BUPA Great Manchester 10k

Well yesterday was the day of my first BUPA Manchester 10k race, 40000 people took part ranging from Olympic champions to wheelchair bound heroes, I wasn't one of the Olympic champions!!
I drove to Altrincham and took the tram into Manchester town centre and then walked through the streets of runners and supporters to my baggage area where i could leave my belongings, once I'd dropped that off and been stamped with my baggage bus number, I headed towards the start. I was quite early so I could take in the atmosphere which was by now beginning to get louder.

The sun was beating down and it was only 10am, I wasn't due to assemble with my green wave until 1135 so I had an energy gel and decided to watch the other waves starting off, I had friends in different waves so frantically tried to see them and offer up some support but couldn't see them apart from my old friend Kay who in last years race tore muscles, I waved her off and then it was my turn, I was quite near the front of our wave which meant I had to turn round to see the warm up platform which was where I was stood to support the others, it was about 500m from the start so with my eyes i couldn't see that far so just did a few dance moves trying to copy the others. once that wa done it was time to wait for the gun, it didn't take long, a huge roar went up and the gun fired, off i set, over the timing mat and I started my garmin to see what my time might be. I thought i would set off quite steadily, at the start it seems to be a free for all, jostling for position and trying to get a clear run ahead, I managed this quite easily and I was away, the streets were lined with loads of people cheering their charity runners and friends, buses from Christies, McMillan's lined the route supporting their runners too, horns, whistles and those inflated things they bang together created a tremendous atmosphere to run along to. My garmin beeped and I looked down at the watch, it said I had done the first mile in 8:41 which surprised me a little, when the second beep went off I looked down again and saw 8:38, I thought my watch was playing games with me as I didn't feel I was running that fast.  The sun was by now belting down, I began to get quite hot as we got close to Old Trafford my face was burning,

I was longing for a water stop as I was also dehydrating I think, thankfully just around the corner form the football ground there was a sign saying water stop ahead, great, so I headed to that, grabbed a bottle, took a quick drink and squirted some at the girls handing out the bottles, I'm sure they appreciated the cool water on such a hot day.
As I ran slower I couldn't help but think that I had helped to build the course, the bumpy pot holed roads on the outskirts of Trafford Park are where I drive my 44tonne truck so I did my little bit to help.
As we turned the corner and headed back towards the centre of Manchester and the finish line I began to get more weary, my Achilles was now quite sore and I was boiling, we approached a shower tent and I thought shall I or shan't I? would it soak me and make it uncomfortable to run after it or would it cool me down, I made the decision to go through it as I'd paid my money I wanted my value for money lol, it was actually very refreshing and cool but it didn't last very long as the sun was making up for being in hiding for the last  years and directing all it's stored energy straight at my head. I didn't want to but i succumbed and walked for a hundred yards, not a bimble more of a forced march, it was probably as quick as my running at that stage but I soon started running again as I wanted to get a good time, Bridgewater Way turned into Chester Road and the

BUPA BOOST zone came into sight, from my memory of cycling to Paris jelly babies were the thing for a boost, so I took a handful and put them in my mouth, I did not have the will to chew them, I tried but ended up spitting them out errrr, that was a first for me, wasting food but I had to carry on as the finish was almost upon me, I walked another 50-100 yards to try and give me some energy to make a push for the line, the 800m sign came and went but I think it took another 1000m before the 400m sign came along, the crowds were by this point getting bigger and louder, a few children were holding their hands out wanting a high 5 and nobody was obliging them so I strayed from the middle of the road and went across and high fived them. on the race number we wore on the front our names are printed, only 1 man said " well done Geoff, nearly there" I thought he knew me until I realised he'd read my name, I was now in the last 100m and even though it was very hard, I managed a sprint to the end, grimacing in pain and effort I headed to the finish line and over the timing mat, I slumped with my hands on my knees for a second or two, took deep breaths and headed for the goody bag stand to get my goody bag. I didn't want to look at my time, i just wanted a drink and to find some shade, bottles of water were handed out and there was a powerade drink in the goody bag so they soon disappeared. I checked my phone to see where I was meeting up with Kay and Steve and slowly hobbled towards there. I then checked my garmin to see what time I had done, 58 Min's and 12 seconds, I was disappointed with that especially after seeing I'd done the first 2 miles so quickly. Anyway, I met up with Kay and Steve and we had a nice chat and a couple of cold drinks, I headed to the tram stop and I headed back home a bit down after the time I had achieved.
I woke up this morning and I couldn't put my heel down on the floor my Achilles was that stiff. I have now looked at my garmin dashboard on the laptop and it is telling me the time I ran yesterday was the fastest pace I'd ever run for any distance since I started running again last year, so taking into account the persistent injuries and subsequent lack of proper training I need to be happy with my efforts, I'm not up to other people's standards, those who have trained, those who have natural fitness or have been exercising for years, I am me, I am still a very long way from where I want to be fitness wise, I have decided to take a 1 month break from all running in the hope of easing off the Achilles issues, in the meantime it's stretching and cycling for me and probably a lot of walking once the pain and stiffness dies down.
My next run is in July at the Olympic stadium in London.

