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Run Faster

1/17/2012

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In May this year I will be doing a 250km run in the Middle East, in Jordan.  The race begins in a place known as  the Valley of the moon.  The race will pass through  four deserts and takes place over seven days.  It won’t be as hot as some of the deserts I have run in as the temperature never really gets above 40 degrees Celsius. It is a self sufficient run, so you have to carry all your food for the week, sleeping bag, cooking utensils etc and there is also a list of mandatory equipment, so it is hard to get your rucksack under 8kg.  The water is handed out at each checkpoint and you can carry up to 3 litres at a time.   

Up until a few weeks ago, I had just been maintaining my running, which was always around 60 miles a week (this does not include the runs I do with my clients).  On the 26th December I started my specific training and steered it towards longer runs and more strength training. 

I always like to build up my training gradually, as this minimalises the chances of injury and particularly since breaking my back, I have had to be very careful and really listen to my body.  The biggest change to my training has been to my speed sessions.  Whereas around 40 per cent of my runs in a week used to be at a moderate to hard tempo, I now only run one or two of my runs out of the seven (yes, I run seven days a week and will say more another time about why I don’t have a rest day) at a hard pace.  It has taken along time (over two years) to get my pace up and there were times that I doubted I ever would.  

The nerve damage I sustained meant my legs were a lot slower to react than they used to be and because the my ball of the right foot and big toe is still numb apart from the paresthesia (pins and needles), pushing off is sometimes tricky, and I have found that my left side is becoming more dominant.  But the good news is, through perseverance, plyometric and balance training; I am almost up to my original pre-accident speed and know that I can get faster still.  I want to emphasise this didn’t happen on its own, I put myself through a lot of crazy training, but I just want everyone who has had similar injuries to me, in fact any sort of injury, to NEVER doubt that the body is incredible at healing itself, so long as you keep working at it.  It needs stimulation, leave it and it ends up like an old car, rusting away, starting slower, creaking more and getting more things wrong with it.  Use it regularly and it runs smoothly, look after it and it will keep going for a long time.


Please, please support me by donating money to Shelterbox.  I pay for my events out of my own pocket, all the money I raise goes to Shelterbox.  Please make my crazy runs mean something!
 

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Happy New Year and Happy Training!

1/1/2012

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I wanted to start the year with a fairly long run so that I could start the first day of the year as I mean to go on. 

Looking out of my window this morning, the weather wasn't exactly inspiring and I had a stinking head cold. 
But I had made my mind up several days ago that I would be doing a 20 mile run today, and it was written on my new 2012 calendar (Christmas present) complete with a little box next to it that would need a tick, or it would annoy me for the next 29 days until I changed the page to February.

Writing down my training in advance where I can see it always helps me stick to it.  A calendar is always better than a diary, because your diary needs to be opened by you, and you maybe tempted to avoid looking in it on the days you feel a little less motivated.  A bit like leaving bills unopened!

The weather didn't get any better on my run, in fact it got worse, but my cold amazingly got better, and I finished with a healthy 23 miles logged on my GPS. 

For those of you still nursing hangovers, and really couldn't face a healthy start today, tomorrow is the first day of the first week of the first month of the New year.  So no excuses this time!

Happy training!
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Setting Goals and shifting preconceptions

12/22/2011

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I didn't do a blog at the weekend, as I was saving it for today.  Today is a bit of a big deal for me, it was three years ago exactly that I broke my back.  It has taken three years to get to where I am now, and I am still not fully where I want to be. 

Do we ever truly reach our fitness goals or ambitions, and as soon as we get there, then what?  Usually it means moving the goal post further.  Today, amazingly, an incredible thing happened.   A lovely lady I have been training, proved just how quickly you can shift those goal posts.

She surprised herself so much that she was almost in shock as she never believed she would be able to do what she did tonight. 

I had help set the original goals, goals she thought were well out of her league, and here she was conquering them within a few weeks.  It was a life changing moment. 

This lovely lady had believed her legs would always be too weak for her to balance on a step without assistance, and she also thought her knee was incapable of bending in a certain way, partly as a result of surgery as a child; as she was born with one leg shorter than the other.  She suffers from atrophy in her calf, so is unsure of her footing due to weak muscles and poor proprioceptiion. 

However, what we discoverd together was, it wasn't the biomechanical problems holding her back, it was her being told as a child by Doctors that she wouldn't be able to, and shouldn't do certain things after the surgery. 

So, the biggest thing holding this lady back was in fact, a lack of confidence and that awful phrase that so many of you use and which I hate so much ......"BUT I CAN'T ....",

Unfortunately, she never had a decent follow up after her surgery, so all her life she lived by this ethos. 
Well, we soon changed that!  

