I have been good. I have been following the Physio’s advice. I have been doing my stretches, I have been applying ice and popping Ibuprofen. So I thought I’d better also get on me bike and keep my fitness up whilst I can’t run.
After dithering around (as usual), I made it out on my bike on Thursday. 12 miles in 1 hour and 6 minutes is not very impressive, but my backside was shouting at me by the end that it was quite long enough! Mental note – add cycling shorts and/or new bike saddle to my birthday list! I set off thinking I would hate every minute. However, after a while I cheered up, and was just appreciating being out in the fresh air again. Cycling certainly seems much faster than running, and I was amazed how quickly my watch was ‘beeping’ the miles. As I was riding on roads I often run down, it felt like I was on the wrong side of the road – a most disconcerting experience.
Following on from that success, I set off today on an even more unusual experience both for me, and for my local swimming pool. May I introduce my Flotation Belt? It was to enable me to go and do ‘Aqua Running’, a strange form of torture involving bobbing about in the pool, performing a ‘running’ motion, thus propelling yourself through the water.
If cycling felt fast moving after running, then aqua running was slow motion! I felt a total dork approaching the pool side with my attractive belt in my hand, but fortunately the pool was fairly empty (apart from the tots in the shallow end). Once I was happy that I was wearing the largest float in the pool, I slipped into the water and set off. Yes I felt stupid, and yes it was boring going sooooooo slowly, and yes people did have a bit of a stare at me. However, it was a good workout, and after 50 minutes I felt tired which is good.
My birthday weekend is fast approaching, so enough fun for today. Time to hide the grey hair and smarten up for a weekend of celebrating moving up into the next age category for races!