FIRST POST INJURY RUN AGAIN!!

Have you been wondering where I've been? I'm sure you have, well, for the last 6 weeks I've been having physiotherapy for my Achilles problem. Yes, I've moved on from calf problems and I'm working my way down my body so Achilles it is now. The expensive physiotherapy who is a slip of a girl, 14 yrs old at the most, seems to know what shes on about though. She diagnosed my problem as tendinitis of the Achilles, this she did by making me stand on my tiptoes, bending forward at the ankles and tickling my feet. She gave me 1 exercise to do and put on her Dick Turpin mask and charged me well for it. The exercise was a simple one, finding a stair or a curb for when I'm out working and standing on it on the balls of my feet then dropping my ankle as far as it will go, then raise the ankle to a neutral position, do this 3x15 sets 3 times a day, I succeeded at that for 12 days then 2 days before I was due back to see her it got very painful, i rested it and she said that was good that i did.

on the second visit to her I had more ultrasound, which basically is rubbing cold jelly like goo into my Achilles with a plastic implement, could be a spoon for all I know as I'm flat on my tummy. Once again Adam Ant was playing Stand and deliver in the background as she took my money and ran, lucky her i couldn't run yet!!

Sent away to exercise again, but this time I was told to walk at least 4 times a week, which i have managed to do, Ive had a new friend to walk with, his name is Angus and he's a bearded collie lurcher cross and is a handful to say the least. He is very affectionate and everyone say he's a handsome lad just like me(yeah right). So I've been walking at least 1.6 miles a night, I have also sneakily run a few times, only 30-50 yards once a night with Angus pulling me along, Ive continued with the exercising but I have let slip on the calf stretches, I must get back to doing them and I've also got a new book called  Running Anatomy, I'm hopeless at reading, not that I can't read, my mind wanders, this book has a lot of pictures which explain which muscle is being trained in the exercises so it isn't too bad for me, maybe I should search google and see if Janet and John do a running book.

So now, we are in the present, the 6th May, it's bank holiday Monday and when i woke up the sun was shining and I had a dog's feet in my back, not massaging me just digging his bloody claws in, so I decided to get up, don my running shorts and t shirt, turn the Garmin on and get out there and try this running lark again. I walked the first quarter mile then jogged slowly for about 100 yards, straight away I felt the Achilles giving me some pain so I walked down the hill to the River Weaver, once down there I started to jog again slowly, the pain had eased and I carried on a bit further and then walked again, by the time I had started to run for the 3rd time the pain wasn't there, Yes I could still feel the Achilles wasn't right but there was no pain, I ran on the flat by the side of the river, I did my longest run which was about 400m then I walked again for a short while. I kept the pace slow and ran pain free for the rest of the time, I'm as happy as the bunnies I saw along the route, if you like nature and I do, then this route is for you, Heron's, ducks of various varieties, bunnies, sparrowhawks and jumping fish as well as a million gnats, mosquitoes and Tsetse flies, you can see the route HERE

 

I am always apprehensive and probably negative too, this comes from being injured so long I think, first it was the calf of my right leg, then it was the calf of my left leg and now it is the Achilles of my left leg, hopefully this strengthening of the muscles around it and the stretching will help massively and I will be able to run pain free and increase my distances. I've paid for and missed out on 3 runs lately including next weeks Chester half marathon which is so annoying, I have the BUPA Manchester 10k in 20 days, I aim to just get round that in one piece, no time pressures, just get round and experience a great event. In the meantime, in 10 days time I am in Chester visiting a specialist about my tendinitis injury, hopefully he will sort it out once and for all and I can take part in the 2 great events I have been lucky enough to get in to, in July I am running at the same stadium where the London Olympics were run, how amazing will that be running 5 miles and entering the stadium with a crowd of 20,000 people cheering me on,

and then in September I am not only doing the English half marathon in Warrington but also The Greatest half Marathon in the world, THE GREAT NORTH RUN, magic fingers crossed for an injury free summer so I can train properly for these events.

FEELING RESTLESS

Well tomorrow morning I should have been running in the Lymm 10k, it was also my chance to run and raise the profile of the CATS FOUNDATION which is the Tay Sachs foundation, Tay–Sachs disease is a rare autosomal recessive genetic disorder that mainly affects children.
It causes a relentless deterioration of mental and physical abilities in an individual and results in premature death.

