Running With Clients

I am a runner. I’m a fully qualified Personal Trainer with lots of fitness and nutritional knowledge and experience. But the truth is my route into Personal Training was through running. Because I’m a runner that doesn’t mean that all I do with my clients is run – I had a hell of a job convincing people of that when I first started in the gym, I guess it didn’t help that I wasn’t built like Mr. Muscles, unlike some of the other trainers – no I have all the capability of training clients, in any way, without them having to run a step, whatever their goals.

That’s not to say that I don’t get my clients to run, sometimes with me and sometimes without, but I don’t go into a new client/trainer relationship with the intention of including running, unless they specifically request it. For starters some clients aren’t able to run, others just don’t want to run (though I am able to talk most of them round, if I think it will be beneficial), but the real reason I limit the running is because my body just wouldn’t cope with running with all my clients plus doing my own training (which often includes running for more than an hour at a time and some of it is quite intense). So I may well run in short bursts with some clients, as part of an overall session but I restrict the number of clients that I do running only sessions with. So far it’s worked well, particularly with Ray who is now running at a level that I can call a good run for me, so I need to cut back on my own running on those days. I’m starting with a new running client soon, a Chef (no not Gordon Ramsay) so we’ll see how that goes. I’ve had to adjust my own regime to cater for him, as I have three clients I run with in succession on a day I would normally do my quality run, but don’t worry I’ll still aim to win races, and one of my strong points is to maximise impact on minimum effort, when required.

Before I started Personal Training I trained to be an athletics coach. In fact it was that experience that threw me into Personal Training, I realised how much fun helping people to achieve their goals was. I cut my teeth with the athletes at Edinburgh AC, being mentored by that Edinburgh stalwart, Alex McEwen. They were good days, I built up a rapport with the group and, I believe, they respected me for what I did. I didn’t run with them at the time as it was a large group of mixed ability and I wanted to maximise the coaching experience for me, in order to do well in my exams. Sometimes I came up with the sessions, which Alex approved, but my main role was keeping time, particularly on recoveries, and to learn from the expert, that was Alex by the way. And yes, I was stringent with those recoveries, if it was a minute, 60 seconds was all they got, and I know the group appreciated that, after all they were athletes and I, as an athlete, wouldn’t want 63 seconds when I was expecting 60. But guys and gals, you’ll be interested to note I’m not so stringent with some of my clients, they’re not trained athletes, like you, and sometimes need that extra time to recover. Oh I’m still no softie, I know when they’re ready but I’m a little more flexible, until they become more Ray like.

Before I qualified as a Personal Trainer I first qualified as a Run Leader, which meant I could coach groups of endurance athletes, or beginners wanting to learn to jog/run. So I organised running groups from Sandbach, Crewe, even a treadmill group in the gym, and Northwich. At most of these I didn’t participate but when the mix was right I was able to take part too, which was great fun for me, particularly when I had members of the paras and ex-marines. It was at these sessions that I met Lee Riley, who I later helped to achieve his marathon world record (but you can read about that in an earlier blog). They were fun sessions and it was nice to have a group to lead, but I decided to stop working weekends to spend more time with the family. Ok so the family is just Carole and myself, but we both work hard so deserve some time to ourselves.

When I’m running with clients I tend not to just run with them, I like to introduce intervals, I feel that it is the best way to get fitter and lose weight. Obviously, as I know from my own painful experience during my early running days, intervals need to be introduced gradually and with relevant recovery, but I do feel it is more beneficial than just steady running, though this has it’s place but the client doesn’t generally need me to be there in order to do that. I use this method with Ray and his fitness has improved no end over the past six months.

When she’s not working, and it fits in around my own training and that of my clients, I run with Carole. Now Carole’s training goes a little differently, we’re both keen to tell each other about how our day has been and I’ve found the perfect way to ensure Iget to tell my story first. I use the first 6 minutes to warm up gently, this allows her to tell me some stuff and gives her the feeling that I’m interested, I then make her hit the first rep hard and bingo, she’s out of breath for the rest of the session and up to 10 minutes after it’s over, by which time I’ve told her all about my day and moved onto making dinner. Harmony in action.

At this point I’d just like to post a picture of an old friend of mine, Paul Coughlan. Paul used to be a great athlete, or so he keeps telling us. Over the past few years he’s had injury issues, that have kept him from competing at the level to which he would like to. Two weekends ago he was in action in a race, back in his beloved New Zealand, and it was interesting to see which running singlet this former Belgrave Harrier was wearing. (For those not used to singlet spotting, it’s a Herne Hill Harriers singlet and it looks good on him, even if he doesn’t look good in it!).

the latest Belgrave Harrier to start wearing a Herne Hill singlet

A little update on what I’ve been up to. As you’ll know, if you’ve been reading these blogs regularly, I’d been upping my training intensity and mileage, laying down some foundations for the winter. Well a couple of weeks ago I started to get aggressive achilles pain and also a little niggle around the left knee again. I thought that if I were to carry on with the same training I’d end up with an injury, so I took a couple of days off, not just running but any activity on the legs, other than standing and walking, and it seems to have done the trick, I’m still a little niggly in the legs but I’m starting to run more freely and with less pain. I’ve also reduced all my quality sessions to 3/5 of the number of reps, which allows me to maintain intensity. It’s a ticking over exercise and hopefully, in a few weeks I’ll be able to pick it up again.

