Yesterday was a pretty interesting day on the course, we were doing a ‘training in alternative environments’ module and went to the local park and started devising programs with just tennis balls, park benches, a few cones, a football and a few dynabands (they’re the stretchy elastic things). By the end of the day, we’d gathered quite a crowd watching us.

Today I had two exams in the morning, Exercise and Fitness Knowledge Level 3 and Nutrition and Weight Management and, to be honest, I think with everything else going on, I probably bit off more than I could chew by booking them both on the same day. I think I did ok on Nutrition but the other one I might just squeeze through, I might not…. the pass mark is 75 per cent so relatively high.

Having the exams this morning meant I did some last minute brushing up from 5am and so I decided to leave the run until this evening for a change – but first I had to do a chore.

One of the things we’ve had done to the house is have a new kitchen floor laid and we had three packs of floor panels left over and they had to be returned to B&Q for a refund. Guess who tried to pick them up all at once? Yes me, and I’ve either pulled a muscle in my chest or bruised a rib when I bear hugged them to lift them at the same time.

So as well as the sore legs, I hobbled another run this evening with a very sore right chest as well… and the faster I ran, the heavier I breathed and the more I hurt. Roll on the day off!

Miles today: 3.5
Target: 1086
Miles to date: 1,506.65
Please donate to my chosen charities by clicking here

Today’s run

The thing with doing the practical assessment is that you pair up with someone else on the course and then train in each other in a session. Given I practised the session I was going to teach today on Saturday, then went and practised the session I was being taught today yesterday, and then went and taught and was taught over two sessions today (anyone still with me? Im starting to get confused myself) in the actual assessment, the thread title is a fair reflection of how I feel.

The good news is I passed the practical element of the course and, providing I can pass the theory test on Thursday, I will be a fully fledged level 3 PT, though will still need to complete some more modules to get my full diploma.

The funny thing is, while I’ve been doing the course, I’ve been surrounded by some proper gym bunnies and I always thought cardio exercises were my strong point and that resistance ones were there’s.

Part of the session that Jonathan, who I buddied up with, involved me doing lactate acid interval training and so I took to the treadmill and thought I was doing it with ease.

When we finished, the assessor said to me that I really need to look at my hip flexors as Im not actually flexing enough in my running… and I think he’s right. Thanks to several doses of shin splints through the year Ive been running, I’ve started to avoid too much stride lengthening and leg raising when running to avoid the higher pressure this would involve on the legs. It seems that by doing so, I’ve compromised my running style. It’s something that in six more days, with a bit of rest, I can start looking in to!

Miles today: 3.07
Target: 1077
Miles to date: 1,496.15
Please donate to my chosen charities by clicking here

Today’s runs

So what did I do today? Three bloody runs instead.

This afternoon, I was meeting my course colleague Jonathan at the gym where I am doing my practical assessment tomorrow for my Personal Training Course. I knew we’d be doing some treadmill work while there and so I decided on the way to calibrate my new Garmin watch with my Garmin Footpod.

The Footpod is a small oval shaped piece of kit that clips onto your laces, speaks to the Garmin watch and acts like a pedometer to gauge your run when there is no satellite signal… where you are in the gym or some such.

To use it though, you have to calibrate it by running when it is locked into a GPS signal and so I ran from the house to the station to do so.

Then in the gym, after yesterdays’ sickening session, Jonathan and I beasted each other and part of my training was a mini interval session – cue the Footpod coming into play.

Finally, I decided to get a few extra miles in by running back home from Clapham Junction. Total mileage covered for the day? 5.78 – nowhere near a long run but I am battered.

Miles today: 5.78
Target: 1074
Miles to date: 1,493.08
Please donate to my chosen charities by clicking here

Today’s runs

Bloody hell. So Monday is my practical assessment for my level 3 personal training award, Wednesday I have a ‘training in alternative environments’ workshop all day and Thursday I have two exams, one in Exercise and Fitness Knowledge, the other in Nutrition.

And it feels as though I’m drowning in it all.

For Monday’s assessment, I have to give a mock session to a ‘body’, a lad called Jonathan from the course that includes a host of advanced resistance techniques in the gym.

And so I ran to the local Virgin Active and made myself do John’s whole session so I knew I could teach it properly. The problem is, the advanced techniques see you do some pretty crazy things, four different exercises, one after the other with no reps and heavy weights.

By the time I’d finished, I was ready to be sick – and then had to run home on top of it… As I said

AAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

Miles today: 3.01
Target: 1071
Miles to date: 1,487.30
Please donate to my chosen charities by clicking here

Today’s run

Run wise, I went up to the Virgin Active gym in Streatham and back, with a workout in the middle. When I say workout, I mean trying out a host of advanced resistance training techniques that I have to prove I can teach a week tomorrow for my assessment.

