Steve and I ran a 10Km race the Saturday before last and managed to get a PB for the distance for this year. 1 hour and 57 seconds.
It felt great that we got a PB but it was hard. I was running faster than I would have comfortably gone, but that is kind of the point I guess; Steve made an excellent pacer without which I probably wouldn’t have made it round that quickly. After the run we went to Yin yoga for a relaxing stretch, but it turned out to be a fair bit harder than the previous Yin classes I’ve been to. I mean, we did a 3 minute long camel pose!
I had a 5 hour exam on Wednesday this week and I’ve been studying a lot so exercise has not been my absolute priority. I went to yoga on Monday for a hot 90 minute Bikram class but didn’t do any exercise on Tuesday. My exam started at 13:30 on Wednesday so I decided to get up and run first which is very unlike me! I did 5Km in 30:47. The first 3Km of which I ran very fast and then struggled round the rest.
I was sitting a professional exam and I have spent a fair amount of time revising over the last month or so but feel like the exam went really badly. I just didn’t have enough time and I’m annoyed I didn’t get enough time to really think about my answers. I’m entitled to extra time due to having dyslexia, and because of misreading the information (seriously) I didn’t request it in time so I didn’t get the extra time allocation and it turns out I really need it. I don’t get the results for 6-8 weeks so I have a long time to worry about the possibility that I failed.
Part of the issue is that so many people said that I’d breeze it, and for many reasons I should but I don’t feel at all confident. I need to not get too fixated on the possibility I’ve failed or the next 8 weeks will be unbearable. Positive mental attitude and all that, but that’s definitely not my natural mindset when it comes to these things.
After the exam there were drinks and then I had a few days off revision and didn’t exercise. I took my running kit away this weekend as we went away for a wedding, but due to traffic I didn’t get out running as planned on Friday night and then obviously I was hungover the rest of the weekend.
Suddenly it’s now Monday and it’s been been a week since I last went to yoga and 5 days since I ran.
I can put some of that down to the exam and a busy weekend, but in honestly it’s been largely hangover related! I really need to remember I have a half marathon in 6 weeks and I can not afford to just spend the run up to that drinking and slobbing about. I need to train for it and I also don’t want to get off track and ruin all the hard work I’ve done this year so far.
I had 2 PBs the week before last and then last week was a bit of a mess, but to have just one week where I’ve been a bit slack is a million times better than the months of avoidance I’d have allowed last year.
So tonight I went to yoga. It was a really hot 75 minute class, I saw lots of my yoga friends there, and I had an excellent class considering I hadn’t been for a week. It was really hot which I like, but there was plenty of air so I wasn’t struggling.
I am working from home all week and so I really have the opportunity to work out regularly, get my 5:2 back on track (after 2 weeks of 7:0!) and just to refocus myself on my happy life project.
my happy life project 