Yesterday I ran the Birchwood 10k, only the 3^rd road race and 2^nd 10k of the year for me. Last year I ran in pain, my left knee, and only managed 33:59 – though still first M45. This year I felt pretty good, I didn’t really know where I was with my fitness but I felt I was coming into form. I set off aiming for 33:20, thinking that if I struggled I should still get a faster time than last year. And I was going pretty well until the last 2k when I started to struggle a little, though I still managed to pull away from some runners who’d been with me for the past 5 miles. I finished, a little disappointed with my 34:14, 13^th overall, 2^nd M45, 1st M45 ran 34:01. But I’d had a great battle with Warrington’s Andy Green, many of you may recall he was a 2:12 marathon man in his day, we chatted afterwards and he’s aiming for the Chester Marathon, so a bit of a feather in the cap, he finished 1 place and 2 seconds behind me. I think times were a little slower than last year, all round, though my mate Louise Blizzard ran around 4 minutes quicker with 37:47. It was also good to catch up with so many friends from the past; as well as Louise I was chatting on the start line with other ex Belgrave colleagues Paul Freary and Mark Miles (Paul took the 1^st M40 prize 23 seconds ahead of me, unfortunately Mark pulled out at around 8k, having been involved with the front runners). I also had a good chat with Herne Hiller John Kettle, who was always just a few paces ahead of me, apart from a stint when the group caught him, he finished in 10^th place, 7 seconds ahead of me. Then there was my old British League rival from the 90’s Paul Simons (who holds the world record for completing a marathon wearing a Santa costume), he was in the same group as me for most of the way but I just managed to gain some ground on him towards the end, he finished 16^th, 8 seconds behind me. I had a good chat with Bill Bradley, who organises the Pennington Flash Parkrun, he informed me that my prediction that Jeff Whittington would raise the bar had come true as he ran another pb to win Saturday’s Parkrun. After the event I had a good chat with a guy introducing Scott running shoes to the market. They looked vaguely similar to the MBT shoes and felt really nice to wear. They also retail at a reasonable rate for running shoes. I was interested and may well invest in some at a later time but if you’d like to find out more visit http://www.scott-sports.com/.

And finally, some news about a new development in my business. I’ve purchased some licences in a meal planning programme that will help my clients with their weight goals, whether that be to lose, gain or maintain weight. I believe it will allow me to offer more to my clients at a very reasonable price. I’ll focus on this more in a future blog, I’m planning to launch it in early September. Alongside this I’ve decide it’s time to get myself a logo and have employed the services of my Australian friends Zoe Gell, she of ‘the girl that runs’ blog. She’s come up with some really good designs and we’re just in the process of refining them before I announce it.

Over the next few weeks I need to select some more races to get some improvement to my times. I think my chances of the England vest, this year, are pretty slim. This will make Carole happy as I was aiming to run in Exmoor, in the BMAF 10k Champs but that falls on her birthday weekend, so now she can be pampered instead of standing around in the cold watching an old man attempt to run fast. But I’m not giving up just yet, until I’m announced as not being in the team I’ll keep training hard and looking for opportunities to race.

The Mile

The Mile, a classic British distance for a race, but it’s not just the British that revere the distance, many of those countries that were part of the British Empire also look on the mile as a classic distance. Whilst other Europeans countries were stopping short of a 4^th lap we Brits really took to the Mile race, dominating the early mile record lists. The first recorded Mile World Record, I have come across, was set by Charles Westhall in London on 26 July 1855, with a time of 4:28, and the World Record remained in British hands until Norman Taber, of the USA, set the record at 4:12.6, at Allston, Mass. On 16 July 1915. However, as there was no recognized official sanctioning body until 1912, there are several versions of the mile progression before then, even split between Professionals and Amateurs, So it’s likely that there are innacuracies in them, but that’s life and at least there is something available to look back at.

The first record to be set after an official sanctioning body had been set up was by American John Paul Jones, who ran 4:14.4 at Allston, Mass. On 31 May 1913, notably slower than the ‘unoficial’ world record of 4:12 ¾ set by Britain Walter George in 1886, but then Walter was a professional! Despite Britain’s early domination of the mile records it was to be another 24 years before a Britain was to hold the world record again, when Sydney Wooderson took it to 4:06.4 at Motspur Park.

At that time the big question was whether a sub 4 minute mile would ever be run. It was Gunder Hagg, of Sweden, who ran agonisingly close with his 4:01.4 in Malmo, just before the outbreak of World War II. And there it remained until, another Brit, Roger Bannister, took it below the 4 minute barrier with his 3:59.4 on 6 May 1954. Since Roger’s feat the mile world record has been broken a further 18 times and now sits at 3:43.13, which was run by Hicham El Guerrouj on 7 July 1999, in Rome. Surely, after 12 years it’s time to break the record again. But it’s that 4 minute barrier that still attracts athletes to the mile, and is still a barrier too far for many talented athletes.

I actually have a video, called Supermilers, which tells the story of the mile world record breakers from Bannister to Cram. It’s a bit dated now and leaves you wanting to know more about each athlete, but still inspiring to watch, I sometimes watched it the morning of a race to give me some inspiration, it was better than Saturday kitchen and I always preferred running a good race to cooking an omelette in less than 30 seconds.

