Getting back into running after finishing a marathon is a real challenge. You've pushed your body to the extreme to peak for race day and achieved your goal. The prospect of going out running in the weeks afterwards isn't always the most exciting, especially if you've not got anything lined up to train for.
After Paris Marathon on April 12th, I felt exactly like this, so I thought I would let you in on what I've been doing to help find my passion for running again.
1. Sign up for the next one!
It might be a little scary, but giving yourself another target is probably the best thing for you. Whether it's a half marathon, 10km, or you just commit yourself to going to your local Park Run two weeks after your marathon, it's good to get out there.
I signed up to Hackney Half Marathon, which was 4 weeks after Paris. I knew that my body wasn't at it's best, so I ran with my Mum and we finished together in 2 hours 35 minutes. It wasn't my best time, but I had a great time doing it and really enjoying the atmosphere of the crowd and the course.
Giving yourself a little longer than 4 weeks might be a better idea, but just having another date to aim for definitely put me in a more motivated state of mind.
2. Take time to find your passion again
If you've just taken on a marathon, you've done a lot of running over the past 6 months. If you don't feel like going out running just yet, don't stress- it's not a bad thing! Try doing something else to keep your fitness up for the time being. How about swimming, cycling, yoga or a circuits class? Now that you aren't committed to long runs every weekend it's the perfect time to explore other activities. It won't be long until you feel the urge again to can't wait to hit the road with your trainers. 3. Treat yourself
A little motivation for me is rocking new workout gear. As we're coming into warmer weather now I felt it was time to do a little bit of online shopping. I raided the Nike sale, wiggle.co.uk and even tried out some of H&M's workout range. The best bit? To wear these new pieces you have to go and workout! This is how I motivated myself to get out running again 10 days post marathon :)
If you've suffered from the Post-Marathon Blues, how did you get back into running? I'd love to hear from you!
A few weeks ago I was a very lucky winner of a UKRunChat competition, with the prize being the Shock Absorber Ultimate Run Bra!
If you know me, I normally live in and swear by the original Nike sports bras. This bra won the 'Best Women's Sports Bra' in the recent 2015 Running Awards, (quite a title!) so I was very excited to try something new. I was sent the black and lemon style, which is limited edition and heart rate monitor compatible. Unfortunately I don't own one, so can't comment on how well this feature works yet, but I may have to make a cheeky purchase soon.
As soon as I put this bra on I felt very well supported. The top clip at the back and well-fitted band are great. The inside of the bra is totally seamless, so it's super comfortable! The back straps are adjustable and there's no elastic involved, so no worry about the straps stretching and becoming less supportive over time.
I've been out for a few runs in this bra now and can say it definitely does it's job. You always know you have a good sports bra when you don't feel any bounce going on! I have had no chafing either, which is a winner in my books. The only issue is that I am 'That Girl' who can't do her bra up from the back (bit of inside info there!), so to get this on when I'm alone it's a bit of a mission. I have to do up the top clip, slip it over my head and jump around for a few minutes to do it up in the back. I'm going to have to figure it out.. What can I say, I'm special!
After testing this sports bra out, I would highly recommend it. It's super supportive and very comfortable to work out in. Pop over to www.lessbounce.com and treat yourself! There is a great variety of colours available (check out the blue!), so I may just have to get myself another... ;)
I would like to say a massive Thank You to Less Bounce for giving this away and UKRunChat (@UKRunChat on Twitter) for running the competition. I never win anything, so I'm stoked!
I've been running consistently for a few years now and when it has come to events I have always stuck to very traditional road races. On 18th April this all changed, when I took on The Monster Race.
The Monster Race is an obstacle event which takes place in April and October and offers a 5km and 10km course, promising to test all elements of your fitness whilst having fun getting muddy and wet. I entered for the 10km course in early January with a group of friends I work with. As it came closer, I realised that this was actually 6 days post-Paris Marathon! Despite my knee troubles, the stubborn side of me refused to pull out though and wanted to go along and experience the event.
The actual day of the event was freezing. The wind was pretty chilly and I can't deny that I was having second thoughts. Race registration was very straightforward, with a timing chip attached to your shoe and your number written on your head with permanent marker.
A warmup was held about 10 minutes before our start time of 10am. It was a bit cringy. We had to partner up and do strange things like jump on each other's back, but it definitely got us moving, so mission accomplished I guess?!
Cornbury Park near Whitney hosts the April race, and is the same place that holds Cornbury Festival. It is on a massive estate and provides plenty of hilly fields, rivers and trails; perfect for an obstacle race! The first few kilometres are fairly obstacle free, which I believe is to avoid bunching and queueing. This worked pretty well, but we did have to wait a few minutes at times.
The obstacles were massively varied. We were faced with:
'Monster Slushies' (skips filled with icy water!) to swim through
Climbing frames
Walls
Rivers to cross
Monkey bars
'Walk the plank'
Tyre walls
Streams
Muddy bogs
Barbed wire crawls
and many others!
The obstacles weren't as challenging as some I have seen in Tough Mudder and other events like this and I made it through most of them unaided. Each obstacle had an official volunteer on hand to help out and make sure everyone was ok. We did a 5km loop twice and therefore had to face each one twice, so I was pleased that they weren't as bad as I had imagined they could be!
The water was almost icy which was probably my lowlight of the day. We had to swim underneath barrels at one point and the cold made me go into a bit of a panic. My chest tightened and my breathing was uncontrollable. After a minute I was able to calm myself, but it was pretty scary! If there's any obstacle you don't want to take on you are free to skip it. If you are hesitant about entering a race like this, don't be! It's all about pushing yourself to your own limits and there's no pressure to do anything you don't want to.