With me only being able to walk due to physio's advice I have emailed them(with no response) to cancel and see if I can run on another date, hopefully I can as they've sent me a running vest.
My stretches and exercise is going ok, when I first started them I felt an initial boost and felt it was working straight away, but after a week of doing the exercises I still get a bit of pain so I have to be patient and not rush this, hard when all I want to do is get out there and run. My left ankle still feels weaker than the right so I need to keep going and get it up to strength then I can start jogging again slowly. Pyhsio said I need to be walking uphill if I can, there are some good hills down by the river very close to here so doing that should aid me as well before I go to see the physio again next Thursday.

Lots of my facebook running group are doing the Edinburgh half marathon tomorrow, I wish them luck, maybe one day I'll do a bigger event, saying that The Great North Run in September is not that small a do.

End in sight???????????

Here are a couple of photos from last weeks run in Runcorn. The top one is of the start with the Runcorn Bridge in the background, the 2nd one below is one of me near the finish, I look fat, slow, bald and knackered. If it had been a close up you'd have seen me hot and sweaty too, I must learn to dress for the weather conditions.

 

Having visited the physio on Saturday I have been doing my exercise and stretch whilst out at work driving the truck. When I have to stop to load or unload I now have to look round for a curb or an empty pallet to use as a step, I stand on the ball of my foot on the pallet/curb and then lower my ankle down as far as I can and hold for 20 seconds. I then do the same but raise my heel to a neutral position and then drop down again, I have to do this 15 times for 3 reps, 3 times a day. I have done them for 2 days now and I can feel an improvement already, fingers magically crossed that there is an end in sight to this injury, here's hoping.

I haven't given up just yet.......

7 days ago I did the "RUN THE BRIDGE" race which was in Runcorn, the start was on the Runcorn side of the Bridge over the murky Mersey. I had not trained one single step for this race as I had been nursing my Achilles from the 10k race I did in Delamere Forest a few weeks ago.
It was a 5 mile race starting by the station and finishing in some park errr 5 miles away. I had  good warm up jogging around the car park for half an hour, doing some stretches mainly for my ankles and calf's, the start filled up quite quickly and I think there must have been about 700 doing the race, 455 men not sure about the women but there were plenty of them, club runners, plodders like me and one bloke dressed as flash

 

The whistle went and the timer on the land rover started, i saw it get to 3 seconds and that as the last i saw of it as the leaders set off so fast. A slight incline to the Bridge and before I knew it we were over the Mersey, I settled into a comfortable pace, I'd forgotten to charge my Garmin so used my phone to record my route and pace etc, as I'd started Nike+ on my iphone my embarrassing music kicked in and I couldn't turn it off, other runners avoided me as sixties music and classical stuff belted out a slow rhythm not conducive with a faster pace, anyway it kept me going and before I knew it the first mile marker was in sight, we had already passed Eddie Stobart's depot at Widnes and gone through a dismal industrial estate, the route was very flat with no ups or downs apart from the Bridge itself. The scenery was quite boring, a few houses but mainly industrial areas, as we approached the 2 mile marker I started to feel my Achilles getting stiffer, I'm always stiff, I didn't feel I was running fast but slowed down slightly to see if it eased a little, it didn't, so I just carried on and the pain got worse, a lot worse. At mile 3 I'd say I was almost in agony and by mile 4 all I could think was just get to the finish line, we hit the countryside briefly and I tried to look round at something nice to see but failed, the Runcorn area seems more devoid of interest than Northwich does. People I had overtaken started to overtake me back, I kept going, kept leaning forward and gritting my teeth, in other runs I had taken part in I always had a sprint finish, this one was different, the pain was bad in my Achilles and I just couldn't sprint, I did put maximum effort in, maybe it was lack of training and not the pain but I got to the line and breathed a huge sigh of relief but the pain didn't stop, I just wanted to get on the bus to get back to my van and put some freeze gel on the Achilles, I was handed a bottle of water, looked around but couldn't see anyone wearing a medal, what a let down, all that pain for nothing.

 

I got on the bus and sat waiting in the heat, my face was burning, eventually the bus headed back to the start, I got out of my seat and could hardly walk, I managed to get back to my van and was in so much pain I forgot to put anything on my Achilles. I just drank more water and set off back home where I iced it.

 

I had finished the race in a time I am more than happy with 46 Min's and 1 second, a pace of 9.13 a mile, considering I was in so much pain I think I did very well and deserved a medal

 

So seeing as I was in so much pain I decided to see a sports injury specialist or just a physio with big prices as they should be known. Anyway she said I had been doing the worst thing possible, resting my ankle, so she has prescribed me 1 exercise and 1 stretch for me to do for the next few weeks. She also told me what I had also been fearing and that is me having to lose money by cancelling 2 runs Ive already booked in to do, the Lymm 10k and the Chester half marathon.