Now, a whole experience has opened up for her, it means she will be able to cross stepping stones, walk on uneven surfaces, start jogging and who knows, maybe even take up surfing!

What makes this achievement so special, is that she also has osteoporosis, so gaining balance and strength, something she has never had before has become a vital skill that will make her condition, a much more manageable one.  

What I am therefore  trying to say to you is, sometimes you need to examine your goals, and question your own preconceptions about yourself, and this can mean sometimes challenging what other people say about you too, including those in the medical profession.   

So, why not, as a New Year's Resolution, find one goal you have set .....and now push it FURTHER!

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Running in the winter

12/10/2011

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Running in the winter

12/10/2011

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Many of you are probably thinking that now is a good time of year to hibernate.  After all, it is cold and wet and the mornings are dark and when you finish work, for most of us it is dark.  Hmm, it doesn't sound inspiring .... So, what are the options for training? 

You can join a gym perhaps?  They have heating and lighting and it has the added bonus of not having a dog chase you.  However, there is also the inconvenience of getting there, the gym membership can be costly, it tends to get monotonous, the machines you want to use are either occupied or plastered in the last person's sweat.  Also, if you are training for an outdoor event, you can't beat training outdoors for it. 

Running on a treadmill is not the same as running outside ... I know that sounds like an obvious statement, but for example,  your running gait tends to be different and so does your weight distribution.  This means that if you make the mistake of transferring from treadmill training to straight away running in a race on tarmac or uneven surfaces, you increase your chance of injuries, particularly shin splints.  Treadmills in gyms tend to have a good deal of shock absorpancy, which you don't get running outside on hard surfaces, you have to condition your muscles for this, and the best way is by running OUTDOORS.  Try varying your terrain and not running the same route each time. 

Of course being outside means that you have to hardcore the outdoors.  Wearing the right clothing helps, investing in a lightweight headtorch also solves the lack of light problem.  Finding someone who will run with you if you are scared of the dark, or even someone on a bike leading the way is an option.

When you run outdoors in hideous weather, you have to embrace it, enjoy the challenge of beating the elements - no really, it can be fun!!  You need to not dwell on the idea of it, because you will start talking yourself out of it. 

You will enjoy it once you are out there, you just have to GO.  The best thing you can do is, if you run before work in the mornings or college etc, when you get up, put on your running clothes straight away, even before the first toilet trip of the morning, so that you have no choice and your brain has to accept you are going out for a run NOW.  

Or if you run after work, don't think about it, just change instantly into your layers of running clothing as soon as you get home, put on some motivating music, grab your headtorch, and just go, (leave those snacks alone!). 

The training I do for my desert runs is largely mental, I run six days a week no matter what  as a minimum.  On my running day off, I always cross train. 

I run this much because it conditions my body into recovering faster. This enables me to do events that require you running an average of a marathon a day or more over several days.  The training you do will depend on what you are training for.  The training I do is specific for the events and kind of running I like to do, which is long distance and off road.

 Never go from never having run before, to running six days a week though, you need to build this amount of running gradually, it may take weeks if you are lucky, but usually it takes months. 

My next event is in May, over the next five and a half months my training gets more intense, I will end up running an average of 125 miles a week several weeks up to the event. 

You don't have to do this sort of training however to just get through running everyday for a week in a self sufficient run in 50 degrees Celsius. 

I proved this by doing no real training whatsoever for the Gobi March, a 150 mile self sufficient run with Racing the Planet in March 2010.  I had planned and entered to do it in 2009, but  I had broken my back in December 08, and had only learnt to walk again in March 2009, so had deferred the entry. 

I still couldn't run outside in November 2009 because of the nerve pain I was getting and the paralysis in lower parts of my back.  I managed about one run a week outside from January 2010, the rest was laboured jogging on a treadmill, having to hold on the majority of the time as my balance wasn't great. 

In March  2009 though, I succeeded in running most of  the Gobi race and somehow I won my age catergory and got fastest British woman.  What I am trying to say is, if you want to do something enough, you will find a way of doing it. 

Training is largely a mental game.  Having someone encourage you is a huge bonus too.  I was lucky enough to have a 14 year old son who cycled with me during my rehabilitation.  He would join me even at 6am in the morning, before he went to school, on the exercise bike, just to motivate me.  He cycled for an hour and I jogged on the treadmill for an hour.  I learnt alot from his support. 

When I run with clients I realise just how important having that support and just how important encouragement is.  We don't always know what we are capable of, sometimes we are never brave enough to try. 