Well what of my own record over the classic distance. I’ll admit to being a bit of a novice, only having run 11 mile races in my 22 years as a runner. I really enjoyed running them, as a change from running 1500m, although the 1500m is my favourite race to compete in – because I just loved the tactical aspects, particularly when I was fit enough to truly believe I could win. Despite the 1500m being my favourite race, it was actually the 5000m and 10000m that I have performed best in, so I never really trained for the 1500m and my pb of 3:56.1 was set days after I ran my 5000m pb of 14:35.27, but I’m proud of the time, getting under 4 mins is a big achievement for club runners, it acts as a watered down equivalent achievement to the best guys breaking the real 4 minute barrier – If that makes sense. Of those 11 mile races I’ve taken part in I’ve won 3 of them. 8 of them were on the road, one as part of a cross country relay, which Belgrave won, and 2 were on the track. My pb, 4:24.2, came in 1999 at a Herne Hill Harriers Open Meeting, the race boasted some pretty tasty 800/1500m runners and I was hoping to get dragged around for a good time. Unfortunately the first lap was slow so I just took off, nobody came with me and I stayed in front right to the end. My slowest mile is timed at 7:54 and took place on 29 April 2010 when I attempted to win the Mow Cop Killer Mile, I came 4th. Now that’s a real challenge, but it was so much fun that I wanted to do it again this year, sadly I was on my way up to Edinburgh the night it was on, though I’ll admit to having fun in Edinburgh there’s nothing like a Killer Mile to a runner. I hope to do it again in the future, before I get too old and slow, afterall I’ve got to be capable of running quicker than 7:54.

Well that’s all a bit of preamble to what this blog was supposed to be  about, and, for equality purposes, I’ll cover the ladies world record further on in this blog. The blog was inspired by a session I did with one of my client’s, last week. If you’ve been reading my blogs you’ll have come across mentions of Ray before. Ray is one of my running clients and is conveniently located in Northwich. Ray’s been running well of late, the previous weekend he’d set a big pb on the Pennington Flash Parkrun and on this particular session he was keen to see what he could do for a 1 mile time trial, having never raced anything shorter than 5k. After some debate about location, we finally decided on Neumanns Flash. We used Ray’s gps watch to mark out each 400m, with the last one being 410m (the watch wasn’t calibrated to mark out 9m). I also put a stick down after the first 200m so I could check I’d not set off too fast (sometimes a problem in my races).

We set off at a good pace, it felt ok but I wasn’t sure it was right. I looked for my stick but it wasn’t there. Well it might have been there but I’m either blind or we were too fast as I missed it completely. So the first indication I had of pace was at 400m, which we went through, according to my watch, in 82 seconds. This was a little quicker than I had planned (90 secs). Ok don’t panic, Ray was breathing heavier but I slowed down a little and told him to relax. We reached the second 400m in 3 minutes exactly, right on target but in order to reach that we’d run that second 400m in 97 seconds. Now was the important 3^rd quarter, where you can win or lose time. I pushed the pace a little, trying to encourage Ray, but Ray isn’t used to this type of speed work and he was hurting. Hurt or not Ray’s no softie and he gave it everything he had. A little down at 1200 (4:34) it was now we really had to work, I was encouraging Ray with everything I’d got and Ray was doing his utmost to respond, heavy breathing, a little bit of streamlining as we hit a windy patch, and fighting the desire to stop. 410 metres never felt so long but eventually we saw the finish, I tried to muster a sprint out of Ray but the sprint was on holiday today. Then it was all over, Ray displaying the classic signs of someone running his first middle distance race.

Ray had stopped his watch at 6 minutes 13 seconds. His pre-race aim had been to beat 6:30, mine to get as close to 6 minutes as possible. Both optimistic, mine perhaps a little too optimistic but we weren’t far off. It’s given us a marker that Ray can use to gauge future races. Plus the other thing I feel it will have given Ray is that knowledge of how to really push yourself in that final mile of a race. So expect Pennington Flash to go below 22 minutes before the end of the year.

While I was thinking about the session I started wondering how many sub 4 minute milers I had as friends on Facebook. I thought it might be 5, but it turns out I only have 4, though there are a few more knocking on the door, or they may have knocked on the door and no one answered. Then I had a really geeky thought, why not rank my Facebook friends according to their mile pbs. Well the problem with that is that I don’t know what everybody’s pb is. So I used that great oracle of factual information, the Power of 10 listing. Ah, but then again, I know that’s not accurate for people like me, i.e. older athletes who achieved their best results more than 10 year’s ago, unless you’re a real big name of course. But I soldiered on and many hours later I produced a totally inaccurate listing. Inaccurate because I have many friends who have no registered times and yet I know they’ve run the mile or 1500m (I thought I’d use both distances as not everybody has done a mile but has a 1500m time that can be related to a mile and then there are others, like me who have a far superior 1500m time to their mile time, so it was a way of levelling up). So I’ve listed everyone I could find. If you’re not here it’s because; you’re old and Power of 10 doesn’t have your result, you’re foreign and Power of 10 doesn’t recognise you, you’re both old and foreign, your time wasn’t registered for some other reason, or you never did run these great distances. Also there are many names in the list that I’m sure have run a lot faster than the time published. So here’s an appeal to all my Facebook friends, let me know your genuine pbs and I’ll update it. And for those still young enough to achieve a pb, get out there and climb up the list.

 

So for anyone who wants to see the list, read on, for those who don’t, skip the next section and I’ll write some more. You should note that there are many people without a mile time but I’ve ranked them based on their 1500m time plus 18 seconds for the 109m (wholly inaccurate again, as someone running a 4 min 1500m can cover 109m faster than someone running a 6 min 1500m, but give me a break I couldn’t be bothered with working out a sliding scale), but what I did do was take into account people who have an inferior mile to 1500m time (e.g. my best mile time would equate to around 4:14 with the 18 second rule) and ensure those people without a mile time didn’t appear above somebody with a superior 1500m time. Well it kept me higher up the list anyway! No mile or 1500m time is indicated with ---. Finally I haven’t given a fig whether it’s an outdoor or indoor or if the mile is on a track, cinder, road, or grass. So have a look and see where you feature, or should feature.

