My First Run in 2 Years!

I decided to go for a run on Saturday, so on the Friday night I searched on the internet for some running tips & general advice. I had quite a few questions about running because this time I don't want to just run for the sake of it, I figure if I research properly it will help me get into the sport that is running!

My first question was "what food should I eat before running". I found out that certain cereals & fruits that are low in fibre are the best foods to eat before you run. Some examples are grapes, tomatoes, grapefruit, pasta, rice etc. As I had none of these I decided to eat some porridge with, almonds, blueberries, mixed seeds and some honey (the same breakfast I have every morning).

I also wanted to know "how long to wait before running after eating". It turns out its pretty much like swimming, 1 hour. Well I know from personal experience with weight lifting that I normally have to eat 2 hours before training so I thought I would try that and see how I got on. FYI I found all this information on running.about.com

So I woke up on Saturday at 8am, had a light porridge breakfast and let it sink in my stomach for the next 2 hours. My friend knocked on the door at 10am and he drove us down to the start position (the start position being near a canal). My friend runs every week so I knew he would find running a breeze.

I set the challenge for myself to run 8km (about 5 miles) which my friend thought would be quite tough for a first timer considering 1 mile of the run was up a long gradual hill.

Anyway we set off running (probably averaging about 8-9km pace). My friend stayed in front keeping the pace and I kept my head slightly down looking at his back, I found this easier to take my mind off the distance, I knew that if I kept looking to see how far I had run I would start thinking too much and possibly stop running.

About 2km into the run and I’m already starting to “feel the burn” so I decided to take my mind off running and start talking to my friend, even though I was a little out of breath I found talking to my friend helped me forget about the running. Before I knew it we reached 3km and I was ecstatic. However as we got to the 4km mark I really started to run out of energy, mainly because the dreaded hill had started.

I had to stop to get my breath back, I was gutted because I knew it was all in my mind, or maybe it wasn’t, maybe I just outpaced myself, either way I had stopped. My friend told me not to worry and that I did very well considering it was my first run for at least 2 years. After the short walk I decided to carry on running up the hill, I finally made it to the top (with another 3 to 4 stops in between). Once I got to the top of the hill I had reached about 5km. I knew from this point forward it was a downhill/flat 3km to the finish. I kept on going for the last 3km without stopping.

For my first run I was impressed with myself, I did not expect to even complete the 8km. When I got back home my knees and ankles were killing me, probably because it’s the first run for 2 years but also because I ran on asphalt. Because my knees and ankles were hurting so much I decided to sit my legs in a cold bath (not an ice bath but very close to it) for about 15 minutes. This really helped my recovery as it stopped my legs from hurting on the Sunday.