#Janathon – It Starts

This year I decided to take the plunge and sign up for Janathon again. I last did it in 2013, and it was a pretty good start to an excellent year of accomplishments, so after a 2014 that has been plagued with injury, illness and overall a bit rubbish fitness wise I decided taking part again would be good a good kickstart to the year.

The only rule of Janathon is that you have to do some sort of exercise and blog or tweet about it within 24 hours, so I add a few little rules of my own to stop me cheating. In 2013 I committed to running a mile a day. This year, with a more varied workout schedule I have decided to change my own a rules a little, so over January I am committing to running at least a mile a day OR at least half an hour of an alternative exercise that raises my heart rate. So Roller Derby counts, circuits at the gym count, yoga probably doesn’t, so lets fling in an extra run on those days.

Of course, the mischevious gods of health and fitness decided to bring me a cold for Christmas, so over the last week I haven’t run at all while I’ve been coughing and spluttering. It’s easing off a little, but I still have a nasty cough and blocked sinuses, so I decided to keep it short for day 1 rather than push on for a longer run. I have to say, after training for the half marathon I find doing some shorter runs pretty enjoyable, its nice knowing you can just head out and it won’t have taken up half your day.

The weather on this New Years Day is pretty sucky, even if my hangover isn’t too bad. It’s a bit damp, grey and overcast, but I was really looking forward to the run so after dragging myself out of bed at, er, midday, I pulled on my kit and headed out for a quick swing round the block.

I look totally manic in this photo because in the first one I took I managed to have my eyes closed, so I took another one where they are REALLY open. I would have taken a third but the lady up the road putting her bins out was giving me funny looks.

After coughing and spluttering my way round the first quarter mile I started to get into my stride a little more and my cold retreated to the background.

After another 100 yards I noticed my shoe lace had come undone and had to stop to tie it up. Seriously, I’ve been running for 2 1/2 years and never had a shoe lace undone on me till the half marathon in November. Now it keeps happening to me, have I forgotten how to tie shoelaces? Can anyone recommend a refresher course?

I had an enjoyable bimble through the common, scaring the crap out of hundreds of collared doves that scattered at my approach, in turn scaring the crap out of me back. I ran past some people walking their dogs and did the obligatory nod and smile at another runner. I felt a bit of a fraud because he was probably running way further than a mile and half, but he doesn’t know how far I was going, I could have been going out for my regular New Years Day half marathon for all he knows. Indeed, for all I know he was only running to the corner shop for a pint of milk and just likes to put on full arctic running kit to do it in.

A man with a dog hilariously quipped “it’s not good for you, you know” as I huffed past and I graciously smiled and laughed rather than sweeping his legs out from under him because it’s New Years Day and I’m feeling all positive and at peace with the world, and bless him, he was only being humorous.

Then my shoelace came undone AGAIN. Seriously, about that refresher course….

And then I was done. A total of 1.5 miles in 16 minutes 11 seconds.

That’s 10’43” per mile, a slowish speed for the distance that was adversely affected by 1 coughing fit and 2 stops to tie my shoelaces during which I didn’t pause my Nike+.

So there we go. It took me longer to write this blog than it did to run it, but personally I think running on New Years Day with a cold AND a hangover is worthy of a medal and goodie bag even if it’s only a mile and a half.

Bring it on Janathon!