Pre and post half marathon stuff

Hey peeps, I hope you are all enjoying the week- hooray it is Friday tomorrow!

Last weekend after breakfast (scrumptious pancakes with apple and spread with some chocolate pb) we headed off towards Oxfordshire.

First stop was Cliveden House. We spent nearly 2 hours walking around the grounds- it was lovely. Pretty mild too so I left my coat in the car. It was so pretty there. Shockingly, we didn’t visit the tearoom, although I did visit the shop.

I love their lime curd (it is even better than lemon curd)- either on crumpets or swirled into yoghurt. The blackcurrant curd had a “Gold Taste award” sticker so I thought I would try it. The magic words “chocolate marzipan” called to me.

Then we drove to Nuffield Place, and had sandwiches in the car park (Andy had made up pb&j’s). It was really interesting there- I didn’t know anything about it, but the classic cars were good to see, and the house was more modern than most National Trust places- it even had original wallpaper in some rooms.

After a walk it was certainly time for a visit to a tearoom. They had some lovely looking cakes- mine was an apple and blackcurrant cake, and Andy went for the coffee cake. Plus Earl Grey tea in very pretty cups.

Then we drove to the park and ride in Oxford and wandered around the shops for a bit.

I was very tempted by some cute lunch containers in Paperchase, but the only things I ended up buying were multi vitamins and lovely meridian mince pie filling.

I bought a tea as the one from the tearoom was quite small, and then we popped to Pizza Express for dinner. I had a new “Superfood salad” containing: Baby spinach and seasonal mixed leaves, roasted butternut squash, beetroot, light baby mozzarella, avocado, pine kernels, cucumber, lentils and fresh basil finished with balsamic syrup. It was delicious.

Then we headed to our hotel- we shared some of the chocolate marzipan for dessert, and then I got my race bits out ready.

In the morning I dropped Andy off at the station and then drove to the race (thinking about that traffic jam is still making me panic now!).

The recovery from it was not that easy. Mainly because I had quite a long drive, so I didn’t get home until 4pm (with the half starting at 10.30am)- seeing as I had eaten breakfast at around 7am I should have had some lunch soon after I finished. I was hoping for a nice tearoom but all I saw were burger van type things, so I just had a clif bar and some water in the car.

Even though I stretched quite a lot on the grass when I finished, I was so stiff when I got out of the car later. I did do some foam rolling, put on some Deep Freeze gel after my shower, and wore my compression socks but I think it was a bit late!

On Monday I didn’t run as I had a late meeting, and then on Tuesday I went to The Waffle House after work with some friends, so my first run was Wednesday. My hamstrings were still stiff, and even when I was running up there I was a bit concerned about how I would manage. It turned out OK as no-one who runs at my speed was there, so I ended up in the middle on my own, but I managed a decent pace (9-something miles) and felt so much better after- a proper recovery run!

This evening was pump. Ouch to those lunges is all I can say!

This weekend I am hoping to go to Parkrun on Saturday, although I just saw the weather! Then I have a 10 mile race on Sunday- good times.