John Gladwin                – Mile 3:51.02             – 1500m 3:35.26

Andy Graffin                 – Mile 3:54.7               – 1500m 3:35.53

Andrew Geddes           – Mile 3:59.28              – 1500m 3:41.0

Kris Gauson                 – Mile 3:59.74             – 1500m 3:40.59

Darren Gauson             – Mile 4:01.12             – 1500m 3:42.16

Paul Freary                   – Mile 4:01.51             – 1500m 3:43.3

Phil Mowbray              – Mile 4:01.81             – 1500m 3:41.63

Mark Miles                  – Mile ---                    - 1500m 3:42.86

Bashir Hussain             – Mile 4:06.6               – 1500m 3:47.4

Dave Anderson            – Mile 4:07.7              – 1500m 3:46.77

Justin Chaston              – Mile 4:08.3              – 1500m 3:46.58

Mike Quinn                  – Mile 4:10.4             – 1500m 3:49.9

Mark Mitchell              – Mile 4:13.42            – 1500m 3:44.44

Paul Evans                    – Mile ---                   - 1500m 3:45.4

Dave Taylor                 – Mile ---                    - 1500m 3:47.9

Nick Goolab                – Mile ---                    - 1500m 3:48.34
Jerry Watson                - Mile ---                    - 1500m 3:49.9

Martin Whitehouse       – Mile ---                    - 1500m 3:49.97

Andrew Barber            – Mile 4:13.96             – 1500m 3:51.5
Paul Coughlan              - Mile 4:19                  - 1500m 4:00.6
Henryk Piotrowski        - Mile 4:20                 - 1500m 3:54.9
Ossie Arif                     - Mile 4:20                  - 1500m 3:57

Roger Alsop                 – Mile 4:24.2              – 1500m 3:56.1

Kevin Quinn                 – Mile 4:26                  – 1500m 3:53.79

Stevie Cairns                – Mile 4:27                 – 1500m 3:52.9

Dougie Selman             – Mile 4:28                 – 1500m 3:51.15
Iain Lockett                  - Mile ---                    - 1500m 3:54.4

Jonathan Henderson     – Mile ---                    - 1500m 3:57.02

Ben Paviour                  – Mile ---                    - 1500m 3:57.74

Tim Elsey                     – Mile 4:28.99             – 1500m 4:04.4

Nick Altman                 – Mile 4:31                 - 1500m 3:58.0

Matt Norminton            – Mile ---                    - 1500m 3:58.42

Alaster Stewart             – Mile ---                    - 1500m 4:00.27

Neil Wilkinson              – Mile ---                    - 1500m 4:02.37

Ryan O’Hare                – Mile ---                    - 1500m 4:04.53

Robbie James               – Mile 4:33.2              – 1500m 4:35.3
Owain Lewes                - Mile 4:35                 - 1500m 4:10

Chris Peach                  – Mile 4:43                 – 1500m 4:02.38

Iain Lockett                  – Mile ---                    - 1500m 4:02.4

James McMullan          – Mile ---                    - 1500m 4:03.0

Chris Busaileh              – Mile ---                    - 1500m 4:03.77

Matt Bell                      – Mile ---                    - 1500m 4:04.25

Simon Coombes           – Mile ---                    - 1500m 4:04.9

Francis Marsh              – Mile ---                    - 1500m 4:06.24

Jack Brown                  – Mile 4:45.8             – 1500m 4:12.92

Andy Robinson             – Mile ---                    - 1500m 4:15.63

Tim Field                      – Mile ---                    - 1500m 4:17.6
Mark Johnston              - Mile 4:46                  - 1500m 4:17.9  

Sarwar Khan                – Mile ---                    - 1500m 4:18.7

Julian Critchlow             – Mile ---                    - 1500m 4:18.7

Barry Attwell                – Mile ---                    - 1500m 4:18.91

Geoff Jerwood             – Mile ---                    - 1500m 4:19.0

Mark Critchlow            – Mile ---                    - 1500m 4:25.8

Gillian Palmer               – Mile ---                    - 1500m 4:25.88

Adam Priestley             – Mile 4:47                  – 1500m ---

Tommy Lawrence         – Mile 4:48                 – 1500m ---

Bill Rubie                      – Mile 4:51                 – 1500m ---

James Mittra                 – Mile 4:53                 – 1500m ---
Ian Campbell                - Mile 4:55

Charlie Dickinson          – Mile 4:56.4             – 1500m 4:26.5

Sam Knight                   – Mile ---                    - 1500m 4:27.4

Harry Matthews            – Mile 5:04.6             – 1500m 4:45.2
Ann Hood                     - Mile 5:15                 - 1500m 4:54 

Katja Eravisto               – Mile 5:17                 – 1500m 4:28.53

Dave Gough                  – Mile ---                    - 1500m 4:35.65

Rob Payne                    – Mile ---                    - 1500m 4:39.4
Sharyn Ramage             – Mile ---                    - 1500m 4:44.04

Mark Thornley              – Mile ---                    - 1500m 4:47.9

Gail Duckworth             – Mile ---                   - 1500m 5:00.12

Jo Thom                       – Mile 5:25                 – 1500m ---
Kevin Graham              – Mile 5:28                 – 1500m ---

Cath Ferry                    – Mile 5:33                 - 1500m 5:08.48

Victoria Bailie               – Mile 5:36                 – 1500m ---
Lorna Rice                   – Mile 5:48                 – 1500m 5:30

