5km Challenge

The sun is shining, Spring is here and it's time for a new challenge. Not a very big one, but just enough to keep me fit and motivated. 5 km in under 30 minutes...

I did my "base-line" test last week, running round the block at my usual pace until I got to 5km (actually I hadn't worked out how to switch William to km - he and I are very old-fashioned and use miles - so I had to guess when to stop soon after he'd said "3 miles...") and the time recorded was 32m 45s. So that's what I have to work on. I have a challenge with one of my 'tinterweb running buddies to see which of us can break 30 minutes first, but it has to be in an organised and timed running event - doing it out on a training run round the block doesn't count apparently. With that in mind I have registered to parkrun. This is an international series of free to enter, run by volunteers, 5km events held all over the world at 9:00 on a Saturday (...the regular crowd shuffles in... Billy Joel, Piano Man) and there is one in Stoke Park in Guildford, along with another 3 or 4 within 5-10 miles drive so I can vary the course if I wish. I won't go every week as Saturday mornings is "date day" with hubby (coffee and shopping!) but some weekends would be good, and a good test of any improvement.

This morning I went for a training run, having worked out how to switch William to km, and did some "fartlekking". For those of a non-running persuasion this is where you jog along for a bit, then pick a corner, or lamppost or tree, some way ahead and run like the clappers before settling back down to a gentle recovery jog, until the next corner/lamppost/tree. The idea is that you teach your body to run faster over short distances to start with but gradually increase the distance so you get used to running faster. I didn't go mad as it was a beautiful warm day but I did cover the 5km in 30m 59s - a huge improvement already!! I can't improve too quickly (much as I want to beat my running buddy) as I'll then have to revise the target down again - before I know it I'll be sprinting all the way and that sounds too much like hard work...!

Elsewhere the mass descent of global family went very smoothly; they came and went one after the other, not really long enough with each of them but, as they all only have a few weeks in the UK and loads of people to catch up with, all their various itineraries are a bit whistle-stop. We will all be together this Sunday at my lovely lovely great-aunt's 90th birthday celebrations in Worthing (looks like it's going to be a fabulous day to be by the seaside), together with all the UK family too so I am really looking forward to that. Unfortunately neither of our boys can be there as they are right slap bang in the middle of exam time, but they are both of an age to be excruciatingly embarrassed by a whole load of people they don't remember, telling them how much they've grown since the last time they were seen (about 10 years ago at Aunty's 80th!), so it's perhaps as well they're not coming.

Finally for now, I have another "medal". Not a real medal, more of a digital certificate really, but it celebrates my participation in "Walk Your AS Off". You may recall I told you about my friend Gerry who runs extreme events despite suffering from AS. Well, through him and another friend, Kathy, who also suffers, I got involved in a campaign to walk to Mars. The AS charity hopes to inspire those affected and their friends to raise awareness of the illness by counting the number of steps walked between March 1st and May 3rd - they reckon it'll take ten years to walk to Mars, but I did my little bit this year and contributed 631,228 steps (obviously running a marathon is a LOT of steps). Next year I hope to beat that, although without marathon training I'll have to try harder.