Severe buffering.

This week has ended WELL. It started with snoozy legs (inevitably, after a race), and ended with a 30@30 triumph for Andy.


Monday - 60 minutes of swimming, had to take it very easy after Sunday's race. I had tired legs, making pushing off the wall somewhat difficult. I had to move into a different lane because Patrick and Steven in my lane are both younger, male and significantly faster than me and I was intimidated.


Tuesday - an hour's easy run with Andy with 5 moderate 2-minute hill reps, worked stiffness out of legs nicely.


Wednesday - 90 minutes of swimming. Back on form, felt very strong, strongest swim I've had for a while. Tip top. Used my new fins for 4 x 50m and it was brilliant, although nobody appreciated the amount of wash that they created. I have yet to decide how to respond to this. Clearly I don't want to stoke the ire of fellow swimmers, but they definitely aid quad strength and cardio work. We'll see how it pans out.


Thursday - ran 6 miles-ish Doctors Gate loop at Hamsterley. One hill exertion where first Mike, then Brian, then Liam tried to pull away, meaning that it ended up being quite a race. Still, it was good to have a bit of a raised heart rate in an otherwise very pleasant run out.


Friday - fish and chips, nigh on 100g of Galaxy, cookie, flapjack... frankly, an overly large portion of food for one woman who knew she had another meal (namely breakfast) just round the corner, and the only thing in between said meals would be a night of unstressful sleep. As it turned out, actually, the sleep wasn't as plentiful as expected, due to having: a) a coffee at 6pm, and b) two cups of tea with my fish and chips at 7pm. This was not a wise move for someone who normally doesn't caffeinate after 6pm. As predicted, I was still awake at 2am, well aware that I would be getting up at 6am to prepare for Andy's 30@30, and VERY aware that the amount of sleep I would be getting was inadequate.


Saturday - Andy's 30@30! It was Andy's actual 30th birthday so we all got up at 6, ready to breakfast before starting running at 7:15. Initially Leg 1 was supposed to be Andy (obvs), me, Jim, Duncan, Pippa, Joe, Mike, Brian and Liam. Joe couldn't make it and Mike, Brian and Liam had decided on Thursday they couldn't run in the Lakes today... As it was, Andy, me, Jim, Duncan and Pippa set off. Pippa's leg wasn't happy to be running so she had to turn back, so the remaining four of us plodded on through Leg 1. Visibility was excellent, the wind less so. Unbelievably windy, making mobility very difficult at times, as they like to say on the MWIS weather forecast. A few times I was blown off course or had to stand still to stabilise myself against a gust. It was blowing my eyelashes inwards so they were poking into my eyes, and swirling snot out of my nose and depositing it on my face. Not cool. Despite all this, it was a great run out on leg 1 - 12 hills (or Wainwrights... some of them didn't have a great amount of prominence) - and about 15 miles, covered in about 3 hours 30ish. 


At Kirkstone Pass we had soup and chips, and a random sheep farmer bored everyone to death with a few substandard magic tricks. Having recommended a coffee shop in Ambleside to Gill and I (we weren't going to Ambleside, but this didn't seem to bother him), just Andy and Jim set off on Leg 2 to do the remaining 18 peaks and about 20 miles of running. Wind was atrocious, and it was raining quite heavily. Not ideal. 


Having mentioned in passing that I had wet feet (thank you 'waterproof' socks for once again allowing water in after approximately 3 minutes of running), the magician man grabbed my attention by shouting across the room "Oi! Oi! Oi! Wet feet, you say? You just need to dry them, and change into dry socks." Brilliant. Once I'd learnt this - something I'd been ignorantly unaware of previously - I mentioned to Gill I might like to go back to the camping barn to shower, and then wash and dry my feet, and then change into dry socks, and even dry shoes. The camping barn had a rather sweet feature in that the shower was actually 2 showers together, behind a glass door, that anyone could see through. No locks. Anyone who wanted to go to the toilet or wash their hands could quite freely gander at whomsoever was showering. Despite the barn being empty at the time, I asked Gill if she wouldn't mind being on guard just in case anyone else came back and decided to wander through. I managed to get my coveted dry feet. 


We went for coffee in the afternoon and happened upon the aforementioned Mike, Brian and Liam getting a sausage sandwich. They'd run part of Leg 3 of the BG. 


And then we went to wait for Andy and Jim to return from their run. Jim had tweeted a bit in the morning (including a tweet declaring there was severe buffering... he actually meant buffeting, but we can't ridicule him for spelling mistakes when he was attempting to tweet in 70mph winds on a cold January day), but we hadn't heard anything all afternoon. Given the extreme wind we hoped they'd be fine, and indeed on schedule. They were scheduled to finish at 17:08 and they arrived at 17:12, which was pretty much bang on time, especially given the 5 minute delayed start due to miscellaneous faffage. 30 peaks, aged 30, about 36 miles, in 9 hours 51. Brilliant. Very pleased for him. 


Sunday training - I hadn't initially planned to do anything, since I don't usually run 2 days in a row, but Jim was going out for an easy hour(ish) so we jogged from the camping barn along the old coach road round the base of Clough Head to Threlkeld. About 7-8 miles, into a headwind, but after yesterday's endeavours the wind, although nominally quite strong, didn't feel like a problem at all. It wasn't actively blowing us over and we could stand upright, so by comparison it was calm.


And that's it for this week: I now have a 30 year old husband, and have had a good solid week's training. I've also consumed sufficient calories in the past 48 hours to last me until at least Wednesday. I think yesterday involved cereal, 2 slices of toast, mango slices, jelly babies, a gel, soup, chips, bread, millionaire's shortbread x 2, different soup, crisps, carrot cake, chilli, cheese, jacket potato, crisps, tomatoes, cucumber, sticky toffee pudding with custard x 2, fruitcake, crisps. I genuinely don't think I burnt off that many calories in my run. I'm still full now.