Milestones

Today I hit one. Not sure I'm ready to be all grown-up...

Shiny and sparkly

My wrists are sporting some new bling :)

I've needed a new watch for a while now. About 10 shops later (without trying on a single one), I spotted this one. Suddenly everything fell into place and I knew it was mine :)

 A wonderful present - so perfect (exactly what I would have chosen for myself) and a lovely surprise.

Are you sporting any new purchases? Or something a bit shiny?

A fantastic tonic

Almost a year ago, I was gifted a relaxation experience at the Nirvana Spa. And I didn't get round to booking it because I'm a bit rubbish about things like that.

As the half-marathon loomed, I had a stroke of genius... Guess what I organised for the day after the event?! An evening of relaxation, including their unique floatation experience and a massage. It was glorious.

Amusingly, when I first climbed into one of the pools (in this case, the Spa Pool) my legs barely worked to swim between the different hydrotherapy jets! My thighs were very unhappy with me and getting around the pool was a bit of a struggle in itself. Gradually, my muscles started to relax a bit and I explored some of the other areas: the Tepidarium (with heated ceramic loungers), the Steam Rooms and the Roman Pool.

I ran every step...

...albeit very slowly!

The strategy paid off - I set off slow, let people overtake me, kept going slowly and, well, just kept going!

Positive thinking

I searched back through old episodes of Marathon Talk (my favourite podcast) to find advice for race week (which is here in episode 13) and found a hidden little nugget of advice: in that last few days make a list of 10 positive things that you did during your race build up, the idea being that you don't spend your time worrying about what you haven't done/what went badly.

Now, as we all know, my "event" build up hasn't been entirely great, so I thought a list of just five would help remind me of the good things that I did manage to do. It accidentally turned into a list of eight...

1) Started running early - I was going out for 2 and 3 mile runs back in October.

2) Found a partner-in-crime - having a regular running evening with a friend made me more likely to go running and to increase the distance gradually. And it was more fun.

3) Discovering that I can keep running whilst in some (moderate) pain. Especially when I started getting sore knees.

4) I went back to parkrun and accidentally PB'ed.

5) I ran in the rain!

6) I discovered how much easier it is to run in daylight and sunshine (which sounds obvious but wasn't).

7) I got out of bed at 6am on a Saturday to fit a run into a busy weekend.

8) I ran 9 miles! All by myself too :)

I am ready

We had a bit of a running photoshoot this evening. More to come...

Fantastic present

My sister and brother-in-law have treated me with...

...three personal running sessions with a professional coach!

I am very excited and have already emailed to try to organise the first session :)

The salad streak continues

Disclaimer: I am not, in any way, shape or form claiming to eat particularly healthily :)

I don't know what's got into me, but I'm really enjoying eating salad with my dinners!

I've never been a big salad fan, and I don't really rate cold food much at all - if at all possible I will eat three hot meals a day. However, after the surviving the flu (I must have had man-flu as I'm still talking about it!) I started experimenting more. Part of my new-found enjoyment has come in the form of balsamic vinegar - what a genius salad dressing! Beyond that, I don't know where it's coming from but it makes me feel awfully healthy! I've even been trying out different ingredients such as finely chopped mange tout for a bit of crunch...