#silverstonehalf

So I have just completed my first ever half marathon for @sidley_ouas. My whole body hurts, my feet is bleeding and I want to sleep. But I feel so proud of myself, a couple of times I felt like I couldn't finish but I powered through. Roll on Manchester Marathon in three weeks #silverstonehalf #silverstonehalfmarathon #onceuponasmile #ouas #running (at Silverstone)

My first run out wearing my #doingitfordan tee shirt. @doingitfordan #charity @silverstonecircuit #Silverstonehalf (at Silverstone Circuit)

Why does running have to be so time-consuming? Whats up with that? It makes me wish that I had the capacity to be a sprinter because those short dashes just look like they'd be way more fun than pounding pavement for 3 hours. Realistically, I'd have to train a whole lot harder and differently in order to be able to competently sprint, so I'm actually better off running this half marathon, but whatever. Hmmmmph. What annoys me about long distance training is the amount of time that you need to devote to running in order to put your body through what it needs to experience before you turn up on race day. Especially if you're as slow as I am. At the moment, the furthest distance that I've successfully ran is just over 6 miles. I know I've also clocked a 7-miler recently, but I walked half of that so it doesn't really count. It takes well over an hour to run 6 miles so I'm looking at a 2 hour and 45 minute run in Berlin. That's so long. And I would really like to be able to run at least 90% of it. I know you can run a half marathon having only trained up to 6 miles and if Bangs can do it, then I'm sure I can too. Apparently, the adrenaline from a race is enough to carry you, but we'll see. Also I'm pretty sure I could comfortably speed-walk 13.1 miles but that completely defeats the purpose of choosing to do a half marathon and that's basically the equivalent of an afternoon of shopping anyway, non? I have to be able to run this race. Cheering my brother and his friend Tim on as they ran the Silverstone half marathon has got me in the mood to run again. This urge to run has crept up on me slowly again and is largely due to Run Dem Crew (whatever hype you've heard, it's true, it really is as good as it sounds) and the fact that race day is less than a month away. Hopefully I can clock up some more miles this week. I got a session in with Barbara (running guru, haver of hot legs and general badass) yesterday, running laps round Victoria Park trying to put into practice the methods that Babs was teaching the Bangs on the Run girls and I. She reinforced what I learned from a barefoot runner several months ago, and I know it's going to take a lot of getting used to in order to run comfortably in this way. The idea is to hold yourself upright, keeping strong through your core, lifting up, so to speak, but to lean forward as though there is something pulling at your chest, so that you ALMOST fall forward. Running like this means that you utilise your energy more efficiently as all you really need to do is lift your feet off the pavement because your body weight is already pulling you forward. You don't even need to make large strides as this is wasting energy. It sounds really simple, and in theory it should be, but I found that it put more pressure on the muscles from my mid-thigh downwards and through my calves and shins. This is because of my underused muscles where I have been running inefficiently for months (I'd say 'years' but I have to be honest on this blog thingy). This is going to be a tough month of perfecting this before race day. It's Sunday, which, for most people, is long run day. I should have got 9 miles done today but instead I stood screaming from the stands at Silverstone circuit (any excuse) as my brother Chris smashed yet another half marathon in 1 hour 45 minutes and Tim zipped through his first ever race in 2 hours. Seriously proud of both of them. I'm going to try and get a minimum of 13 miles done this week. This is going to take a considerable amount of willpower. Blah.