running

All posts tagged running

May 2025 Stats

Posted by Richard on 1 June 2025
Posted in: Cycling, Diary, events, Fitness, Home Gym, indoor cycling, Pain Cave, Running, virtual cycling, Walking, Weight. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , . Leave a Comment

May began with me looking forward to a long weekend in Cornwall on the BMW R1250RT and that didn’t disappoint, even if it – meaning Cornish Pasties, cream teas, and pub meals – led to a few days off from the Pain Cave.

Most of my time other than that was spent in the Pain Cave for more FulGaz rides, mainly my usual  John Hallas’ Weekly Challenges, but also the FulGaz Winter Escape Tour 2025, which they put out for the riders in the Southern Hemisphere (remember that FulGaz was started in Australia).

Anyway, here are May’s stats:

May 2025 Statistics

May 2025 Statistics

Activities: 27 Distance: 444.96km Time: 17:47:57 Calories:  18,569

Turning to my weight, at the end of April I weighed 86.8kg and at the end of May I weighed 87.0kg, which is up by 0.2kg. Body fat percentage was down from 25.6% to 24.8% which wasn’t bad considering the pasties.

New Boots and Panties

Posted by Richard on 2 May 2025
Posted in: Diary, Gear, Running. Tagged: , , , , . Leave a Comment

Actually, no panties, and they’re running shoes, and nothing to do with Ian Dury.  But apart from that…

I’ve previously owned and used and abused a number of pairs of running shoes and in fact I’ve tracked their lives on Garmin Connect, so I can work out when they need to be renewed.  Decent running shoes should be replaced around 300 – 500 miles of use, so 500 – 800 kilometres.

I’ve tracked:

  • Nike Flyknit Lunar 3 ID
    Since 24 Apr 2015
    Retired on 4 Nov 2016
    460.6 of 483 km
  • Nike Flyknit Lunar 3 ID
    Since 8 Mar 2016
    Retired on 26 Oct 2020
    500 of 500 km
  • Nike Free RN (for walking to and from work)
    Since 26 Oct 2016
    Retired on 20 Dec 2017
    802.7 of 800 km
  • Nike Free RN Commuter 2017 Premium (ditto)
    Since 20 Dec 2017
    Retired on 20 Oct 2020
    800.5 of 800 km
  • Nike Air Zoom Pegasus 37 By You (bought for running, but only now used in the gym on the Schwinn)
    532 Activities Since 3 Nov 2020
    9,802.3 of 10,000 km
  • adidas Adizero Boston 9
    Since 8 Jan 2021
    Retired on 4 Nov 2023
    543.9 of 650 km
  • Adidas Adizero Boston 12
    164 Activities Since 6 Aug 2023 (not yet “retired”…)
    861.6 of 800 km
  • Adidas Alphatorsion (bought for CrossFit and used for a multitude of sins including mountain biking)
    224 Activities Since 22 Jan 2022
    2,431 of 3,000 km
  • The North Face Vectiv Exploris Futurelight™ Boots (bought for hiking)
    51 Activities Since 5 Mar 2021
    223.8 of 800 km

Having loved – and run marathons in – Nike shoes, especially the Flyknit Lunar 3s, I was disappointed when they were dropped in favour of the latest design of super shoes that then fed down to the ‘everyday’ running shoes with big chunky and extended soles.

I gave the Air Zoom Pegasus 37s a really good chance, but as they were always getting caught or making me trip, I ‘binned’ them and moved over to Adidas and the glorious Adizero Boston 9s which I was using on the road and on the dusty/sandy paths around Corralejo. I then bought another pair – the Adizero Boston 12s – in blue that still look like new, because they’ve done very few outside miles, mainly being used on the treadmill in the garage.  I will now use these for the very occasional holiday outdoor runs, I reckon.

