks for that advice re trail shoes. My rubber spikes look almost as good as new and the uppers have no splits in them yet, so hopefully they’ll last for some time yet. 

    I’m still getting that cookies “wall” stopping me accessing the forum until I click on accept. Maybe it’s because I’m using my iPhone, I’ll try to remember to use my laptop when I next post and see if that makes any difference.

    Don’t forget to book your flu jab!

  • Whoops our posts crossed WtnMel. It’s a much better idea to go to Druridge Bay. 
  • Aquarius - the Premier Inn at Team Valley is being refurbished so we've been staying at the one on Lobley Hill instead ..
  • Afternoon all,

    WtnMel,you certainly get around during your holidays.

    Aquarius, I hope that by posting on your laptop gets over the problem with the cookies.
    I never get notification from the surgery about flu jabs. My sister has had one and had her jab today. Her surgery is just down the road from mine. I will phone up on Monday to make an appointment. My sister told me that her shoulder aches after the jab, whereas in the past, it hasn't.

    I ran 8.3 miles in the forest this morning on a different route, and didn't encounter any cows or ponies. There were several dog walkers, but they kept their dogs under control. The last 4 miles were into a very strong headwind which made the going very hard.
  • HS my arm was also very painful after my flu jab on Thursday, so much so I mentioned it to the physio when I was there yesterday in case I’d injured it somehow, I could understand the muscle aching as that’s where the jab goes, but I wasn’t expecting my whole shoulder to ache. Well done on your forest run today, and good that you didn’t encounter any cows or ponies.

    I was pleased the physio said my back is a lot looser than when I saw her a fortnight ago. I’ve got some exercises to do to keep it that way so I’m hoping it won’t flare up again.

    I decided to do Gibside parkrun today in the hopes of there being fewer dogs than at my usual parkrun. Fortunately I only saw one, and that was well behaved. It’s been two and a half years since I last did Gibside but surprisingly my time was only 2 seconds different. It’s a pretty challenging hilly trail course around the National Trust’s Gibside Estate but excellent training for trails or XC, I’ll certainly be doing it again. Unfortunately Steve and I are still struggling with colds so I think I’ll try to be sensible and give running a miss for a few days now.

    I was just about to post this when a message popped up on my phone. Our club was holding it’s annual Prize and Presentation night last night but we couldn’t get over to the coast to attend. The message I’ve just got was to tell me I got an award and need to collect it from the club. What a lovely surprise, I can’t imagine what it’s for...:)

  • Aquarius, good to hear that your back is looser now, and hope the exercising helps to keep it from tightening up again. Sorry that you and Steve are still struggling with colds. Well done with your parkrun. A few rest days should help cure your colds.
    Interesting that you have achieved an award and don't know what for.

    Very heavy rain today and I just ran 4.5 miles on roads this morning.
  • Good afternoon all
    WtnMel - how did your skinny dip go this morning? I hope it wasn’t too cold, the North Sea can be pretty chilly!
    HS is this a rest day for you?
    It’s pouring here today, quite a change from yesterday’s blue skies and sunshine. I’m glad I’m not running today, 
  • HS our posts crossed. I see you have had rain too😐
  • Evening all,

    Aquarius, I rang the surgery today and have an appointment for a flu jab on Saturday. It's at 9.08 am, so I might not feel like running afterwards if it makes my arm ache.

    It rained for a few minutes this morning and then stopped. It's raining now and forecast to rain all evening.
    Ran a steady 8.3 miles in the forest this morning with the two Sarah's and Danii.
  • Another flying visit from me as we're still away and I'm using my phone. We're in York now and as it's Margaret's birthday today we've been to Betty's for a champagne afternoon tea. We followed that with a visit to York Minster. The weather doesn't look as promising tomorrow so we think we might go to the Railway Museum.

    The dip was great fun (we worked out it was our 4th NESD). I didn't see Rev Kate Bottley who was dipping this year but we got chatting to some nervous newbies who'd not dipped before and they were exhilarated and buzzing afterwards. The weather was a bit murky but the sea seemed a bit warmer than in previous years. And the waves were so strong, Margaret got knocked over. Highly recommended! 

    Another day in York tomorrow but then we head home on Wednesday. I might even be able to go for a run to burn off the calories from all the cake we had today.


  • Glad to hear you’ve got your flu jab appointment booked HS and I hope you don’t get a painful arm afterwards. I think I was probably just unlucky, Steve’s arm was fine after his jab. Perhaps my arm was painful because the injection is into the muscle, and Steve’s arms are a lot more muscular than my skinny specimens. Incidentally our incredibly disorganised health centre texted Steve and I today to remind us that the flu vaccine is available and to ring them for an appointment. I’ll have to call in tomorrow to make sure our records have been noted to show we’ve already had this year’s vaccine.🙄
    I’m going to try to get to the club tomorrow to pick up my mystery award, I won’t be taking part in training though due to my cold. I’ve been trying to work out what I’ve done that has merited an award and I think it must be because I was the first female finisher in our last GP race of last winter. (It wasn’t that I was particularly fast, just the handicap working in my favour). Anyway I’ll find out tomorrow night.
    Good running again from you and the two Sarahs plus Danii, do you have another event lined up?
  • I reached 45 the other day.
    After my injury to my ankle in December I think I might have actually beaten the times I was getting with my different training methods before the injury.
    One of my old drinking mates who is similar age to me has been getting good times on his social runs so I am hoping that my self belief will help me beat him on our next run.

  • Morning all,

    WtnMel, I like York. Many many years ago, when I was just a teenager, I spent a couple of weeks with a friend,  working on a farm in Strenstall, a few miles outside of York. We did make several visits to it. We also visited the railway museum and were very impressed. I used to be a train spotter, in the good old days of steam trains.
    Glad you enjoyed the skinny dipping, but had to chuckle at your comment that it was highly recommended that Margaret was knocked over :lol:

    Aquarius, thanks, I don't expect that I will have any side effects after my flu jab, but fingers crossed. I had a similar occasion to you a few years ago; a couple of weeks after an NHS Health check, I received a letter inviting me to have one!
    Hope you collected your award yesterday and were pleased with it?
    I haven't any more races scheduled for this year, but will get back into it again next year.

    I did a 5 mile road run yesterday morning in torrential rain. I've got to stay in this morning as I'm waiting for the Inspector to come and inspect the loft insulation that was installed in June.

    Damien, good to hear that your running times are improving since your ankle injury in December. Hope you will beat your friend in your next run together.
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