I went for a 23km run on Wednesday having done a 20km run the previous week. It was actually quite enjoyable and because I did the 20km I was mentally up for going the extra distance. It way my first half marathon and it feels strange because I’ve been running for so long and I’ve never really wanted to run more than 10km at a time. So it makes sense but its also new which is cool.

As per usual, I mixed up the route and on the way back I got sort of lost but not really – I’ve never really been one to loose my sense of direction entirely. I can always feel the way relative to the last waypoint I remember and back- track from where I deviated from. I ran too far on the way back and found myself at the West Ham football stadium. Its in the Olympic park and I figured upon seeing it, that I should probably go and investigate it and run around it.

On the way in I ran with some guys from work and I told them I’d be running a bit further and longer than usual and they we’d have to diverge at Victoria park as I intended to go down to Lime house basin again. One to the guys said that I the Olympic park is not that far away and indeed I did see it on the map last week. I thought perhaps I’d schedule that run the next week as I’d quite wanted to have another go back down to see the Thames again and Limehouse Basin(Its a cool dock like St Katherine's Dock).

So as it turned out, I did see the Olympic stadium after all. A week too soon! I will continue with this ‘Olympic route’ next week and perhaps diverting somewhere else to mix it up.

According to my various technological aids, one being Strava and the other being my Garmin 235, this half marathon was my longest ever run. Not bad I think, and I did notice on the 20km run that I ran over an hour, so this time I brought a SiS isotonic energy gel which I consumed about an hour in. Good move. I think what I’ll do moving forward is on these longer runs is to bring some water too and consume that either with the gel or sip intermittently.

After such a yomp like that, one might expect a bit of strain accumulate in the legs, and dutifully I noticed after the run a slight strain in the lower side of the knee. This is probably because of my naturual running style with is under-pronated(I run and land on the sides of my feet). This effect was to be expected. So I decided to recuperate by yielding any running until the next Saturday and instead did the cycling, the stair master and rowing. I also noticed a bit of a tingle in the back of my throat, a usually sure-fire sign that a cold is developing. Again, I responded quickly by ensuring I eat a lot of good food as to support my immune system now that I needed more than ever. I felt like i eat too much but that tinkle and strain left promptly afterwards. I’m happy with my performance and my recovery after the run.

I ordered a Garmin Virb action camera which I received and then took for its maiden-voyage down to the gym in Cowley on Saturday. I then proceeded to drop the damn thing while running on the tarmac and its new shine lasted all but 10 minutes into the run. It looks battered and well weathered from day one. With that said, its doing very well. Its well-built and is tough. I like it. Unfortunately I didn’t read the listing properly when I bought it and got only the main unit without any mounts. So I ran with it in-hand and then briefly out-of-hand…

So I’ve actually ordered a second unit with the mounts and will have 2 units moving forward. This gives me transferable mounts, an extra battery charger via the new unit. So it worked out well. The mounts are crucial If I'm not going to drop it anymore: I want to mount it to my head using a head-strap mount as this is the most suitable and stable place to film from while running. I’m also waiting for the head mount to be posted and arrive.

My plan is to record my runs more frequently as this will be an interesting way of documenting them and help keep the momentum going as I look to increase my running moving forward.

At work, I’ve found some autonomy in the project I’ve been assigned to and have been given the opportunity to get stuck in and figure it all out, which is the way I like it. I’ve been able to research and learn about implementing AWS lambdas, interfacing with CF services from .net core and made some interesting discoveries (eg. IExtensibleObject).

I had a good back workout on Saturday and I’m getting stronger by doing wide-grip pull ups. I still battle to do 4 sets of 10 completely, with only the first set being under good form and it gradually goes downhill from there as I stagger in repetitions of 5 however and then sometimes just 2-3 at the end. I’m optimistic about it and I think its the right thing the be focusing on.

One of the things I’m eager to setup is my Virb on a tripod and watch my technique and particularly my range of motion. I also would like to improve my swimming and I think setting it up high will show me deficiencies in my strokes. Perhaps I can show it to a swimming teacher and ask(or pay?) for advice on how to improve it. Though, right now with the weather being so hot, the pool is in demand so I’ve put this off. I haven’t ordered a tripod yet anyway.