Miles today: 3.2
Target: 1053
Miles to date: 1,469.28
Please donate to my chosen charities by clicking here

Today’s run

What to do? Crank the miles back up to five for today before hitting tomorrow’s big run as part of my marathon program for Athens. We’re endurance runners for cripe’s sake, what else did you expect

Despite the niggles and sore bits, as per usual it was fine when I got outside and started running… but then again, it always is!

Click here for a link to Garmin Connect for a map and details of the run

Miles today: 5
Target: 1029
Miles to date: 1,432.68

Please donate to my chosen charities by clicking here

While I think I get most of it, it’s only when you actually start revising the information you’ve accumulated that you get just how much you get.

One of the things Abbey, our tutor has been drumming into is earlier this week is the need to get clients – and ourselves to breathe properly. Stop reading now, stand up and take ten deepish breaths and watch how you breathe.

Some lungs

What was your body doing as you were breathing? Most people will be raising their rib cages massively on the intake and pushing their tummies out on the breath out… if you did the same, you’re not breathing efficiently.

What you should be doing is breathing with your diaphragm. It’s the big muscle that flattens to let air into your lungs when you take a breath and when you breathe in, your tummy should raise, when you breathe out, you should pull your tummy in to expel all the air from your lungs.

Now try breathing again to see if you get it right. For something to become a habit for the body, it can take thousands of repetitions and so you may have to practise this thousands of times to get it right in future. Try doing it for ten to 15 minutes each night when you first get into bed.

From an exercise perspective, breathing properly should make one’s body more efficient and hence help improve performance, so this week I have been trying to breathe properly on my runs.

The trouble of course is that my body had begun to adapt to my previous breathing style and I’d become a fairly decent runner by using it. Now to re-adapt, I have to take a step backwards and slow down when running to get it right. Theoretically, when I start to get it right and crank speed back up, I will use my oxygen supply more efficiently.

It’s the kind of example that illustrates the need for a personalised training program on occasion when people want to step up.

Another example would be the lad from the course I am using for my practical assessment. While he spends six days a week in the gym and is pretty big and chiseled, his flexibility is poor and the range of movement he uses is restricted.

When weight training with heavier weights, as he’s not going through the full range of motion for an exercise, he is not working efficiently. I want to take him a step back to some lighter weights to help strengthen the tendons and ligaments that attach muscle and then work on his flexibility, so when he moves back up, he will be able to go for heavier weights and get more from his next program.

Click here for a link to Garmin Connect for a map and details of the run

Miles today: 3
Target: 1026
Miles to date: 1,427.68

Please donate to my chosen charities by clicking here

After heading into town for my PT course, it dawned on me that I’d had a pretty heated conversation with some travel industry colleagues at the leaving do and so sent them an apologetic text.

On the course, I was found out pretty much straight away and, to compound things, I couldn’t get my head around the three bodily planes of movement and spent most of the afternoon in the classes beating myself up about it all.

Nonetheless, I came home when we finished, had an hour’s sleep and then spent the best part of the evening working out which exercises move in which plane. I won’t bore you with the theory, but if you are interested in it, you can find out more here under the planes and axes section.

This morning, like all week, I was back on a simple three miler – there are too many aches and pains from Sunday and Monday’s runs to contemplate more, my body is screaming ‘rest’ and I’m trying not to ignore it for once, the last thing I need is an injury with just a couple more weeks to go.

Click here for a link to Garmin Connect for a map and details of the run

Miles today: 3
Target: 1023
Miles to date: 1,424.68

Please donate to my chosen charities by clicking here

Best laid plans and all that… I ended up leaving at 11pm, a mixture of red wine and strong lager coursing through my veins. 5am, this morning and it was me cursing… my stupidity.

My head ached, I felt sick, had to go for a run and be in some kind of shape to not look stupid on the course. I ended up stumbling around Streatham like an idiot and turning up at the course feeling even worse.

One of the things we have been learning are nutrition guidelines: one of the main ones is no CRAP (caffeine, refined, alcohol and additives, processed). Of course, for me it all went out of the window.

Click here for a link to Garmin Connect for a map and details of the run

Miles today: 3
Target: 1020
Miles to date: 1,421.68

Please donate to my chosen charities by clicking here

When the cat alarm (thanks Mini) went off this morning at 3.30am, I wanted to just curl up and die. Luckily, I was so whacked, I managed to pull her under the covers and get her and me back to sleep.

Six am and I was up, feeling like the body weighed about 20 stone rather than 13. A five miler seemed impossible today so I Vaselined up on all the sore bits and headed out to do three at as slow a pace as I could.

At 42, I am also now discovering the joys of Sudocrem – an antiseptic ointment that helps relieve discomfort from things like nappy rash!

Click here for a link to Garmin Connect for a map and details of the run

Miles today: 3
Target: 1017
Miles to date: 1,418.68

Please donate to my chosen charities by clicking here