Ed Bec                         – Mile ---                    - 1500m 5:32.4

Helen Smethurst            – Mile 5:52                 – 1500m ---

Louise Blizzard             – Mile ---                    - 1500m 5:44.15

Jane Searle                   – Mile 6:04.5             – 1500m 5:52.5

Ray Tran                      – Mile 6:13                 – 1500m ---

As promised here’s a bit about the Ladies progression, it would appear that they haven’t had as many opportunities as us fellas, certainly in the 19^th and early 20^th centuries it was probably a bit of a no no for ladies to race. The first record I came across was the 6:13.2 by Elizabeth Atkinson, another Brit, who set this time in Manchester on 24 June 1921. It stayed in British hands until 1953, when Romanian, Edith Treybal, ran 5:00.2. It was taken below 5 mins 4 times, from 1954-55 by Britain, Diane Leather, who left it at 4:45.0. That time took 7 years to break, by New Zealander, Marise Chamberlain. In 1967 the IAAF began official ratification and the first ‘official’ record went to Anne Rosemary Smith, of Britain, who ran 4:37.0 on 3 June 1967. The record has been broken 12 times since, the current record standing at 4:12.56, by Svetlana Masterkova of Russia, which was set on 14 August 1996. Surely we have enough quality women runners to set up a mile race to break that record.

  

My personal feeling is that it’s a shame there are not more mile races out there. I know all the League races have to be standard metric distances but I sometimes think that in open meetings and local friendly leagues we’re missing an opportunity to give athletes a chance to run something different. Also it would be nice to have an opportunity to run a few more road mile races, I love them, even if I do find them a lot harder now than when I was a lot younger. With 2012, and the Olympics coming to Britain there’s an opportunity to bring back the mile, every location of the torch relay could host a 1 mile event. What a great way to involve the kids. Then in 2014, as well as the Glasgow Commonwealth games, it’ll be 60 years since Roger Bannister broke the 4 minute barrier. Surely it would be more fitting to run a load of mile races than to put a stopwatch on a 50p piece. Maybe I should start a campaign.      

Some good news I received last week was that my pal from Edinburgh, Jim Buick, passed his level 3 exams and is now a fully qualified Personal Trainer. So if you’re looking for a Personal Trainer in the Edinburgh area, consider Jim. By the way, if you’re looking for one in Cheshire, I still have slots available. Other good news I’ve been back to the photographer and after an enduring morning I now have some pictures of me smiling, these have been forwarded to the publishers and, hopefully, will feature with the article in September.

This blogs already overblown so you’ll have to wait until next week to find out what else has been happening in Rog’s world.

My Gym Is A Very, Very, Very Nice Gym

I know people who have bits and pieces of fitness equipment around their house, I’ve also come across people who have their own multi-gym or even a bigger full sized one. But having a gym of your own is not always possible, firstly there is the cost and then there’s the issue of having a room available to use as a gym. If the truth be known, for most of my life, I never had any inclination to have a gym myself. I’ll admit to having bought a pair of 1.5kg dumb bells when I was a teenager (yep I was even more slight in those days and that was about the extent to what I could lift), in fact I still have them and yes I do use them, though only on some of my more genteel clients. However, when I’d had a couple of years suffering running related injuries I bought some cardio machines to help me stay fit with less impact. My first cardio machine sat in my lounge when I lived in a one bed flat, yes I was single at the time. Eventually, when I started making some good money I progressed to a bigger house and was able to use the loft space as a cardio room – still not a full gym, my weights were in my parents garage and at that stage of my life I had no desire to use weights anyway. In fact it wasn’t until about two years ago that I started doing anything with weights or even core exercises. You could take that statement and ask who needs core exercises if I can run as well as I did without them, to which my answer would be that I wish I had done them earlier as it may well have made a difference and may have saved me from some of the injuries I suffered. Oh well no point in crying over lost opportunities, just get out there and seek some more.

Now that I’m much more aware of exercising I have an array of equipment, to which I keep adding. This is equipment I use for myself and also with my clients. For the past two years we’ve been living in rented accommodation, whilst we tried to sell Carole’s place in Gorebridge. This restricted both how much equipment I could store and where I could workout. But now we’ve finally settled in Northwich, in our own place, and it opens up the opportunity for me to consider my gym situation. The beauty of this house is that there is a separate room that I can use to store my equipment but also carry out effective workouts. At the moment I only use it for abs/core, weights and kettlebell workouts but my intention is to bring my cardio equipment down from Edinburgh to make it a more effective gym for overall fitness. This will be good for me and also good for any clients who want to visit me to carry out their training sessions. 

So what do I have in my gym:

Interchangeable weights

Light dumbbells

Kettlebells

Ankle weights

Boxing pads and gloves

Wobble board

Skipping rope

Trampete

Football

Swiss ball

Small core ball

Exercise mat

Weight gloves

All the equipment one needs to create effective workout sessions. Soon, hopefully, I’ll have my cardio equipment and I’m considering getting a trx system, but we’ll see, and no doubt I’ll be adding to my kettlebell collection (I’m already adapting to the 12kg one so next I’ll be looking to get a 16kg one).

Of course the gym needs to be painted and needs a certain amount of personalisation. Lee Riley sent me a copy of a newspaper with a write up on his World Record breaking run and he’s added a little thank you note and his autograph, which nicely personalises it and stands as a reminder of the small part I played in his success, so I’m going to get that framed and put up – once I can find it in all the piles we’ve been moving from room to room.

