2016 Resolution number 6 – an Update

‘It’s not exactly the most relaxing activity, granted, but I always imagine I’m sweating out all the things weighing on my mind’ – Becca Fitzpatrick

Back in January it felt obligatory to jump on the blogging bandwagon that was doing the rounds that week and I created my 16 in 16. 16 resolutions for 2016 (god help me in 2072!). I remember posting it and getting a few positive comments about them and it was all lovely but I don’t think, if I’m honest with myself I was under any illusion that I would actually do any of them. Believe me I’ll say pretty much any old shit for the sake of a half decent blog post.

So fast forward a few months I  noticed on my stats page that for some weird reason, my 16 in 16 post was being read again, which made me read it again, if only to laugh at myself for spending 3 hours creating a useless list of half baked ideas that were going to somehow make my life better. The most surprising thing is, I have actually managed to do a few of them. Perhaps one of my resolutions should have been ‘be less hard on myself’?

Anyway, that gave me the idea to create a few posts giving updates on some of the things I said I would do, and low and behold I actually have!

Number 6 on the list was:

Get back into running – I still have a love/hate relationship with running. I don’t particularly enjoy it and I find it difficult, but I’ve always a bit of a masochist, I like punishing myself by doing things I don’t enjoy. Health wise nothing tones me up like running, it gives me the opportunity to discover new music, and it completely clears my head when I’m down. I know all the benefits it brings, I just need to get it done.

I’m not ashamed to say I’m a fair weather runner. I don’t find anything wrong with not wanting to run outside in the pissing rain, or snow, in fact I think that’s a perfectly normal attitude to have. Problem is, spring has sprung, the clocks have changed so we have more daylight hours, which means I have less excuses not to get off my fat backside and get out and get it done.

I haven’t ran properly since I did the Blaydon Race with Dave and Steph last year and it’s worrying to think that this time last year I ran 10k everyday over Easter weekend, there’s no way I could have done that this Easter weekend. No way Jose. That’s not to say I haven’t been trying to keep fit of course, I’ve started spinning semi regularly and still going to the gym almost 6 times a week. I just haven’t been running. So I decided 2 weeks ago to start up again.

As you’ve probably gathered if you’re a regular reader of this blog, I don’t go particularly easy on myself. My usual comfortable distance always used to be 10K but I knew that trying to do that after not running for 8 months would be ridiculously hard and I would say really horrible things to myself when I was unable to achieved it. So I’m basically starting again. Well, starting at 5k at least, then building on that whenever I can.

So far so good, I’m trying to get out at least twice a week (weather dependent) and building up a kilometre a week. I figured that if I can maintain that level of ramping up, I should be running 10k’s again by the weekend of Steph & Chris’ wedding at the end of April.

Not that their wedding requires their guests to participate any form of distance running of course, that would be weird, but it should hopefully mean I’m back to a level of fitness that enables me to wear a very unforgiving bodycon dress I’ve had in my wardrobe for 18 months and never been brave enough.

I’m really hoping I stick with it and get back into it again, even if it’s just bashing out a 10k once a week when I have time at the weekend because when I’m fitter, I do enjoy running a bit more, and the better I get at it the more adventurous I can be by running in some areas with nicer scenery – like along the river Tyne, which is one of my favourite places to run.

I’ll be perfectly honest though, the main reason I like running so much is that it absolutely melts calories which means I can eat more chocolate and drink more wine!