Adidas seem to be out of stock of the Adizero Boston 12 in the colourway I wanted, but my wife was trying to decide on a birthday present for me and I was overdue a replacement pair, so…

Here they are:

  • Adidas Adizero Boston 12
    1 Activities Since 1 May 2025
    6 of 800 km

And as a bonus(!) here’s me earlier this week in the Pain Cave wearing the Nike Air Zoom Pegasus 37s:

Of course the ironic thing is that some time before the crash, I’d already seen a consultant who’d told me to stop running and cycle and/or swim instead because of my worn out, cartilage-free knees. That was before I ran the Berlin Marathon.

I got some great physio from Adam Goode a while back and have built on it since.  Running still is an extremely painful thing for me to do, but I’m balancing that with my perceived need (at 63) to do a lot of cardio to try to live forever (the second time around)…

February 2025 Stats

Posted by Richard on 28 February 2025
Posted in: Diary, events, Fitness, Home Gym, indoor cycling, Pain Cave, Running, virtual cycling, Weight. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , . Leave a Comment

February started with some new work coming onto the horizon that was soon confirmed with a week’s visit to New Delhi for a Hearing.  The hotel had a pool and allegedly a fitness centre; the former I didn’t really get to use because we ended up working well over 70 hours that week, including the weekend, and the latter was better than it looked on their website.  The treadmill also linked properly to my Apple Watch Ultra and launched an Apple Fitness+ run which appeared to show video on the main screen and the photos that were mentioned came up on the Watch.  I only managed to get it to work like this once, though.

In the Pain Cave it was a combination of running on the treadmill with JRNY adaptive workouts, and FulGaz, with a continuation and eventual completion of their Grand Tour 2025, as well as my usual  John Hallas’ Weekly Challenges.

And there was the good news that ROUVY had decided to keep FulGaz going as a standalone app, providing they could maintain the user base at its current level.  Fingers crossed!

Here are February’s stats:

February 2025 Statistics

February 2025 Statistics

Activities: 22 Distance: 401.09 km Time: 16:08:36 Calories:  17,545

Turning to my weight, at the end of January I weighed 86.8kg and at the end of February I weighed 87.4kg, which is up by 0.6kg, sadly. Body fat percentage was down from 25.5% to 25.0% though.

2024 Statistics

Posted by Richard on 2 January 2025
Posted in: challenge, Cycling, Death Ride, Diary, events, Fitness, Hiking, Home Gym, indoor cycling, Pain Cave, Running, virtual cycling, Walking, Weight. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , . Leave a Comment

2024 continued my fitness consolidation with a combination of real-world activities when we were in the UK and in many parts of Europe (but not the Middle East where I didn’t venture outside the hotel to exercise), using the gym equipment for use in Alison’s personal training venture.

Since early November 2023, we’ve been back full time in the UK – other than holidays, of course – so the Pain Cave is visited pretty much every day first thing before work.

This definitely helps with the pain by building support for the affected areas including my knackered (necrosis-riddled) knee and the pelvis and spine from the motorcycle crash. ‘Helps’ but doesn’t get rid of the constant pain that I have had to come to terms with.

Anyway, moan over, here are the stats:

2024 Statistics

2024 Statistics

That one instance of using the gym? Yes just after Christmas when I decided to get some coaching from Alison as a PT to try and do some upper body work for a change, Must. Try. Harder.

Still, I’m impressed with the stats: 4,218.76km on bikes (real and virtual) with that epic 162.89km “Death Ride” back in February; and another 700km on two legs.

Not bad for a 62 year old?

Weight-wise? On the 1st of January 2024 I weighed 86.2kg with a body fat percentage of 24.5% and on 1st January 2025, I weighed 88.0kg with a body fat percentage of 24.6%.  I can live with that, but there’s still room for improvement.

December 2024 Stats

Posted by Richard on 31 December 2024
Posted in: Cycling, Diary, Fitness, Hiking, Home Gym, indoor cycling, Pain Cave, Running, virtual cycling, Walking, Weight. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , . Leave a Comment

December 2024 and my usual spike in weight whilst trying to cope with shorter, darker, drearier days and more work, work, work with deadlines to hit.