Whilst I’m thinking about the gym it’s now time for me to get going and do a session, if I’m able, while we were moving furniture at the weekend I dropped a unit and pulled a small muscle in my back as I tried to catch it. It doesn’t stop me running, as I proved yesterday, when I did a big session but I don’t know how it will work lifting and twisting, I could feel it this morning when I was demonstrating exercises to clients so we’ll see how things go.

I should point out that Carole is pleased that she is no longer finding bits of equipment strewn throughout the house and that visitors no longer have to walk into a room to find me contorted and sweaty.

I’ve also been writing an article for a local magazine, which will hopefully be published. The magazine wanted some pictures of me, unfortunately, as many people will know, I don’t take a good action photo as my face gets awfully contorted due to the level of exertion I put into stuff. I’ve sent along a few recent pictures of me running for Herne Hill, even the one of me leading the first leg of the Southern Masters Road Relay, which Julian Critchlow likes so much. But the magazine have selected one of me running the East District Cross Country Relays for Edinburgh AC, that they found on the internet. I also had some photos taken of me in the gym and doing some kettlebell stuff but I wasn’t smiling so it’s back to the photographer to get some more. But I might as well include a couple. 

Rog in his Gym

Now you can see for yourself how weedy I am

Six Men Make Edinburgh’s Day

I sometimes get quite nostalgic, of course my regular clients will know this as I use Alsop’s Fables to illustrate a point. It was whilst in reminiscent mode that I decided upon this week’s blog. I was taken back to a great day when I was unexpectedly thrown into the thick of it and emerged a National Champion. I am of course referring to my debut run for Edinburgh AC, though in those days they were named City of Edinburgh (and there was another name they were referred to by our friendly rivals the Hunters Bog Trotters).

But before I go into any details about the great day in question, let me start by explaining a little how I ended up a member of Edinburgh AC. Since starting to run, at the age of 24, and turning 40, I’d only ever had one club. It was my local club, Belgrave Harriers, and such was my attachment to them, I served my time as Road and Cross Country Captain and also held the position of Honorary Club Secretary. I had no intention of leaving them but around the time I turned 40 there were a few circumstances that came together, the result of which was that I switched allegiance to local rivals, Herne Hill Harriers. Soon after this switch my marriage broke down, which was taking the Belgrave/Herne Hill rivalry a little far (my ex-wife being a member of the Belles). With the marriage over I had nothing to tie me to London, and, having worked abroad as a contractor before, I started thinking about all the exotic locations I might go to work.

Having mentioned my good fortune to my boss and in my usual honest way, commenting that I didn’t anticipate staying in London much longer, I found myself being offered a promotion and relocation to the Edinburgh office. A move which would cement my future in the Bank, I so enjoyed working for. To cut a long paragraph short, I found myself living in Edinburgh by November 2005. As I was still making regular trips back to my home in London I didn’t really do anything about getting to know the running scene in Edinburgh, in fact it wasn’t until Boxing day (I had worked Xmas day so needed to get out and do something) that I ran my first race in Scotland. The race in question was a 14k multi terrain handicap race at Beecraigs. It’s not the sort of thing I’d normally have done on Boxing Day but faced with a miserable lonely day in a small flat it was a mighty relief. Thanks to my friend, Jim Buick, who provided the transport but also gave them information on my best 10k time, achieved 12 years earlier, I found myself going off scratch. Needless to say I had a lonely run, went off course and managed to punch myself in the face on a descent of the Cockleroy. I did however finish 2^nd fastest so it wasn’t a complete failure.

My second race in Edinburgh was on New Year’s day 2006, in the Portobello 4 mile Road Race. It was nice to get out on New Year’s day, for some company, I’d spent a lonely New Year’s Eve and retired to bed early, having received my only New Year’s Eve greeting from a prostitute hanging out of a window on my walk home. Mind you going to bed early on New Year’s Eve in Edinburgh guarantees nothing other than being woken up at midnight by exploding fireworks. At the race I ran well and finished 4^th but first man over 40, so not a bad start to the year. It was around this time that Jim Buick emailed me, asking if I’d joined a Scottish club yet. My cheeky response being that nobody had asked me resulted in Jim forwarding my reply to Alex McEwen and thus contact was made with City of Edinburgh. I’ll admit to being a bit hesitant at first, after all I was in a club already, and we were successful, but I knew I would be getting down to London a lot less once I’d settled in Edinburgh and the UK Athletics rules allowed me to run for both Herne Hill and Edinburgh.

So I joined City of Edinburgh and, due to other commitments, lined up my first race at the Scottish National Road Relays on 1 April. Of course being an oldie, and knowing that Edinburgh had more than 6 men better than me I expected to play a part in their Master's team. The week before the race I had spent in London, on a course, and as I flew back on the Friday night I figured that Edinburgh’s Masters were so strong it wouldn’t matter if I wasn’t on full cylinders so decided to have a couple of glasses of wine to assist in enjoying the short flight. When I arrived back at my flat it was like walking into the Sahara Desert, without the sand. I’d moved in only the week before and my central heating hadn’t been working. I’d left keys with the workmen whilst I was in London and they’d fixed it but then left the heating on full output for four days. Despite turning it off, and opening windows, it was still the height of summer in my flat when I awoke from a restless night. So I hadn’t had the best preparation for my debut for Edinburgh. Still I was keen to run, get to know some of the local lads and set down a marker.

