A morning with Essex Boot Camp...

Half Day Essex Boot Camp 

 As you know if you read my blog, still find it odd that people do, last November I spent 24 hours running up and down the hill at Great Notley Country Park. Well today I was back on 'my hill'!

I train twice a week with Essex Boot Camp and love it, I have been a member for over 5 years and apart from a few months last summer have always gone regularly. It really helps with the running, having a strong core, upper body and also the mindset you need to get through sessions.

After my 24 hour challenge Wez and James from EBC said they would put on a half day boot camp for members and ask them to donate to Moorfields Eye Charity.

So this morning myself and 69 other boot campers arrived at Great Notley Country Park to be put through our paces. It was a brilliant, muddy, tough morning. Having been struck with a cold on Friday it would have been all too easy to ditch training plans this weekend but so glad I didn't as a good tough workout and I am feeling a lot better!

The warm up involved lots of running up and down the hill with some press ups, squats and burpees thrown in!

Warming up!

We were then split into four teams and had four sessions to complete during the morning. Our 

first one was with Wez and we were exercising with tyres and doing hill runs, the hill never gets any easier to run up, not even after 265 reps last November!

Next was onto James and some team log carries, my cold was making breathing trickier than normal, but with great encouragement form the instructors and members I was able to keep going. 

We then moved onto Glynn, more hill running with bodyweight exercises and some team trye pulls up the hill. The hill seemed to get muddier as the morning went on and staying upright was becoming tough.

Our final session was stretcher runs with Aaron, one person on a stretcher the other four carrying, we took it in turns and had to complete 5 burpees, 10 press ups and 15 sit ups at various points around the course. It was a tough one to finish on but we got it done. The whole morning went really quickly and was great fun.

Training with Essex Boot Camp is always tough but good fun. The instructors will push you to your limits and get the best out of you. They also encourage that positive mindset that is so crucial in all of my running challenges. It is true that spending your time with positive, like minded people  is so important not just in fitness/running training but in all parts of life and EBC motivates and encourages everyone no matter what their fitness level, goals and ambitions!

If you are inspired to get involved have a look at their web site, there are sessions all over Essex.   www.essexbootcamp.co.uk

Finally a massive thank you to all the instructors for this morning and to everyone who came out, trained hard, got muddy and donated to Moorfields Eye Charity, we raised over £400 which is awesome and will really help the charity with their research into cures and treatments for many eye diseases. Thank you all.

Have a good week and happy running/training xx

It's all mental...

So the school holidays are here and I have time to breathe, do 'mum' stuff (cleaning, tidying etc!) and concentrate on training, it's great!!

Also been reading... Lindley leant me Matt Fitzgerald's Brain Training for Runners and it's got some really good stuff in it about embracing pain, deciding not to slow down when it hurts and that some suffering means you're working hard and that's how you should feel so it's a good thing! Having taken this on board I've given this some thought whilst running and at boot camp and it really helps. I've always used the excuses 'I can't run well when it's hot' 'I'm no good in the heat' etc so with last week's hot weather I changed my mindset and told myself I could run in the heat and maintain the pace I was supposed to be running at and chose not to use the heat as an excuse not to run as fast as I am able and I just about managed it. Thinking 'yes I'm too hot, I'm dripping with sweat and uncomfortable but that's ok doesn't mean you need to slow down' actually worked and I had some pretty good runs last week. Also tried the same techniques at boot camp pushing myself to do a few more reps or sprint a bit faster. 

Something else I realised this week is that my race number for The Chiltern Way Ultra is the same as Saffron Trail, number 3. Very sensible friends and the sane, rational part of my brain knows it doesn't matter what number I'm wearing it won't affect how I run. The slightly crazy, superstitious part of my brain, that bit that makes me salute lone magpies, not open umbrellas indoors, put new shoes on tables etc says differently! I'll let you know which bit wins this battle!!! 

Looking back at my running year so far I am surprised at how much I've changed and I still have so much to learn as I'm still fairly new to ultra running, but I feel I am heading in the right direction. I love having something in my life that makes me happy that I look forward to and that enables me to see beautiful parts of the countryside and that ability to keep pushing myself further. Then there are all the people it has brought into my life. What's not to love...

Have a good week and happy running xx