Fiona: Happy Valentine's Day!

Happy Valentine's Day everyone! I hope you have a great day, whether you spend it curled up with a significant other, contented with your family, giggling with your friends or totally blissfully by yourself.

 

PS: Try and get a run in! Get outside and celebrate your relationship with running :-)!

Fiona Mcg

Fiona: Week 5

Now, this is what NOT to do:

1) Do nothing from Sunday after BUCS till Thursday.

I blame this bad boy.

2) On Friday try out zumba, even though you know you can't dance.

I know everyone loves Zumba but I actually found it really hard, having no dance background. So much I couldn't follow and I got so frustrated!

3) Spend all day Saturday in bed.

4) Spend all day Sunday in bed, then go to Super Circuits class, then leave 3/4 of the way through to throw up (no idea why!).

5) Eat rubbish all week.

I am an APPALLING IAM training blogger! Will try harder next week I promise.

Fiona Mcg

Fiona: Interesting Health & Fitness Idea

This video is by thefuntheory.com, which I came across randomly. The idea seems to be to make things that are good for everyone to do (more exercise, recycling etc), more fun to do in the hope that it will facilitate the behaviour. 

This one is about taking the stairs instead of an escalator- how cool is this?!

Fiona McG

Fail.com

So I failed my latest challenge but not in the way I anticipated! Instead of Friday night wine versus Saturday morning run it became Friday night cough bottle versus Saturday morning get off the couch! A chest infection and painful cough have thwarted my best intentions and prevented me from doing any kind of exercise for the past week!

In the meantime my bum has gotten so large that the lining of my skirt spent most of the day gathered somewhere around the top of my thighs in an unyielding and inelastic reminder of the current state of my body and my complete inability to run the length of myself!

As I drove home from work I saw lots of women running, training and getting in shape! I honestly felt a pang of runners envy! I am fully aware that my attempts at running look more like a waddle, with more than a little wobble, but alas it would appear I miss the public humiliation of running like Phoebe from friends (if you have never seen this episode I highly recommend looking it up)!!! I want to be the cause of someones runners envy! I will have new trainers by the weekend and will soon have some more inspirational material to share with the group....until then I'm off to do another menthol crystal inhalation and drink cough syrup straight from the bottle!

Training Update and Thanks

So thinking about signing up for the 5k fun run in March, think it will be great fun and also a good way to get ready for the 10k in March.

Not done quite as much running as I would like so far, but went for a wee run tonight from my house to Mollinsburn and back, not that far but went quite well :) also thinking about trying to go to the gym at my uni on the days where I have like 3 hours off between lectures -more productive use of my time- but we shall see how that goes !

Also want to say a big thanks to one of my fellow face of the race ladies Liz Burns for sponsoring me on my just giving sight, I appreciate every penny people can donate and just want to raise as much as possible for Yorkhill.

Have a receiption at Ibrox stadium on Thursday as me and my friedn rachel are receving medals for our help for the charity foundation. During the summer we ran from Hampden to Ibrox and then took part in a 5.3k walk around the pitch in order to raise money. So really looking foward to that and also getting more training in for the womens 10k.

Hope everyones training is going well :)

Fiona: Week 4/BUCS

Last week i did a lot of running (Mon-Thursday), nothing hugely out of the ordinary apart from ENJOYING a tempo run on Tuesday, which is a rare thing indeed! It was very hard but I felt a huge huge sense of achievement when done.

The biggest thing this week was of course BUCS, which went really well. Our highest woman was Elspeth Curran, a truly amazing runner, who was 8th in a very competitive field. I was the second slowest GUHH girl but for me my time was alright!  The girls team was 8th overall. Our captain was lovely and said that he was so impressed at all runners. Personally I was seriously impressed at Neah and Stephen, who had great races, and at Luke for battling through seriously hurting his shoulder. He was almost in tears when he finished but He. Finished. and thats incredible.

The men's A Team: from left: Adam, Chris (El Captain), Mike, Dave, Kerrick and Shabir.

Its a tough course too- a lap that was a) over the distance stated and b) had a double loop hill, where you are required to race up, run down, then turn on your heel and go straight back up... That its a lap course can also be quite demoralising as the best runners lap you.

Women's race start

I may not be any good as a competitive runner, but events like that remind me of why I race. Everyone was cheering everyone on- by name or by institution if you didn't know each other. If you saw someone flagging you yelled 'Good effort!' or 'Not long now!' or simply 'Come on insertunihere!'. It also reminded me of why I love my club- No one yells 'try harder' or anything, just full on support. Whereas other clubs had members shouting advice... in a race I wouldn't want to hear that! Also the overall feeling of GUHH is that its amazing if you happen to be a gifted athlete, but if you're not all they require from you is that you love a run and banter.

Back Row: Julie, Stephen, Chris, Neal
Mid Row: Megan, Me, Neah, Bernadette
Front Row: Yulia, Cat, Sarah

Fiona McG

The (Ouch) Challenge

Well I did it...I managed double Zumba! Two whole hours of huffing, puffing, sweating and yes, on one occasion swearing! I wish I could say it was easy, that my muscle memory meant I suffered very little pain (and embarrassment) but that would be a lie! But it's a start! It's a step in the right direction. It’s…a wake up call!!

Bleeding Heck (excuse my French!)! The race is 96 days away! 96 DAYS! OK…deep breaths…woosaaahhh! 96 days…that’s ok! That’s like 13 weeks…I can get back in shape in 13 weeks! 13 weeks of double Zumba, trips to the gym, pounding the streets of Glasgow and getting my wee (wobbly) bahooky back in shape! 13 weeks is an age! That is just over 3 months, one trimester of pregnancy, a quarter of a year…3 pay days! Ok maybe it’s not that long! But it’s achievable! Isn’t it?! Words of encouragement welcome here…

Self doubt and scepticism will be eradicated! First real run of the year planned for Saturday! I will not be defeated by the chunky, lazy girl currently inhabiting my body! I will update all on progress following the next real test on my willpower…Friday night and an open bottle of wine versus an early Saturday morning run! Wish me luck ladies!