GLOUCESTER SPORTS BLOG

Race to get fit

2012/01/30 at 09:45AM by Steve

I have been struggling with the deadly manflu for the past 12 days, and with a couple of important races coming up I ventured out for an hour run on a crisp, cold Sunday morning. 10 minutes of splashing through the mud in my Mizuno Wave Harrier 3's and I was finding it surprisingly tough, carried on for a few more minutes and quickly realised it wasn't going to be my day, so turned around and headed for home. 25 minutes done but I felt terrible. Hoping a bit more rest will sort me out and that this week I can get back to some sort of decent training. Wish me luck....



28 days later!

2012/01/28 at 15:18PM by lofty

  Now i have been running for some 18 years and tried all sorts of ways to re invent my training and have tried all sorts of training plans of which some worked and some just killed me! My favourite was night running up around Cranham and painswick with head torches, sounds daft but try it. (give me a ring and i can take you out for a run to try it)

  So i now find myself trying a new strategy, running every day. I was a believer of time on my feet but now find myself in a strange position of wanting to know how far i drag my lardie butt around and now wear a Nike GPS Sportswatch .

My hour run i thought was a guessed 6 miles now turns out to be 6.34 miles, i have been stitching myself up all this time by putting less miles down! As for the running every day it seems to be making me feel stonger and i feel a bit more alert in the mornings (not the grumpy old get i was , ask the wife)  Been mixing long steady runs of up to 9 miles off road with tempo runs  at the club and hill reps. On my usual rest days i have now been running steady, some may say junk milage but i will call it "recovery runs" and are around  3 miles. Its 28 days into January and i do think that the combination of daily running and now knowing mileage has strangely relightened my fire to run again.

Lofty.

 

 



Man Flu!

2011/12/23 at 16:45PM by Pat

I've steadily been upping the training every couple of weeks for a while, with my main goal being the first indoor grand prix on the 11th of december. Once there the dreaded pre race nerves took hold as I had never ran indoors before, but once I warmed up i couldn't wait to get going! I put on my un-used Nike Victory's (i've owned them for months without using them!) and managed to nab a cheeky 3rd place in my race, ending up with 5th overall!

Its fair to say I was more than chuffed, and I returned home full of enthusiasm for my running, and less than 48 hours later I was in bed (missing a free curry!!!!!!) with the worse dose of Man Flu i've had in a long time. Pants.

After spending a few days off work i'm back training now, just in time to run off the huge amount of food I plan to consume in the next few days... Cant wait!

From all of us at Gloucester Sports have a great Christmas and  happy new year,

Steve, Lofty and Pat



Buying show

2011/11/21 at 14:25PM by Steve

We were lucky enough yesterday (Sunday) to go along to a buying show, which gave us a sneak preview at some of the running shoes for Spring/Summer 2012 and also Autumn/Winter 2012! We have to plan that far ahead!

Was very impressed with the range of shoes from New Balance for next year, much improved. Saucony are making some nice shoes but they are too expensive for what they are, so I bought lots of offer shoes instead! Puma are getting back into the serious running market, making some nice shoes and spikes. Hoping to get some Faas shoes in early next year as I've been trialling a pair recently and love them. Disappointed with Mizuno, prices have gone sky high despite no improvements in the shoes. K-Swiss were very disappointing, the shoes don't justify the price tags.



Cross-country season returns!!

2011/11/10 at 15:34PM by Steve

Ran my first cross-country race in 2 years last Saturday, a Gloucestershire League race at Blackbridge in Gloucester (home course!), so thought I'd write about how it went. I've not been running much recently owing to the arrival of baby Eve, so this was a first opportunity to get back into the swing of racing!

After no warm-up and working on the stall al day, not ideal preparations but I toed the start line with 180 others. Two small laps of the field were taken at a steady pace but I was trying to warm myself up, sitting just off the lead pack of 4/5. Out onto the first big lap and I moved into fourth after over-taking a couple who had got carried away early on. Tried to settle into a steady rhythm, always hard to do on cross-country! Onto the second lap and started to feel good so reeled in third place and pushed hard up the incline to discourage him from sticking to me. Tried desperately to close the gap on 2nd placer but he pulled away on the final straight, showing my lack of strength at the end. Happy with my run though, sets me up for the big one this Saturday, the first fixture in the Birmingham and District cross-country League at Leamington.

The Adidas XCS 2 (the green/black spikes) were the shoe of choice, absolutely great shoe. Quite a broad-fitting spike, nice and light and extemely flexible, helped me get up on my toes. They can be found in our spikes section on the left-hand side of the home page!!!



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