Another idea is to go Kayaking one Saturday or Sunday with the virb. Someone from work suggested we go. Sounds promising…

I’ve continued with a decidedly military themed reading list on the train recently. Having finished Who dares Wins, which is about what it takes to get into the SAS, I’ve started reading a similar book this time bout another branch called the Royal Marines Commandos. They’ve also got it tough. I finished that today in the library and bought a new book called “The Future of Terror” by Frank Barnaby which is basically a A-Z guide on terms of modern terrorism, from extremist Islamic terrorist groups to Animal welfare activist groups.  Fairly interesting until your head fills up with term after term after term and it get a bit like reading a dictionary, which has its place but not today.

So I’ll continue my morning reading by reading more about the Royal marines commandos. Having read up on this stuff, I’m fairly interested in learning more about orienteering and more specifically map reading. I think I’ll order a OS map, a compass and read up on how to use it. Perhaps try it out while Kayaking… I’ll leave my GPS.

I also bought a book on Investing and Google Hacks. All were criminally being sold at my local library and I bagged a bargain for £2. Oddly enough, I also came across and bought a book about what one practically does when someone dies - a bit unconventional, sure and perhaps a bit morbid but after seeing it, I thought that that's something I know absolutely nothing about and could learn more.

So perhaps this later set of book purchases will dictate my reading list moving forward.

The other interesting think about the Virb is that I can control it from my watch – I can tell it to start recording, take pictures etc. Very cool.

So far so good.

I went for a 20km run on a Wednesday. It was the longest run I’ve ever run apparently. I might have done that before because it was not that tough as perhaps I could have been if I’d not done it before.

I set off from the office at 10:30 as per usual. The other guys aren’t as rigid as I am when it comes to routine(or they are more flexible!) and they wanted to go 30 minutes later – I wasn’t having any of that – my mind is a 10:30 kind of mind. That’s how I set it and that;s how it is.

I do find that when I run by myself that I normally have a more exciting run because I switch things up, which they’d be less inclined to. For example the other day I went running with this one guy and I asked if I could take him ‘off-road’ and he agreed enthusiastically and afterwards he said he never wants to run with me again. He got a truck-load of strava achievements. Too bad?.

I don’t like the monotony of the regular ‘loop’ route we run, which is around Victoria park. So it was another opportunity to mix things up again. I decided to look up the map of the area the last time I ran off-road to see where I could go. I saw that there was a couple of parts, I’d I ran past Victoria park, that were grassy and most probably parks and I like running up uneven turf because it makes me feel like I’m a human with legs capable of doing that and not a car just running straights and even altitudes.

I decided to run there or around there abouts.. It was great, everything was new! It was sort of like new frames in a cartoon, I just kept running - it was a page turner. I like running like this. So I just keep waiting for the next scene, as I ran up and down hills, around bushes, seeing new things - mostly along regents canal.

I don’t understand why we’d not run a new route each week all the time.

I didn’t know exactly where I was going but I new that I’d come across large grassy areas and I did. I didn’t how far I was, So I just kept running until something made me stop – either me or something else. As it turns out, that wasn’t me – I’ve got a tough mind, but it was the Thames. I ran all the way to the Thames as the Lime house Basin. Nice to see regents canal become the Thames.

Ran around the Dock. Never been there before, it looked like Katherine’s Dock approaching and for a moment I thought ‘I’ve ran that far?’.

I set back up and I knew that I started to slow down, or that’s what I felt because I was getting tired but it wasn’t that much, but everything got heavy - legs and shoulders. I just keep running at whatever pace I found useful and fairly easy. I got tired but the scenery made me enthusiastic about being there. I find that I find it more enjoyable to run and see something new than keep running even if you’re tired. So I saw different stuff on that way back because I was like ‘ wait, let me run up there, I know I’m tired but I’ll see something new’

I realised on the way out after a while that I’d been running for a long time and I then figured that I’d like to see If I could do 20km, as they would probably be possible because I decided to add the ‘loop’ route also,  which would be double what the regular ‘loop’ routes was. Near the end I was tired but it felt ok because It felt that I let off the pedal because I was tired so that allowed me to keep going as I slowed down.

Near the end, I was around 17km and was getting really tired and close to the office, so I needed to run more to reach 20km.

I decided to make multiple detours while watching my distance on my watch until I made the 20km. That means I found new streets that I’d not seen before because I needed to take them to rack up the miles.

