At one point, Steve Carrell’s character is sitting at a bar, nursing a drink, moping about his wife having left him. He gets pitied by a smooth-talking ‘player’ in the bar, who decides to help him improve his look and educates him in the ways of picking up women. The line that stuck in my memory was an exchange over what Steve was wearing:

“Are you Steve Jobs,” asks the Player.
“What?”
“Are you billionaire founder of Apple Computer, Steve Jobs?”
“No,…”
“Then why are you wearing New Balance trainers?”

Which at first struck me as elitist – I love New Balance trainers, they are my running shoe of choice. But then I looked at him, in his oversize suit and New Balance trainers, and realised… That’s what I must look like half the time.

So this weekend, we went suit and shoe shopping (as well as, more importantly and more successfully, shopping for Amanda). The Jones sale furnished me with a pair of ankle boots which I think are probably a reasonable upgrade over my previous best efforts for day-to-day footwear, but the hunt for the suit continues – thanks to the diet I am firmly between sizes at the moment.

Still, new shoes. Good start.

It was quite hard work,and although my timings weren’t woeful (31.30 and 32.30 for two successive 5ks), they weren’t great, either.

It’s amazing how quickly at my age the fitness deteriorates. A few months ago a 5k run was an effortless thing, and now I’m stiff the next day.

Ah well, more practice and more stretching and a bit more focus. Much as I hate to contemplate it, at current rates of training and improvement, the Basingstoke half is not looking like a good idea. But there’s a couple of months of summer left – I will do what I can!

I have a half marathon to run this year and a family to be healthy for. So here’s to it!

The last three 10ks I did (SunWeds/Sat of last week) saw a pretty dramatic improvement – 68 mins, then 64, then 61. I attribute some of it to improved fitness from the regularity of the runs, but most of it I’d say was down to my attempt do make the ITB rolling part of my daily routine. Which means I have five minutes before my shower rolling around on the ground with a large polystyrene roller. And whilst I’m down there, I’m trying to restart the ’100 push ups’ challenge, which I flatly gave up on a couple of years ago and have since lost all tone from the requisite muscles.

Perhaps the activated core and the stretched ITB will let me achieve my target time of 2hrs for the half marathon when I face it in October? We’ll see…

The sabbatical saw a bit of a refresh; 53.5km in March and 60k in April. Progress, or so it would seem – but I continued eating at sabbatical rates, so my weight hasn’t gone down and that’s contributing to my persisting slowness.

May, to date, has also been a bit better – 30km run so far and its not even midway through the month yet. I’m trying to stick to a routine of two-three 10k runs a week, which is non-trivial as I’m not as limber, fit or light as I was when I was last doing this distance, but the only way to get there is to push along!

So, YTD I’m actually ahead of my target, modestly – 270km odd run. I’m hoping that the newly revised target, as well as the more regimented ITB rolling and stretching routine will see my overall distance rise more significantly. My speed is still poor; the weight affects everything and whilst I’m not ludicrously heavy the extra few kilos feels significant on me at the moment. I haven’t found the will to start the obsessive compulsive diet tracking yet – maybe that should be on my agenda? {sigh}.

Race plans remain thin on the ground. I’ve entered the the Basingstoke half-marathon but I’m still hopeful Ill do a second one at some point this year. Maybe a Northern summer half marathon? We’ll see…

I ran last year - here’s the proof. It’s a fun race where you chase after a man in a banana costume – who runs fast! Well, faster than me, anyway, completing the 5k circuit in about 23-4 minutes.

It’s Cancer Prevention Week so there’s all sorts going on – you can read more about it over on the WCRF blog.

Today, everything hurts. Not knowing how much you’ve got coming makes it hard to pace yourself sensibly!

It was a great experience and if I can fit it in around my commute when I go back to work next month I’ll be keen to join proper. There’s something about running in a pack that sets the adrenaline going and makes you push yourself more than you ever would running alone, no matter how much the group encourages you to take things at your own pace. Man is a competitive animal, even me, sometimes.

The session was a ‘coached run’ – in which we did a warm-up run (about 2.5k, which I completed in 14 odd minutes), followed by ‘stride’ training on a short loop of road (a few hundred metres). This involved another 45 or so minutes of running in circles focussing on different things – first just thinking about the stride, then trying to get a sense of falling forwards whilst running, then trying to run silently, then bouncing from foot to foot.

It brought back memories of PE sessions at school, with a kindly teacher working to coach through encouragement rather than drill-sergeant esque barked orders.

There was a persistent feel of good natured, supportive, encouraging camaraderie throughout the club and think I’d enjoy running with them. However… despite claims that its a club for people of all abilities, I was near the back of the pack and was probably one of the only people there without a race booked – apparently most people are running two races a month at the moment!

So it’s a little intimidating. But maybe when I find my metaphorical stride, it’ll feel more natural. I’m still coming to terms with fatherhood, commuting, country life and all the rest of it, so imagine in time two races a month will seem like a sensible thing to do!

For the best part of a year, I’ve run a second blog, the Long Slow Run – initially in collaboration with a colleague, then solo, charting my newfound passion for running – which I took up last March and has seen me run two races (so far) and subject myself to hundreds of miles run and at least three pairs of trainers in the last 12 months.

Keeping up two separate blogs – when most people who seem to follow my antics do so via Facebook rather than RSS – seemed increasingly pointless, and a brief poll on LSR confirmed that people weren’t too bothered.