Still not knowing many people I drove to the race on my own, taking the long way round by getting lost twice. When I finally found the Edinburgh guys it was apparent Alex wasn’t around, he was on race marshal duty and had left the team in the hands of Mark Johnston. It was then that I was told I wasn’t going to make a difference to the Master’s team, I was actually last man into the A team for the Seniors. I looked at the team names, recognising nobody except Darren Gauson and Mark Johnston. I then noticed Martin Ferguson’s name in the Master’s team. ‘Surely’ I said ‘Martin is running better than me’, I’d seen some of his results and he was going well, I was beginning to regret having drunk two glasses of wine and sleeping in the oven. It was then I was introduced to Martin Ferguson, who had been standing next to me whilst I was singing his praises. Clearly happy to have someone say something nice about him Martin declined the place and was sure Alex knew what he was doing. I was beginning to wonder if Jim Buick had mentioned my times from previous decades and this had bumped me up the entry list. Oh well in for a penny.

I wasn’t nervous as the race started, I was on leg 5 and knew nothing of the team chances or the opposition. I had a lot of experience running and winning relays for Belgrave and Herne Hill so I was prepared for anything that came my way. Before the start I’d been introduced to the other 5 team members, but I knew very little about them and they knew even less about me. In the following few paragraphs I’ll describe the race as I saw it, with thanks to Mark Johnston who sent me a link with the full results. For any statos out there here is that link http://www.salroadrunningandcrosscountrymedalists.co.uk/Archive/Road%20Running/Road%20Relays/Results/2000s/2006%20ALL.pdf

It was Mark Mitchell who set us off on leg one. Still only 17, Mark was highly ranked in the UK in his age group for the 800m. But it was a big challenge to pit him against some of the strong runners on leg 1. Mark ran a fantastic short leg 16:17 to bring us in 3rd, just 11 seconds off 1st.

Grant Stewart, more of a hill runner than a road runner, took over from Mark on the first long leg. His time of 30:18 was 5th fastest on the leg but good enough to gain us 2nd place. In front a 29:21 from Irvine's David Millar had moved them from 8th to the lead.

Then it was the turn of Darren Gauson. Darren had been running well and was on his way to an American college, but before that he was to take us into the lead in this relay with a superb leg of 15:41. Great as it was this was only the 2nd fastest on the leg as Kilbarchan's Ross Toole ran the day's fastest short stage at 15:39, which brought them into 2nd place. 

Half way through and we were leading, things were looking promising. Relays can fluctuate from leg to leg so being in the lead didn’t necessarily mean we had it sown up, still it does you no harm. I was one leg away and beginning to psyche myself up.

Mark Johnston was on 4^th leg and although he had an 89 second lead he had some strong opposition on his long leg. Mark did a great job, running the 6th fastest time on his leg but couldn't hold of Irvine's Lee Richardson who brought them back into 1st position from almost 2 minutes back. I should point out here that Mark was at the Beecraigs run and was fastest man, running a minute quicker than me, that’s probably why he got the long leg and me the short – but I wasn’t complaining.

Not knowing for sure how long the long legs were I was at the start line early. I was enjoying not having to small talk with people, then an old gent came up to me and said ‘are you going to win this for Edinburgh, we’ve never won before’. Well history is one of my favourite subjects but my knowledge of City of Edinburgh’s lack of success was sadly lacking so all I could say was ‘I’ll give it a go’. At last the leader came in sight, and it wasn’t Mark. Irvine had taken the lead and they seemed to be a long way ahead, though it was actually only 16 seconds. Irvine’s 5^th leg man set off and seemed to be pulling well away before Mark showed handed over in 2^nd place.

Well I’ve done some pretty good relay legs in my time and I wasn’t about to let an old Edinburgh gent’s dreams get shattered. I set off after Irvine’s man, with a vengeance. Just before the 1 mile point I was metres down. It was at that precise point that I caught a quick sight of the Edinburgh lads, with mournful faces. It was only later that I realised they weren’t too happy with me because they’d seen Mark, on the previous leg, a long way ahead and, because they didn’t know me, they’d assumed I’d just lost the lead, it wasn’t until after the race that they realised I’d run ok. I pushed into the lead and, though I tired towards the end, the cheering Edinburgh lasses helped me on my way and I brought the team in 1^st. My time of 16:26 was 2nd fastest on the leg, only 2 seconds down from one of Scotland's greatest athletes, Bobby Quinn, who'd brought Kilbarchan up to 3rd. 

Matt Bell had the task of holding onto the 44 second lead I'd given him. As usual, I went for my cool down back along the course to cheer Matt on. I had no idea if he was going to hold the position and it was a long wait before he turned up, but he was and remained in the lead running the 3rd fastest time of the last leggers with 30:35. We’d won in a time of 2 hrs 20 min 50 secs and made an old gent happy, actually make that two old gents as I was pretty chuffed too, my first race for Edinburgh and I was a Scottish National Champ at the age of 41. 22 seconds behind us William Richardson had brought Irvine back up to 2nd and a further minute and 7 seconds behind were Ron Hill Cambuslang.

A couple of interesting post notes. The Irvine man I passed on my leg turned out to be Colin Miller. He was 48 years old at the time, so he’d had a tough task to try to hold first place, even if I was only a few years younger than him. We subsequently met up when we both represented Scotland, later in the year, and have become good friends. And here’s one for my Cambuslang friends, a lot of people made remarks about how it was a slow winning time. But do I care, no, the results speak volumes, it’s City of Edinburgh who were Scottish National Road Relay Champions in 2006, beating all those great teams who ran even slower and my medal states National Champion, not National Champion from a slow race.  

Now 5 years on it’s interesting to see what has happened to Edinburgh’s team. They’re all Facebook friends of mine but we all live different lives in 4 different countries.