It was a good, tiring but really fun run. Doing something unusual is exciting and this proves it. It look me 1.3h and my pace on average was actually not as slow as I thought, considering the extra distance and how tired I was tired at the end. .It was actually only 10 sec’s slower than my last 12-13km. My pace was 4’46. I think I’ll do it again, but I think I’ll do a little more touring.

This is it:

These last couple of weeks I’ve been doing things a bit differently. or at least its felt different. Yesterday I went to the gym and did Back and Biceps, and these days I can just keep on going. I mean, I don’t need to quit after an hour or even two of training. I used to get tired and I knew when enough was enough. Now, I seem to be able to keep on going. Today, I went in again, this time it was shoulders. I didn’t need to go in today as shoulders is only on Tuesdays. I went in anyway. I grinded it out for what felt like hours, but if I had to guess it was probably an hour and a half.

In both instances I didn’t time the sessions. I wonder if this is the key? I guess, following the stop watch signals mental ques in your brain just like it does when I go running during the week – which is why I keep changing the route to confuse the visual recognition route patterns I’ve already associated with perceived exertion.

I’ve been wondering if perhaps I’m getting used to the routine and that perhaps I should make it more difficult by loading up the weights. Today, I loaded up the weights in a few exercises, but not all of them, and it wasn’t a problem. For example, I was quite able to do 2 dumbbell shrugs sessions. Same with military presses with the barbell. Perhaps its psychological because its summer and you just seem to have more time to make up your mind to go to the gym. I also feel more like I want to, which counts a lot.  Even my run-in to the gym are fast. Today I was sweating a load on the run in, didn’t seem to make a difference. My muscles weren’t tired during the lateral side raises either, in fact I did them twice also.

Its a good thing.

I think that I am eating more which I speculate is actually helping me recover and fuel my workouts more its hindering them. I tend to just go and eat when I’m hungry and can eat 2-3 times a day without any set-schedule. with the new job, trends have changed. I now eat at about 12 noon at my favourite stall down in the market. I eat again at about 18:00 on the way back from work – usually a protein shake-type thing(oats+protein+chia) or more recently a low-fat yoghurt with layers of dry oats in between. That's really been my only perceptible change in terms of eating.

I said this before but I’ve reduced my training load a lot since starting my new job and I have become somewhat lazier, not taking the opportunities that exist to train more(which is why I train less, obviously!). For instance, I used to run a lot into and out of the office in Chalfont. I also used to train in the mornings. These days, I’ve not done this. Instead I train after work and run only once or twice a week over 8km. It might be because its summer and there is no need to avoid the afternoons – its still plenty light and it makes it very possible. I think so. But this reduced load, fairly casual(lazy?) route is working out, perhaps its just that like many things, consistency is key and I’m consistent with this new schedule.

In other news, I found a new move recently which I really enjoy now. Its a chest move to isolate the pecs, however as you get tired it starts bringing in the shoulders. Its the usual standing cross-over fly. I never really thought much of it before because I always felt that Its just a vanity move(and perhaps deep down I knew that it requires strong pecs which I’ve not had before), because it looks great in the mirror but after getting through my routine the other night and like I said, still with gas in the tank, I tried it out. I find it tricky to know for sure when I’m isolating the pecs but this one really feels like its stretching them. The only real sign I use normally, is the next morning feeling. If its stiff, it worked. Even in the middle of the workouts, I don’t get sore anymore, I just get tired and weak. I wonder if this is partially because I usually do high-volume and fairly modest weights. Perhaps this will change moving forward. That said, I don't want to be stupid and get hurt. That attitude has gotten me this far and I’m happy with it.So jury’s out on that one.

What I have found which might also account for my extended sessions is that I’m now taking a bottle of water with me and re-filling 2-3 maybe even 4 times between sessions. Perhaps all this hydrations is the reason, It certainly coincides almost exactly. If I was a betting man, I’d cite this rather than the lack of timed sessions or high-volume, moderate weights.

I’ve completed my last module at university and theoretically speaking that will give me my B.sc (Hons) majoring in Software Engineering, I got an email the other day asking me to pick a ceremony date. I don’t care about going to a ceremony, especially one that takes 2 hours. I’d rather be in the gym, running or studying. However I’m at a bit of a loss until I get my exam results, which will take 9 weeks. Idle hands are the devil’s workshop. Mostly I’m finding it easier to reflect and train more in the absence of studying. I think a masters is worth a ceremony.