So – all my posts from LSR have been imported to division6, and a separate page (up in the nav, or here for those of you keeping up via RSS/Facebook) will now capture all my running related posting. I hope you either enjoy it, or will forgive the further profligacy on here. I can promise that my blogging volume is likely to drop to relatively normal levels once the sabbatical ends in a few weeks…

The proportionality between the angle of your running stride and the distance covered does alway surprise me (“…you cover two per cent more ground with each stride for every degree you increase your stride angle”. I really need to do some more stretching… although as much of my training this sabbatical has included heavy-lifting in the garden as it has running and stretching so limited progress has been made.

Unfortunately, unlike David Cameron, I can’t afford to hire personal trainer Matt Roberts to sort out my running stride. I’m still thinking about getting a running coach but not sure where to start. I may start by joining my local running club (blog here) and see if anyone there has any good advice for me.

Good luck Sally!

Incidentally, whilst I was warned that it would be more painful to do my ITB stretching on a tennis ball, it’s more the coordination required that presented a challenge – it’s hard to balance and roll from your upper thigh down to your knee on a tennis ball – especially when slicked with sweat after a run in 30 degree heat!

I’ll get there…

A side note: the treadmill was delivered within 24 hours by no less than SIX delivery men and the general manager of the fitness equipment importer. I know it’s a high margin, high value item but this is taking service to ludicrous extremes! In any event, it took all of them to shift it – that is one HEAVY, big-ass machine.

First, we looked for a replacement treadmill. Limited progress was made with the actual dealer we wanted to visit, despite claiming to have an outlet in Mid Valley on their website, actually not so much existing. So it may be some time before we sort that out.

Let’s start with the things that were good about the Celebrity Fitness experience.

1. They had good working treadmills
2. They had reasonable showers

And the bad:

1. Appalling customer service. I was shuttled back between the front desk and the customer service desk, not told where the changing rooms or equipment was, asked for my mobile number three times (“I don’t have a local mobile”), and made to wait for 10 minutes whilst they registered my limited information for a day guest pass. I’d made reasonably clear that I wasn’t going to join and just wanted a transactional relationship with them – give me a pass, damnit! Eventually got in, having eaten into a short window of time I had for the workout.
2. Damnit it was hot. It must have been 30 degrees in there WITH the airconditioning going. The whole point for me in going to a gym was to avoid the blistering outdoor heat!
3. It cost RM60 – about £12. An absolute rip-off for the experience.
4. There were no locks on the lockers (another fact they didn’t apprise me of – should I have just known? I told them I was from the UK, they could have given me a heads up…). You’re meant to bring your own, apparently, so kit stayed with me – including during my shower. Fortunately I found a broom closet to stash my stuff in whilst I had the world’s quickest shower.
5. Crap water coolers, despite the heat.

So… not going back there. Will find another way to work out here. My mediocre run total for the day came to approx 5k in 33 minutes. Not a great time on a treadmill.

0n the plus side, whilst I continued to fail to find a foam roller, I did remember that Sudhir told me I could do the ITB workout with a tennis ball – so will dig around the house for one of them instead!

The running helped the pinched nerve thing, with my neck seeming freer after the run… but I seem to have some have back tightness today so will spend a bit of time this week stretching out ahead of next weekend’s training. I’m getting old.

Next weekend will see me down the coast so the running will be a bit more exciting, hopefully, and keep me going for longer!

Before this recent bout of running hit me, if someone had talked to me about running “technique” I’d have been somewhat cynical. One foot in front of the other, and all that.

When the ITB injury hit me last year I learnt how much I was doing wrong from Sudhir, and it became apparent that I needed to put much more thought into the way my feet rolled off the ground, the length of my stride, etc.

On Friday, Amanda was watching the One Show (before Eastenders rather than through deliberate choice) and they were doing a feature about rabbits – and how they run quicker than people. A big part of this, they said, was because the proportional stride of a rabbit was equivalent to a full grown man striding three meters with each footfall as they run. My running stride probably varies between 60cm and a metre, at a guess, due to rubbish hamstrings, poor fitness and disciplines. So on the run today, I gave it more thought and was amazed at the difference in pace I achieved when making a conscious effort to lengthen the stride. (Incidentally, the One Show tried to extend the stride of a man by extending his legs with those running stilt things – silly, but fun)

It makes sense, after all. 1000m is 1000 steps with a metre stride, and 600 odd more with 60cm strides. Effort wise, it stands to reason that the smaller effort in lengthening the stride is proportionately less than the effort needed to take the extra 600 steps. So I plan to spend a bit more time focussing on my hamstrings and my stride in the runs to come.

As an aside, another bit of random telly we had on whilst Emily was feeding was some athletics. During a 3000m race, people were finishing in 8 minutes, with a 2m 30 odd second split per kilometre. Given my best time for 3 km is about 17 minutes, this was pretty awe-inspiring. Their stride was immense. No idea how big but a damn sight bigger than my meter / 1.2m at best running stride.

More effort / training needed. Need to give that running coach thing a bit more thought…

I was wearing the new trainers, which surprisingly enough were totally comfortable and didn’t seem to need much breaking in. Even the ITB rolling was less painful than I’d expect… so hopefully a good investment and encouragement to resume training.

2011 distance to date – 25.7 miles – about a marathon in the first three weeks. My pace is still pretty mediocre, but at least I’m starting to rebuild the routine…