As always, I hope that whoever reads my latest training and life update – thanks Maria – had an amazing weekend. I’m not sure why but a three-day weekend actually felt shorter than a ‘normal’ two-day weekend. My weekend had a couple of highlights; barcode scanning at Beacon parkrun, an interval session in the sunshine and some epic sleep.

The fifth week of my Couch to 5k training plan looked like this:

Each interval session started and ended with a five-minute walk. I’m always impressed with how quickly I seem to go from feeling too hot to too cold whenever I finish running. Cross training sessions consisted of a half hour torture sessions on my exercise bike. So, how did I get on during week five of my Couch to 5k training?

Monday – 30 mins cross training

The working week started with a double positive; thanks to my socks over shoes trick I managed to avoid doing a Bambi on ice impression during my walk to the station and both of my trains were on time. It was also getting light at 6am and was light by the time I reached the centre of Birmingham.  It’s amazing how much a small amount of daylight improved my mood; please remind me of this statement when I’m getting woken by the sun at 4am!

Work was work, there’s not a lot more I can say. My Monday included a spot of number crunching, flow modelling, end of year admin and time recording. I left the office at 3pm, got home and headed to bed for a power nap.

I have no idea what happened, one minute it was 5pm, the next it was 8:30pm and I was only just getting my exercise bike ready. I like to think that my post-peddle beetroot face was a good indication that I’d worked reasonably hard. I need to remember that exercising just before I head to bed never ends well.

Tuesday – 33 mins intervals (Run 8 mins/Walk 3 mins x 3)

The trains were running on time again and I was in the office just after 7am. Not bad considering the length of my commute. I had another productive day although at one stage it felt like Excel was trolling me. I think the highlight of the day was booking Friday off as annual leave. I left Solihull at 3pm and was working on a job application in my office at home by 5pm.

I probably shouldn’t admit this, but I didn’t feel like heading out into the cold and running. I was quite nervous about the prospect of running for eight minutes and was a little concerned I’d not manage to complete the three interval sessions. I decided to head to my favourite ‘flattish’ route and to see how I got on.

The first eight minute interval felt easy, the second eight minute interval felt slightly more challenging, mainly because my legs felt like lumps of lead, and the final eight minute interval was a case of ignoring what my head was telling me to do and getting to the end without walking. The final couple of minutes weren’t pretty, apologies if you were the dog walker I frightened with my heavy breathing and slightly distressed look. I’m clearly not very fit at the moment. At least I slept well that night!

Wednesday – Rest

I quite literally had a quiet and productive day in the office as I had a whole section of the office to myself. Bliss! I dialled into a webinar organised by the wellbeing team, it was great to see parkrun mentioned a few times. I’m still not convinced I’m going to check out the health kiosk when it makes an appearance in my office. I already know I’m overweight and need to make several improvements to my lifestyle. Let’s just say the section on alcohol consumption didn’t stop m heading to The Crown for a couple of pints with a friend after work.

Thursday – 27 mins intervals (Run 7 mins/Walk 2 mins x 3) Rest

Getting out of bed at 5:25am for the fourth day in a row was difficult. I very nearly hit the ‘snooze’ button but managed to drag myself out of bed. The office was unfortunately back to its normal noisy and slightly hard to concentrate in self. I’m not sure if all offices are the same, but I really struggle to focus when I have someone what I call angry typing next to me. And don’t get me started on the never-ending phone calls. I switched on my out of office and almost skipped out of the office at 3pm.

The trains were a bit of a nightmare which meant that my commute home took two hours. It was a case of welcome to the real world, Emma! My friend ‘phoned to see if I wanted fish and chips, it took me approximately 0.00001 seconds to say yes, please. I didn’t end up eating until 7pm so knew that my interval session wouldn’t happen unless I waited until 10pm. I wasn’t overly concerned as I knew I was on leave the next day and figured I could run first thing in the morning.

Friday – Rest

It was a case of ice stopped play on Friday morning. A poor excuse I know, but I didn’t want another running injury. I originally booked the day off so that I could work on a job application. The reality was, unfortunately, a little different. I have no idea what happened to the morning but I only managed to draft out a response to one competency question. I’d agreed to meet up with a friend in Mere Green for lunch at 1pm. After working my way through three courses and drinking a couple of pints of Vedett Extra Blond, the odds of me having a productive afternoon were slim.

I’m not sure if I really needed a three-hour ‘nap’ when I got back from Bistrot Pierre, but I most definitely felt a lot better when I woke up. In an ideal world, I would have made the most of what was left of my Friday off. Looking back, I can’t remember exactly what I did during the afternoon but I know I managed to waste a day of annual leave.

Saturday – 30 mins cross training

My Saturday got off to a positive start when I braved the scales and discovered that I’d finally lost rather than gained weight. I like to think that my exercise bike torture sessions are finally starting to make a difference. I had put my name down to scan barcodes at Beacon parkrun in Lichfield, so at 8:30am I found myself walking towards Beacon Park wondering where on earth parkrun started.

I found the start, let the Race Director know I’d arrived and was handed a pink volunteer vest. Have I mentioned how much I hate the colour pink!?

Although I enjoyed barcode scanning, I can’t wait to have a go at running the new and improved Beacon parkrun course. It looks flat, reasonably fast and less likely to leave me a knee injury than the Sutton Park parkrun course. I got home at 11am and decided to get my exercise bike training session done and dusted before I could change my mind. I like to think that my post-exercise bike beetroot impression was an indication that I’d put some effort into my peddling.

Exercise for the day completed, I switched into ‘getting shit done’ mode. I’m not going to bore you all to tears with the details as this post is already getting far too long, but my Saturday highlights included ironing, drafting out a parkrun run report, washing, gardening, and some blogmin. As I didn’t want to miss a second interval session, I made sure that I laid out a set of running gear before heading out for a couple of beers with a friend in Mere Green.

Sunday – 33 mins intervals (Run 8 mins/Walk 3 mins x 3)

I was woken by an all too familiar sound; rain beating against my bedroom window. Thanks to me being lazy and resetting my alarm for 7am, I managed to dodge the rain. Unfortunately, avoiding getting wet was probably the highlight of my Sunday morning interval session.  I blame the single magpie I spotted during my five minute warm-up walk.

Have you ever had such a terrible training session you’ve actually felt like giving up and heading back home? Every step felt difficult and I could tell my pacing was all over the place. I felt like I was constantly running into a wind tunnel and just wanted to walk. If I wasn’t so stubborn (and so far from home) I would have walked back home in a major strop. The third running interval could only be described as a failure as I ended up walking twice.

So that’s the fifth week of my Couch to 5k training plan more or less completed. I’ll just ignore the interval session I missed on Thursday. I’ve got everything crossed I make it to the end of the training plan in three weeks.

Week 6 of the Couch to 5k training plan I’m following looks a little too challenging given my current fitness levels. My interval sessions this week knocked my confidence a little and I have a feeling I’m going to struggle to run for 10 minutes at a time, especially if the wind increases every time I step outside.

Training totals

• Runs: 12 (out of 15)
• Time: 5 hrs 40 mins
• Distance: 29.11 miles

Niggleometer

• Right knee: 3/10
• Left knee: 2/10
• Right foot: 2/10

Apologies if I’ve already asked this, but what is your favourite parkrun volunteering role? A few people were quite surprised when I said barcode scanning is my favourite role. Anything but time keeping 😉

Do you have any tips for getting your running back on track after a not-so-positive training run? After what happened I need your hints and tips.

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