Training, Valentines Day and Diet

I have been busy over the past week (and now need a nap)!

My training last week consisted of the following:

• a cycling masterclass with team GB Olympian Dani King then took full use of the fancy gym and took part in a circuit class and then a swim
• a very early morning training session with my hubby and PT (and friend) Emma
• spin class
• spin circuits class
• running the long way round to my mums (usually 2 miles but the long way round is 7 miles)
• 4.5 muddy hilly trail run with the dog and my friend Laura

My main concentration is training for my half marathon at the moment, which includes short runs, long runs, hill training, faster runs and slower runs.  But I am aware I also need to work on my core which I will feel the benefits of when running and cycling so I include the row machine and the cross training when I can.  Having an amazing personal trainer (Emma) is so much of a help to guide me in the right direction.

Usually I complain a bit in spin circuits as a lot of the ab work I am not amazing at.  Engage my abs Emma says.  What abs? is my usual response.  I have no abs!  But I am getting there. By getting there I mean with the exercises – the abs are, I am afraid, a long way off and still covered in a good layer of meat and gravy.  But I am doing it!

On Friday my husband and I went to the bike show at Excel and I had a lovely experience!  I was looking at the Fat Lad At The Back stand when one of the lovely ladies who work there came over to tell me she knew me.  At first I was a little confused as I didn’t recognise her immediately but then she said she knew me from my blog and once she said her name I remembered her from my Instagram account.  It was a little surreal but not the first time I have been recognised – it is lovely but still an odd feeling that people are reading me going on and on about how I am slower than a herd of turtles wading through peanut butter etc etc.  These ladies are super nice and I am chuffed with my new cycling jersey!  Their clothing is so nice and caters for sizes larger than most cycle clothing companies and also women with boobs.  I was going to try and tart that up a bit with some nice wording but it is what it is – some of us have boobs (big ones at that) and lycra is not your friend when you are cycling up a steep hill, zipped to within an inch of your life in a jersey that is making your boobs sit under your chin and cut off your windpipe!

Trying to fit the running in around other training can be hard but where there’s a will there’s a way.  At the weekend I ran the long way round to my mums to get a 7 miler in before I headed off to watch my niece/goddaughter smash her netball match 35 to 2.  I did this whilst still in my sweaty running gear (yep I know classy hey?) and also sporting my Dry Robe.  Everyone mocked the Dry Robe wondering what it was but who was warm?  Oh yes I was mwahahahaha!

On Sunday (Valentines Day) I didn’t know what to do whether to run or hit the gym or swim and then spoke with my friend Laura and we decided that seeing as our other halves were out cycling we would hit a local park in our trail shoes and go for an easy run in the mud with the dog and that we did.  4.5 miles up and down hills in the wood through the park.  I am not entirely sure who had more fun us or the dog?

 

The downside of all the exercise is that I want to eat.  After all the workouts.  I seem to get home and I could eat literally all the food.  If I were left alone I reckon I could consume the majority of the fridge.  That switch people have to say they are full?  Not me!  I can just keep going.  I joked to my husband yesterday that it was a good job he was at home or I may have eaten everything!  He could well have got home and the furniture could be missing – I may have eaten that.  Can you imagine reading the headlines – lady on a fitness and weight loss mission caught gnawing on the leg of her dining room table?  That would be me.  My husband might ask me where the sofa is and if after one of my long runs – my response might be that I ate it.  I would leave the other sofa though – I am not totally selfish.

This last week has not been amazing for me.  I’ve been asked by a few how come I’ve not been updating my weight loss plaque and the answer is that it has not changed!  My weight loss plateau is sticking around, despite all the exercise and being good with my food, and it is taking it’s toll on my positivity or lack thereof.  So come Thursday I thought I would look back a year and see if I could tell the difference and I could.  There was never a doubt that I would not continue on this journey but a plateau that lasts for two months (yes two months!) is a stubborn b*tch and makes it hard so seeing in a picture made it a little better.  (Excuse the miserable face but it had put me in a somewhat tetchy mood.)

Anyway…….now to run!