MY FAT CHANCE

I Love Wednesdays

As you may or may not know, me and Shameek started our own running crew in Hackney Wick on Wednesdays. RDCY Hackney.

There’s been ups and downs but I know that I want to make it work and continue to see and run with my friends every Wednesday. For the last couple of months I’ve had really bad days on Wednesdays but when the clock strikes 6 it all starts to get better. The anticipation grows and I can’t wait to lace up with my crew.

We’re small, there’s about 6 regulars including myself and Shameek but so much quality there. Lemara and Ounie (above) took to the crew in the best possible way and keep it going now. They’ve never let me down! It’s with people like this that the foundation for an empire are made from.

Charlie Dark, founder of Run Dem Crew often reminisce of the early days of his crew, where him and 6 friends would meet in his kitchen and then run a small loop of Victoria Park. I now know what those memories are like too. I experience it every Wednesday when we’re all chatting pre-run in my living room.

We’re only just getting started, I can’t wait to see what the year has in store for us.

My Fat Highlights of the year gone

I’ll keep this one short and sweet because if anyone really wanted to list all the highlights of the year then I would be typing away for hours. My main moment last year was training for the London Marathon. I followed my training plan to a T, ate right and worked extremely hard. It all paid off on race day. After that I was stuck in a post Marathon slump that I’m still trying to get out of.

2012 was a year of huge ups and huge downs for me but nobody can take away what it felt like to run that race last year. Nobody.

Below I’ve put some other important moments for me too.

• Seeing my Grandmother during the Marathon on the embankment, I will never forget that moment.
• Pacing my girlfriend Veema through the Amsterdam Half Marathon, I’m so proud of her. She went from strength to strength in that race.
• Working for Nike & Modelling for them more than once!
• Gaining weight after the London Marathon and losing that fitness that felt so good. (I will get fit again)

And I survived the year, can’t forget that it was supposed to end last year! 

Nearly ran 1000 miles this year.

I checked out my Runkeeper last week whilst I was sick and found out that I was only 80 miles away from clocking up 1000 miles this year but in my state I decided to wait until Monday to assault London one last time (that sounds so wrong). The week started off well enough, with 10k runs from Monday to Thursday, Friday is my normal day off so I stayed in. That brings us to today. I planned on running around 8 miles through Clapton and Dalston and then Mile End but it didn’t go to plan at all.

This morning I had a very long nosebleed in the shower and I didn’t take that into account today. It’s been raining in London all day and with Winter just about approaching it’s quite cold. I should have known better, drank more water today and brought tissue with me but I didn’t do any of that. A mile into the run I got really hot and then felt a nosebleed coming on. In my 2 years of running I’ve never had a nosebleed when running. I get them a lot but it was so scary. Knowing I was losing blood, hot, without water in my system, I felt like I was going to faint as I was running. I had to use my hat like tissue, it was so embarrassing.

I’m sitting down at home now, worried about not hitting the mileage but my health is more important I guess, right?

Body Check

On this run you can see that I had a somewhat stuttered start which is normal for people regardless anyway. It wasn’t a normal stutter for me though, it started out with great pain in my lower back that I couldn’t explain. I had seen my Ostepath recently and things have been looking good for my back so this intense pain was both unexpected and unwelcome for me.

I wanted to keep on running but not with such discomfort. I figured that I had to be doing something wrong. I did a body check and readjusted myself. I learned about Body Checks when at a special pre VLM talk that the organisers had put on for us. An ex marathoner told to do a Body Check every 10 or so minutes. You start from head to toe and ask yourself the following questions:

• Is my head up?
• Are my shoulders back?
• Is my back straight?
• Are my hips beneath me?
• Are my knees landing below me?
• Am I heel striking?

Saying those questions back to yourself let you readjust pretty quickly and then start running how you want to again. I took a step back, looked at myself and readjusted.

I ran tall and proud. With that, the pain eased and I maintained a comfortable 8 minute pace after that. I felt lighter and my run just got better and better.

This got me thinking about how I could apply this to my life outside of running. At the moment I am looking for a job, so I’m at home a lot more now. How can I make sure I stay positive and motivated?

I do a mind check.

• Am I looking at the right job?
• Does my CV reflect the skills that the job requires?
• Am I being proactive to find work or better myself with my free time?
• Am I happy?

Never doubt yourself when you run, just look for solutions to your problem whilst you’re out on the road. When a problem is presented to you in life try to resolve it and you may be surprised by the results.

Do a body check when you run and at work do a mind check. Stay positive and see the light that’s out there, even when you really don’t want to.

8bit Ego will be at Eurogamer!

The team will be bringing exclusive interviews from Square Enix as well as interviews from Indie Games Designers plus much more that will be dropping on our YouTube channel! Stay tuned for more!

My Return To Speed!

I used to be fast. F*ck it I am fast, I wore short shorts tonight so I’m obviously on a high…

But honestly, in the last few months, my speed has left me. I’ve been chasing that shadow of a man in front of me that could control his tempo with ease and glide across the embankment. These days I’m more of that dude with his head down, waiting for the traffic light. They’re both runners though, and strong ones at that. Read more below.

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