And did I mention three Christmas Dinners and a Christmas party?

Over on FulGaz, I completed their Around the World in 80 Days challenge and their Ironman Sprint Series as well as doing some more of John Hallas’ Weekly Challenges as usual.

Plus I continued with yet more (painful) treadmill runs with JRNY as well.

Here are December’s stats:

December 2024 Statistics

December 2024 Statistics

Activities: 32 Distance: 384.40 km Time: 20:06:28 Calories:  18,978

Turning to my weight, at the end of November I weighed 85.9kg and at the end of December I weighed 88.1kg, which is up by 2.2kg!  Way too many Christmas Dinners and Mince Pies!

November 2024 Stats

Posted by Richard on 30 November 2024
Posted in: challenge, Cycling, Diary, Fitness, Home Gym, indoor cycling, Pain Cave, Running, Syndicated, virtual cycling, Weight. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , . Leave a Comment

November 2024 was more work, work, work keeping me busy, plus a number of trips into London for work and pleasure (The Script and London Grammar) and Motorcycle Live at the NEC Birmingham, all of which somewhat disrupted my training schedule.

Over on FulGaz, I continued their Around the World in 80 Days challenge as well as doing some more of John Hallas’ Weekly Challenges and another Ironman Sprint Series ride. Plus I continued with yet more (painful) treadmill runs with JRNY as well.

Anyway, here are November’s stats:

November 2024 Statistics

November 2024 Statistics

Activities: 29 Distance: 406.37 km Time: 17:52:00 Calories:  17,145

Turning to my weight, at the end of October I weighed 86.7kg and at the end of November I weighed 85.9kg, which is down by -0.8kg.  Still eating too many sweets and dried pineapple of an evening with the cats!

September 2024 Stats

Posted by Richard on 20 September 2024
Posted in: Cycling, Diary, Fitness, Gear, Home Gym, indoor cycling, Pain Cave, Running, virtual cycling, Walking, Weight. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , . Leave a Comment

September 2024 saw the end of the holiday theme starting with a few days in Prague and ending with a weird week in Corralejo. Weird? Well the last time we were there it was as residents moving back to the UK full time and this time we were back as bloody tourists staying once more at Bahiazul.

The complex contains the ‘main’ Bahiazul operated villas but also others we’ve used before: Villas Veaco and KATIS Villas. The upside of booking with Bahiazul is two-fold:

  • Breakfast in their restaurant is included so that sets you up nicely for the day; and
  • You have access to the gym which is relatively good, though not as good as our Pain Cave.

As far as I was concerned, I could simply run or walk but my knees and post-crash issues make that uncomfortable to say the least, plus I wanted to ride a bike anyway.  This meant hiring a mountain bike from Easy Riders which was a painless experience and recommended.  As I knew I’d be heading out on the roads past the dunes, I needed to wear a bike helmet and didn’t fancy hiring one, so I bought an alpinestars Vector Pro Atom helmet and some needlessly flash Galibier Campionissimo Luxury gloves. Both were excellent.

The hire bike – a Trek Marlin 7 – had two issues for me:

  1. The gearing was great for climbs and no doubt spot-on for off-road riding, but on the road I was unable to pedal quicker than 31km/h due to the low gearing (104rpm cadence).  My fault for choosing an MTB but the road surfaces can be a tad iffy out there.
  2. The seat post kept descending due to my weight and the bumps, so I was needing to stop to heave it back up again because I didn’t have the necessary Allen key.

Lesson learned and next time I may hire a road bike or choose one with a larger front sprocket.

Anyway, here are September’s stats:

September 2024 Stats

September 2024 Stats

Activities: 41 Distance: 406.47 km Time: 31:12:40 Calories:  20,118

Turning to my weight, at the end of August I weighed 85.4kg and at the end of September I weighed 87.1kg, which is up 1.7kg.  Too many good breakfasts and restaurant dinners!