Day One - The best laid plans...

Having spoken to Bryan the night before I was relieved to hear the schedule of exercise he'd sent to me shouldn't be done all in one session. It broke down like this:


Warm-up and stretching
Core and stability exercises
1 hour cardio vascular [CV]
Strength exercises
Warm-down and stretching
Ice bath or hot/cold shower

Apart from the time it would take to do all of this in one go (I do have some time on my hands at the mo'), he wanted me to spread it out over the day. Effectively, the CV exercise could be done in one session and the remaining core and strength rep's session at another point in the day. Of course, the warm-up and down and stretching need to be done with both.

I probably need to explain at this point that my wife and I have done a fair bit of running in our time but had only in the last couple of months got back into running regularly. We've had to build the mileage back up very slowly as we'd really let it slip over the last couple of years.

So, the plan for day one was; up nice and early; 6 mile run with the missus; core and strength session later in the day.

As the title of the post suggests, the best laid plans, etc., etc...

I'd woken up at about 3 in the morning with nagging sinus headache. A couple of ibuprofen would sort that out but getting back to sleep was obviously a task too far for my aching brain. Much turning, sighing, thinking and sheep counting then ensued until the whining drone of affairs rural banished the silence and Farming Today announced that a new day was upon us. Only at this point did it seem I was able to nod off. Why does that happen!?

Needless to say, the prospect lugging my hefty frame around the streets of Cardiff for an hour did not appeal at that moment and keeping to the same plan but a couple of hours later wasn't fair on my wife (crusts to earn and all that!). The resolution to this thorny conundrum was to swap the sessions around.

After a bit of a lie in and letting breakfast settle I headed down to the garage to tackle the non-CV bit. I have a cross-trainer, exercise bike thing which uses a combination of arms and legs to operate, so that was employed for the warm-up. Laying an old rug down and using a chair allowed me to do the various 'body weight' exercises.

Bryan had told me that the most important part of this was not to run over the suggested rest times between rep's. It didn't matter if I struggled to do the indicated number of press-ups or sit-ups, just keep to the 30 seconds, or whatever, between each set. I have to confess that struggle I did. The last set of each of the exercises had to be really ground out but I'm pleased to say I did all that was asked of me.

The run was tackled a few hours later, just before lunch, which was a convenient time for the Good Lady to take a break from the pooter. We normally walk for a couple of hundred yards before breaking into a run and take a break at the halfway point to stretch and have some water. Wanting to fall in line with the new training regime we decided to start as normal but stop to stretch after a mile or so. As it happens we had to stop a few times during the run, either for traffic (there's a lot more than when you run first thing in the morning) and to stretch my calves out as they were tightening up and making my feet go dead. This is something that used to happen a bit when I ran regularly but would sort itself out after a few minutes. It seems to be more regular and long lasting now but today was particularly frequent and annoying. I shall consult the guru and I'm sure we'll work something out.

In spite of all the minor travails the first day was completed successfully. When all the traffic and stretch stop times were taken out, actual running time was 54 mins 23 secs during which we covered 5.95 miles and all the sit-ups, press-ups, dips and squats were ground out, so not a bad day in the end.

The cold shower's going to take some getting used to though!