So no running for the foreseeable future, just walking uphill which is supposed to be best for me and plenty of stretching and exercising the Achilles 3 times a day, I can do that and hopefully strengthen it enough to be able to run the BUPA Manchester 10k on May 26th.

OH and by the way I beat The Flash so that makes me superhuman !!!!



 

I GIVE UP

Well I'm blogging again today, I was going to stop as I just didn't feel in the right mood to carry on, does anybody ever read the stuff I write??? Maybe it's not about other people reading and more about me keeping a diary of my efforts or lack of them that is the key to carrying on.

I'm still flaming injured, sore Achilles, its rested, its stretched and it's not being put under the stress of running at the moment. I haven't run for 2 weeks, this is a regular thing at the moment, I've got a 5 mile run next Sunday, Easter Sunday across Runcorn Bridge, this is also Run for Fun's 1st anniversary run so I can't back out of that. It's so annoying and soul destroying that I cannot get into a regular 2 or 3 runs a week without feeling there is going to be pain at some point, perhaps I'm not meant to be the runner I want to be, maybe just a mid life crisis dream that I should just give up on and ride a bike instead.

Trying to get into my doctors surgery seems to be a hard thing at the minute, the Doctor who was recommended for sports injuries only works in the mornings so i can't see him, if I'm driving at 830am I miss out on the appointments so it's all about timing I think. Will keep trying next week before all the Doctors go on their Easter holidays, must be great to have all these holidays, still I'm lucky to be working so will have to wait for my turn, maybe taking up the offer of a trip to Morocco to do a half marathon there should be in my sights, bit of sun would be nice.

BETTER LATE THAN NEVER

Last Sunday I took part in  10k run in Delamere Park, Cheshire. I had only done a couple of runs before hand since my latest injury, so I was determined to go slowly and make sure I got round in one piece. I arrived early to a slightly snowy Delamere, it didnt last long it soon turned to cold rain, there was also an icy wind blowing so I stayed wrapped up in my thick fleece, Ron Hill running pants, tracksuit, hat and gloves and made my way to the registration tent, signed in and got straight back in my van and put the heating back on.
Slowly but surely the place started filling up, athlete after athlete turned up, looking like Mo Farah and Paula Radcliffe and I felt quite unfit, I am so that wasnt a problem. 30 mins from the start I made my way downt to the start area, I'd text my running friend for last minute advice on energy gels and dextrose tablets and ended up just having an energy drink. It was bitterly cold so I ended up warming up, I dont normally warm up very much but i had a good 20-30 minute warm up running slowly up and down a small grass bank, stretching and keeping as warm as I could. It was lmost time and the 2 warm up girls decided to get everyone moving, I already was so I didnt get involved in the dancing and waving and just wanted the raace to start, I was ready, I was eager, start the flipping race!!!!!

5, 4, 3, 2, 1 Goooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

and we were off, very slowly, too many people in too small a space and there was only 500 of us. The course was a loop through the forest, around a large mere and a lap was 5k, some people had decided on 5k but I had signed up for 10k so had to do 2 laps, the course was reasonably flat but quite muddy and slippy in places, plenty of people were avoiding the puddles, in my eyes they were losing time going around them instead of through them, its this winning attitude that makes me so fast , yeah right.

first lap, once we got going seemed to go quite quickly but I was puffing a bit and wondered should I only do 5k instead of 10, but there was a nagging voice in my head, "DONT GIVE IN", so I kept going past the 5k finish line and there was no going back. I took a bottle of water from the drinks station, bit of a waste of time as the water went more down my top than my throat so I only had a few sips and then threw it by the marshalls post not like the inconsiderate people throwing them wildly into the forest. There were signs at every kilometer and at the 7km marker my achilles was beginning to suffer a little, I wanted to ease off a bit but I also wanted to finish as strong as I could too, so I just plodded on, kept leaning forward and picked a target in front of me, which happened to be a blonde girl about 100 metres in front of me. I got to the 9k marker and tried to speed up a touch, there was the sound of the tannoy at the finish line in the distance and it was getting louder, the blonde was getting closer too, as we took the final bend I made my final push, breathing hrd I overtook the blonde and sort of sprinted as fast as I could for the last 50 yards, i'd made it, I was pooped, I grabbed a medal nd a bottle of water and snuck off back to my van to have a breather and a protein bar. I had finished the run and checked my time, i had done the 5.97 miles in 58 minutes and 34 seconds, I was very pleased with that and a bit surprised it was so fast.

my achilles was sore afterwards and still is today almost a week later and I am planning to run slowly tomorrow morning. my next race isnt until the end of March, 5 miles over the Runcorn Bridge