It often takes someone else to see our potential.  So go on and get out there and test yourself ... if I can do it, absolutely anyone can!
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Christmas and being slack

12/3/2011

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This time of year always seems to be a training blip for lots of people.  There's the Christmas shopping to do, the work's Christmas party to go to, your partner's work's Christmas party, your social Club's Christmas party, old friends come home and want a party, the supermarkets all have irresistible chocolate aisles and mince pies are buy one box get one free.

This doesn't mean you should abandon your training altogether and do the usual thing of planning your New Year's Resolution, which only ever lasts a month, tops, and that doesn't begin until several days after the New Year's eve hangover, so three weeks or so and you get bored. Then, before you know it the sun comes out and you cringe looking at yourself with flesh showing .. and the flesh falling over your shorts, and... well you needed new shorts anyway ....NO!

Rewind, we are not going down that path, we are in training NOW.  Drink loads of water and jog off your hangover, save the chocolate for Christmas and Boxing Day, not the weeks leading up to Christmas, make the chocolate treats special, not gluttonous indulgement. It's hard, but there is no point having a Resolution after all the damage is already done.  

Resist overindulging now, Christmas is not when the shops start selling massive tins of your favourite assortments,  Christmas is 25th December, and a day or so won't matter to your training.  Weeks will!  Even better, go for a run or a bike ride early Christmas morning and you have earned your Christmas Dinner!
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Time, Time, never enough Time ...

11/25/2011

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One of the biggest excuses I hear when it comes to doing exercise is, 'I don't have any time'.

So let's think about this.  What are you doing right now? How long have you been on the computer for? Hmm?

I know, it isn't as simple as that.  Working out gets you sweaty and smelly, and you have to go to work after, or visit some friends, or you JUST haven't got the time!!! So, realistically how much time do you need a week?

If you want to see quick results, a minimum of five hours. 
That's 5 hours out the 168 that you have in a week.  Over seven days, that is less than an hour a day. 

I am going to give you a scenario with someone called Jim.

Jim works from 9am to 5pm on week days. 
His work is ten miles away.  It takes him twenty minutes to drive to work.  He leaves the house at 8:30am just to be sure. 
Jim always has an hour lunch break.
He usually gets home at about 5:40pm (by the time he stops at the petrol station for a quick snack on the way back).

Jim has two boys, one is four years old and the other is ten years old.  His wife looks forward to him coming home so she can have a break from the kids. 

The kids go to bed at 7pm. They usually have supper at 6:30pm.  On Friday nights Jim goes down the pub with his mates.  He usually comes back after 11pm.

At the weekend, Jim's wife usually keeps him busy with jobs that need doing around the home, by Saturday afternoon he slumps on the sofa and watches the TV.  Then he takes his oldest son on Sunday mornings to football training, whilst he waits in the car until he finishes.  More often then not, they stop at the drive through at McDonalds and pick up a quick snack of large fries, a big Mac and a shake, and sometimes a little desert, just to fill in that gap before tea.

Sunday evening usually involves a DVD and a few drinks relaxing on the sofa.

Quick quiz: Does Jim have any time to exercise?

The above is very simplified, and you may find it patronising, for example you may work more hours, take longer to drive home, have five kids not two etc. But if you have just identified time for Jim to exercise, and perhaps some sacrafices he could make ( we all spotted his trip to McDonalds), we
can start to look for time in our lives too that can be juggled around.

Try writing your typical week out.  If you can't spot where you can fit time to exercise in, I bet one of your friends could ...

If this still fails, call me or email your week's agenda to me. I am the Queen of finding time to train.  Just to prove it, in the following blogs, I am going to reveal my training to you. 

I am currently training for a 150 mile run across Jordan desert in May next year.  It involves running with a rucksack weighing around 8-10kg and very hot weather.  Training for this sort of event involves alot of time if you want to do your best. Alot of time which I don't have either ...







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150 mile run in May 2012 across Jordan Desert

11/23/2011

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I am going to put a bit about my own training, just in case you were wondering if I actually do anything, or just eat chocolate all day. 
Actually, I do both. 

When I am not eating chocolate, I am  following my business motto which is 'Live Without Limits'.  I try to prove it to myself each day that this can be done.  Especially as I have a disc missing in my lower back after a paragliding accident. 

I am forever doing challenges.  Challenges make me feel alive and give me a sense of  accomplishment.  They give me something to strive for;  challenges give my training an aim. 

You should set yourself a challenge.  Here is one for you.  Start your life over from today and decide once and for all that you are going to get fit and strong. 

Then, once you have done that, you can start setting yourself daft challlenges like me, and run 150 miles across deserts ...
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    Wanda Summers is Personal Trainer who loves what she does. 

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