Blog

I know a traditional Chinese curse that translates to “May you live in interesting times.” This morning’s run was interesting. And I am unsure if that is good or bad — it is only interesting. I thought I had a 45-minute easy run to complete today — which is what my workout’s description was. However, when I started the session on my watch, it displayed as an hour session. I messaged Jateen, but because I still had to shower and get ready for work after my run, I decided to start running before he sent feedback on whether it should be 45 minutes or an hour. My expected average pace for today’s workout was also quite fast for an easy run: 8:15. I’d love to run comfortably at 8:15, but I am not there yet. ...

I considered introducing myself at our morning standup meeting as being dead. My training today was a 40-minute HIIT strength workout. The only exercise I struggled with was the chest-to-floor burpee, but that doesn’t mean it was an easy session. I had ten different activities to do and 30 seconds for each one, but no rest in between — apart from the rest I could take once I’ve finished each set’s required repetitions. After the initial round of ten, Jateen dropped one exercise from the next and continued like this until no activities remained. The chest-to-floor burpee was the first removed exercise — thank you, Jateen. ...

Today’s training was a lower-body focussed strength training session - I’ve not had a strength training session in a long time. I found today’s workout challenging but manageable. The only exercises I struggled to do were the split lunge jumps. I also experienced cramps in my legs during the glut bridge raises, which concerns me a little bit. But they quickly passed, and I am still recovering from last weekend, so I will not worry about them too much. ...

Graham, our Run Zone club chairman, has a thing about the word “just”. A typical conversation with him after a club or time trial run would go like this: Graham: “Well done! How far did you run?” Me: “Just 5 (or whatever other distance) km today.” Graham: “It is never JUST 5 km! Well done!” But it gives me great pleasure to say that today’s run was JUST 21 km (actually it was a few hundred metres short, but let’s not get stuck on technicalities). The word “just” means that I have worked so hard that I can claim 21 km as being well within my capabilities. I have the fitness, the strength and the endurance to run 21 km, it is only my right foot that is holding me back on pace — and that I am trying to work on as best I can. ...

Who am I? I always start answering this question by saying that I am a software engineer, a happily married mother of four, an avid runner and the author of two books. That is more or less the order these things occurred in: software engineer, married, mother, runner, author. But those are things that I do. They are not who I am. So, if I take all of those out of the equation, who am I really? ...

And it is a wrap! What an incredible three days of running. Thank you RunZone and especially Graham Block. Day 1 - 30 km This was the race I needed to push myself in the most. I’ve never run 30 km, but we heard rain forecasts for the weekend, and I wanted to have the extra 10 km to play with if necessary. Day 2 - 20 km This was the most challenging route of the three days. If I never run this route again, it will be too soon. I could also feel the previous day’s 30 km and it was difficult to push through. ...

I always push myself during our running club’s Wednesday afternoon time trial. The time trial from two Wednesdays ago was no different. I pushed and pushed some more; I ran my heart out. Yet my watch recorded a disappointing 38m 17s — more than two minutes slower than the former time I ran it! Back at our clubhouse I reluctantly filled in my time on our leaderboard sheet. Our club chairman spotted me and asked, “How did your run go?” ...