Since ‘the Big One’ my runs have been few and far between. I have done one 10k and a tough hill run but that’s about it. This is fine, this is the time for recovery and in perfectly aware of that. However, that hasn’t stopped me getting itchy feet entering a couple of ballots NYC Marathon (unsuccessful) and the 2010 London one as well as signing up for a 10k with a few mates. It is with this 10k in mind I clean off my shoes and start retraining.

The Niketown run is nothing new for me ( to any of you who subscribed to my marathon blog apologies for the repetition) however I think it’s probably a good time to advertise the concept again – not that it is under subscribed! If you head over to the nikeplus site make sure you are on the UK site (union jack on the bottom right), then click community, niketown runners, sign up (free) select your preference 3/4/7 miles then turn up at NikeTown Oxford Circus at 6:15 Monday(for girls) / Tuesday night ready to run! I will also make in the next few posts a conceited effort to write a review of my Nike+. If you want to go for a free run on a weeknight it’s a good wheez in my humble opinion.

This week I opted for a seven miler and had the previously rare benefit of having a running buddy. Soo, who is also doing the 10k in July decided he would join me for my first lap. I really enjoy running with others as it tends to push me a bit more, I’m a bloke hence I’m naturally competitive. Anyway we set off and the pace creeps up, I’m breathing fairly heavily after 3k I was aware this wasn’t going go be a gentle one. My problem is when someone drops back a bit I slow myself a bit to let them catchup but then tend to find myself speeding up when they do cause I feel like I’ve dropped too much, viscious circle. After the first lap Soo dropped off and headed back to the shop, by this point I was aware that it was going to be a fast one realising we had put in some 4:35min kms. I knew I wouldn’t be able to maintain the same pace on my own on the second lap but endeveaoured to stay at a faster than 5:00 km pace which it turns out from looking at my garmin data I managed.

Over the next few blogs I really want to pull out some info from both my watch and my nikeplus to embedd on the right and in posts. There is some really cool stuff including heart rate / pace info which I don’t feel the way garmin presents it does it much justice. I think I have found some graphing software that looks good and a way of extracting the info so hopefully it should all fall into place a lot better!

It’s that time of the week again, off to Ox Circus I go.

This run for me was somewhat pivotal, having struggled on Sunday on the half marathon I was a little bit low, doubts were starting to set in my mind – am I taking on too much, will I manage to get round this course….?

Well the run went pretty well. Did it in a really great time, fealt like I had plenty of energy left after 7 miles, bring on my next run! » Continue reading “Nike Town Run”

What could possibly break today! The last two runs have been far from succesful, breaking my earphones two weeks ago and then the nike+ footpod last week I was certain something may go wrong! Fortunately not, only a little splash as a car drove through a puddle but I got luckier than the person who just overtook me and got completely drenched!

Anyway – standard run really other than I got the opportunity to run with a garmin watch today. Will add reviews of this watch later when I have run a few more times. First impressions are good, other than somehow mid-run I ended up with a compass on the screen that I couldn’t get rid of! Annoying.

Its that time of the week again, back to niketown regent street to run round regents park a couple of times. Less of a turnout than last week – new years resolutions starting to end again….

Standard run really, first lap was on my own, no music – until about 3/4s of the way round. Second lap did not pass without an event….

Neil Lock vs Tree…

…tree wins

To cut a long story short earphones caught round an overhanging tree, ripped off my head and proceeded to break – i guess if there is any consolation my ipod carried on going! just need to buy a new set of earphones now!

Second lap was actually pretty good – one of the nike team members ran with me, meant had someone to talk to and when the loop is 3 miles thats pretty damn useful.

Next NTR on tuesday – next long run at the weekend. maybe get an interval session in on thurs/fri.

Tuesday night marks the return of my “Mid Distance” runs. 7-8 mile distances with either my dad (who is currently on hold on running training) or with the NikeTownRunners(ntr).

The ntr setup involves rocking up to NikeTown Oxford Circus at 630 on a Tuesday night and running with a group of other people. Unfortunately im not quick enough to keep up with the front batch of runners so it has the potential to be an individual run. However, it is a routine event meaning that I can calendar it in and hopefully maintain a run at a time i probably wouldn’t normally bother with!

From a physical perspective this run was again a testing one following the long distance Sunday run, the back of my legs were a little tense at the end of it and I also didn’t really have the best preparatory food for it at lunch (pizza!) so had a bit of a stitch for the first lap. Perseverance is the key though and the second loop went by quite easily. Darren from work came along with me too so managed to have a chat as we went round which always helps the run fly by a lot quicker.

I have attached the map of the route here7mile_map_web. Its fairly simple and has a massive plus to it – its FLAT! Awesome. The course is a little dull on the whole but at the end of the day its miles in the legs…