The Little Photo Company had quite a number of photographers around the course and took a ton of photos. All credit for the photos posted If you fancy looking at the carnage that went on you can see them all in the galleries here.
The monkey bars over the river were my absolute favourite. I pretty much lived on the monkey bars as a kid, so it was a bit of a flashback to being 5. Another highlight was the huge water slide at the end of the course. It was probably 25 metres long and positioned at just the right angle to launch yourself down and gain some serious speed. The water at the bottom was filthy and stank from everyone's mud by the time we got there. Fresh water would have made me feel a lot cleaner!
For a first obstacle run this was great fun. The obstacles were at just the right level of difficulty and I really enjoyed it. As long as I'm running marathons I think I'll avoid another one due to the injury risk, but it's definitely something I'd recommend. The October race may be even better if the water is a little warmer too!
Quick Hits
The Good Bits
A medal at the finish (not always the norm for mud runs)
Great obstacles
Decent race village with lots of food
The Not So Good Bits
The water was freezing!
Expensive entry
No race t-shirt (however the organisers had explained that this is to invest more in obstacle construction).
Have you ever tried or been tempted to try a obstacle run? What did you think?
For anyone who has run 26.2 miles, you will know that one marathon is never enough.
In April 2014, I took on my first ever marathon in Paris. At the time I thought that although it was one of the greatest experiences of my life, I had ticked it off the bucket list and that was that. However, two weeks post-marathon, my Mum got itchy feet again and told me she wanted to enter for 2015. Just like the previous year, my response was "Well, I'm not going to Paris to watch.. I'll do it too!" and just like that we were signed up to run the streets of Paris again. Oops!!
I wrote a pretty detailed review of what went down last year here, but I thought I would spend a little time writing about my second time round as this was quite a different experience.
As expected, the morning of April 12th 2015 was stunning. It had been forecast to be a nice day in the run up, with temperatures reaching highs of 20 degrees celsius which I know people were feeling anxious about. Someone told me last year and it still holds true- it never rains on race day.
My Mum, Dad, boyfriend Pete and I all stayed in an apartment near Gare du Nord, nice and accessible to the start line via a 20 minutes Metro ride. For some reason, we were a lot more relaxed with time than last year and didn't end up reaching L'Arc de Triomphe, where the race begins until almost 9am.
We had a great time posing in front of L'Arc, which is the perfect photo opportunity as it's the one occasion when the roundabout is closed to traffic.
By about 9.10am we had decided it was about time to get into our starting pens and Mum and I left our dedicated support crew. Finding our way to the pink section (4 hour 30 corral) was easy enough, with volunteers checking numbers and only letting race entrants in.
Once in the start area, we queued for a portaloo. In our pen there were just 6 portaloos, dotted 3 on each side. Considering there were probably 10,000 runners assigned to our corral, this was absurd. By the time we joined the queue for one, it was already the width of the pen and beginning to snake round. We still had an hour before we started, so I wasn't too worried.
At about 9.50am the pen was packed and we had only managed to inch forward in the queue for the toilet. We were probably 10 people from the front when suddenly everyone in the pen started moving. Our section was being walked forward to the start line to begin the race! I won't take our toilet troubles into too much detail, but I can tell you that the lack of facilities did mean that we both bit the bullet and lost our dignity on the Champs Elysees. Both covered up with plastic ponchos like ladies of course.. Now that's something I didn't think I'd be writing! I found our reaction to the whole situation pretty funny and you can check it out on my vlog down the bottom of this post.
Anyway...
After a rather stressful 10 minutes, Mum and I found ourselves a place in the crowd and loosened up to the music. Before we knew it, the countdown had gone and we were crossing the start line!
The first mile of the marathon is one of my favourites, with the downhill incline of the Champs Elysees letting you see all of the runners ahead spread out across the wide Parisian road. It's this sight that hits home to me that I am actually about to take on a crazy 26 mile journey and it's going to be awesome.
As expected, the course was just as beautiful as I had remembered, with varied scenery from the Eiffel Tower to the beautiful Chateau de Vincennes. The streets are plenty wide enough and it's a great atmosphere with plenty of support at most points.
I decided not to try and follow a pacer, as there tends to be a high volume of runners around them and didn't enjoy my pacer experience last year. This year I was armed with my Garmin Forerunner 220, (which I absolutely LOVE) and was confident that I could pace myself to 10 minute miles to break my 4 hour 30 minute goal.
I really struggled with my knee during the race, with my IT Band giving me pain from the beginning. By mile 17 I even broke my stride to walk/run for about a kilometre, which is unheard of from me as I tend to be pretty stubborn and get on with it! I got hold of some neurofen near the Eiffel Tower at 30km (top support crew!) and was back on my way. Although I had broken my pace, I spent a minute calculating how quickly I needed to run the last 12km to still reach my 4 hour 30 target. Once I realised it was possible a new determination came over me and I was off.
During the race I met two lovely ladies who follow me on Instagram and spotted my very bright compression socks from my 'What I'm Wearing - Paris Marathon' video. It was the best thing ever to have friends on the course and they really helped me at difficult stages. We all ran very similar times and ended up finishing within minutes of each other so managed to catch up and congratulate each other - such a cool experience!
I managed to push through and crossed the line in 4 hours 25 minutes 26 seconds, which I was over the moon with. It was under the 4 hour 30 barrier that I desperately wanted to break and over 25 minutes faster than my 2014 time. I think you can see my excitement in the picture below!
My post-marathon celebrations were pretty low key, but I did manage to sneak some Champagne in there ;)
Even though this was round two, I can truly say that 2015 was every bit as good as 2014. It has it's little flaws, but Paris Marathon is such a great race and I'm totally in love with it. YES, I will be back next year, as I managed to get myself a free place through a competition, so.. I'll see you there?!