Mark Mitchell, still a young man at 23, he left Edinburgh at the end of the 2010 track season and is now putting in some good performances with Birchfield Harriers. I saw him on the TV yesterday, running in the UK Champs 1500m, along with another ex colleague Kris Gauson (brother to Darren). Mark ran a pb 3:44.44 to come in 8th with Kris two place back in 3:46.76.

Darren Gauson is still in America, he’s now coaching at Butler University, where he’s been joined by brother Kris. He’s still running and not bad too, having got close to 4 minutes for the mile this year. Interestingly both Darren and Kris also represent my old club, Belgrave.

Grant Stewart, born on the same date as me but 11 years later, just in time to enjoy one of the UK’s hottest summers, he’s also now a Master. He’s had some success with Mountain running but it appears he’s given up the running now to concentrate on being a Doctor.

Matt Bell was always a reliable runner, he also seemed to prefer running hill races. He’s now moved to Melbourne, Australia. Another one who has reached the age of Master, I hope he manages to find some good races in Australia.

Mark Johnston was the first to leave the club, moving to Bellahouston Road Runners within two years of this victory. Mark trained with the Bellahouston guys and felt a growing affinity with the club. He’s still running, and not badly too as he gets close to his 40^th birthday.

And of the others;

Alex McEwen is still coaching at Edinburgh and I have him to thank for helping me when I was in training to become a Level 1 coach. As well as all the other athletically minded things he did for me whilst I was up in Edinburgh. A true club man, dedicated to seeing the success of athletics in Edinburgh and the sort of club man who should be given a leg of the Olympic torch relay. But don’t give him whisky, he doesn’t drink it. Incidentally he’s marked down on the Power of 10 as 40, which is quite interesting as I’d have said he saw his 50^th birthday some time ago.

Jim Buick is now training to become a Personal Trainer and is already qualified as a Fitness Instructor and Run Leader. Jim has helped many people to pace their marathons, being a bit of a marathon expert. We still keep in touch and Jim pops down here sometimes to try out English races, I’ll have to get him along to Pennington Flash one weekend.

Five and a bit years on, what have I been up to. If you’ve read last week’s blog you’ll know that I was feeling a bit tired and decided it was time I took a little break from the intensity of my training. The desire to train easy was there, but, as I said last week, it was fitting it in around other circumstances, so my planned easy week ended up an easy 3 days. I hadn’t intended running the Pennington Flash Parkrun but after chatting to Ray, during our training session on the Tuesday, I decided to give it a go. It’d been a hard week for sleep as the removal of all the old curtains and poles, so that the sills and walls could be painted, meant we had the constant glare of street lamps and early morning rises. So I wasn’t feeling great as I drove up to Pennington Flash. We had a car full as Ray and his wife Sharon and my Carole were all aiming to run. We got a bit of a shock when we arrived as the car park was full of tri-athletes, preparing for the following days triathlon, but we managed to park ok and headed for the start. The usual suspects were there, plus a few new faces. In particular I’d noticed one guy who looked like he might be a serious contender to win. You’re never sure, but I had a feeling I wasn’t going to win my 4^th Parkrun. As we set off I was surprised I was on my own again, but about 50 metres into the race I had company, yes he was a serious contender. I decided to set a good pace to see how he ran, up the first hill he was breathing harder than me. At that point I thought I might be able to break him so kept the pressure on, at the top of the 2^nd hill he spoke to me and told me he’d only come along for a tempo run. Never the quickest witted person I was fighting for something to put him down with but failing that I thought the best possible putdown would be to finish in front of him. The pace was still pretty quick but I seemed to be ok with it. Halfway round the 2^nd lap he decided it was time to push me and he succeeded, I couldn’t match him. But I wasn’t going to give in without a fight. The two times I’ve been beaten at Pennington Flash I was beaten by about 50 seconds, this time I was keeping him in my sights. It was just after the start of the 3^rd loop I decided to check my watch, it said 11:57. I’d figured it was about 5 minutes to the finish from here but as I saw my time I thought I’d either miscalculated or I was having a good run. It didn’t feel like a good run as I was starting to hurt, but I stuck to the task as best I could. As I crossed the line I was slow to stop my watch, but was amazed to see 16:57. The winner, who wasn’t registered so I don’t know who he was, though I think I’ve seen him before, ran 16:46, and my official time was 16:56. That’s another course pb by 18 seconds and meant I was only the 4^th person to run sub 17 minutes for the course. Some achievement on this tough course. It also gave me a better age graded score though I’m still lying 3^rd. I realise that to knock Jeff Whittington from top spot I’ll need to aim for a new course record, something I thought was impossible for me a few weeks ago, but now I’ve dipped under 17 minutes I’m not so sure. What’s the betting Jeff runs a 19:10 to raise the bar again. Now I’m sure many of you are reading this and wondering what the fuss is about over a 16:56 5k, well you see this is a tough course. When I ran a road 5k in Hollins Green I finished in 16:39, at that point my best around Pennington Flash was 17:33, but buoyed on by the Hollins Green run I ran a 17:14 PF the following week. So you could look at this and say that, were I to run a road 5k now I should run something between 16:02 and 16:21, which is about the time I ran last year at Hollins Green. The difference now is that I had reached my peak by Hollins Green, whereas this year I feel like I’m on the way up. Interesting for me, of course running isn’t an exact science and I know I now have to get out there and compete against my peers in some road and cross country races if I’m to make the England team. Which is what I intend to do, so it’s goodbye to Pennington Flash for a while, hello to road races.