Training #fail

This was the weather on the way to Holme Pierrepont Wednesday night. It was rain, sleet and snow, all rolled into one horridly freezing evening. Combined with the fact I was really miserable (5 days semi-no-smoking) I decided to turn round and go home. So training was a fail. I paid for it at weigh in yesterday with a 3lb increase, darn it! I should've braved the bloody weather... one training session certainly would've counter-acted the week of replacing fags with foodie treats! Hmmmmm???

I may have jacked in the training plan but I still did something for the good of TRFGR. I spent over an hour in Westfield hand delivering begging letters to our favourite stores! I really hope we get some positive responses. I also hope the letter made sense. Basically I said the Team and friends are meeting each month. We're cooking a meal and all chipping in some money for CRUK. All we need is a few businesses to recognise they could help us and be generous. We're not asking for cash, we're asking for food so we can add the shopping budget to the donation, and any products from their stores we can raffle off or give as prizes for quizzes or games. I hope I'm not the only one that can see the potential boost to our fundraising this could generate. It's all for Cancer Research UK, who could say no to finding a cure for Cancer? Well apparently Next can, they wouldn't even take my letter, instead they gave me a slip with head office phone number on and told me that was all they could do. Was I naive to expect more, am I going to be disappointed when we get no replies?? Oh dear!!

Guess I'll concentrate on the training and sponsorship for the 10k, always a great comfort to know I can count on the generosity and kindness of my friends and colleagues! I'll start passing round the sponsorship forms soon! If you want to sponsor me online go here !

Expect another update on training early next week. Well it's the beer festival tomorrow so I HAVE to fit training into the weekend else next weigh in will be another disaster! The plan is to go for a jog Saturday morning then do a MEGA walk on Sunday with Phil. Fingers crossed for better weather!!

Race For Life: T-6

Righto then, it's 6 days till Race For Life 2009. Im so proud of all our friends and family for really stepping up to the mark these last few weeks and digging deep to sponsor us all! Late minutes sponsorship is more than welcome as we need a last burst of encouragement as race day literally races towards us! If you want to support us and help beat cancer follow the links on the right of this blog and donate to your fav Fat Girl. No matter what you can afford it all goes to an amazing cause, see what Cancer Research UK do with your money.

I've done NO training since my last post, and i've no time for any training till 'Race For Life: T-1' aka Saturday, which is taking shape as a fun filled afternoon of poolside chitchat and munchies with TT dvds in the evening at Mrs Sarahs house. We'll be working out those core muscles through a strict schedule of belly laughing till it hurts and dancing our carbs off to our boys! It's exhausting training but we're dedicated! You'll have to wait to hear if we're sweating alcohol like the Sarahs valiant effort last year!

REMEMBER you can not only support us with money but with your presence at The Bowl of Hellfire on SUNDAY 26th JULY. The Race starts at 11am and as we found out last year the traffic gets worse the later you leave it so pack a drink and some suntan lotion and get there early, we'll be limbering up from about 10am so come give the Fat Girls a wave!!

Photos will be posted here and on our Facebook group so check back for those on Monday!!!
Do i sound more jovial about race day? It's a lie, im bricking it!

Confession of a Fat Girl

I meant to go out jogging ...... i had a whole evening set aside for Fat Girl training, i was going to the Bowl of Hellfire!! I had a bagged packed up with jogging clobber, a fully charged MP3 and TWO bottles of water! Sounds good so far doesn't it? Well, dont get too excited. I'm not sure if you remember what the weather was like on monday but it was blazingly hot..... BLAZINGLY HOT! And with memories of the skin blisters i got after burning at RFL2008 i hung my head in disappointment and wimped out of the run. In my defense i didnt have sun cream and what with Katie's Midnight Walk II only a few weeks away i thought it foolish to risk it.

The guilt at maybe using malignant melanoma as an excuse to avoid going jogging has led me to hit the gym three times this week already. OK so i'm not exactly doing much whilst i'm there but it all counts. I've even developed the confidence to really jog on the treadmill.... even when other people are present! I know!!! Progress or what!

So i've jogged about 1 mile in 10 minutes each day as well as using the bikes and rowing machine to combat those calories (kitkat craving is back, bad times). I really need to increase my time and pace on the treadmill but it's so hard, my stamina is poor and my knees burn almost as much as my dirty smokers lungs!

What's a Fat Girl to do?? Perhaps organise another training session...?? Well low and behold it's only my ruddy birthday soon and i think it only right to celebrate it in true TRFGR style....... DANCING! So grab your gladrags Fat Girls and our beautiful supporters, it's your duty to come train with me....... :D

Oh and there's a theme, and it's electric blue. Be it a bangle, belt or bow i want you all wearing it and being Eclectic in Electric!!!!

Team meet

The first 'tactical' training session of Team Run, Fat Girl, Run has been held for 2009.
I'd love to say we talked tactics and got a plan underway but in reality we had fun with the badges, relived last year's stagger around the Bowl of Hellfire, and then got down to the serious business of pulling shapes. All while wearing fantastic, beautiful shoes - which hopefully has helped to tone our leg muscles.
We blessed the, er, Bless with our hospitality but after losing out to Noel Edmonds on the quiz machine headed off to Mosh to pull some shapes. And what shapes they were! Some frankly stunning synchronized dance routines reminiscent of The Supremes (but with better shoes and adorned with Fat Girl badges) stunned the other punters.
I'm convinced that the effort it takes to perform such a technically demanding creative flow of dance moves counts as training, especially when heel height is taken into account.
Unfortunately, the effort was detrimental to some as early doors were called for the team when Sarah B's back problems of last year threatened a painful reoccurrence.
Thanks must be given to the Street Pastors who complimented our footwear before fulfilling the role of team support with the handing out of free flip flops; much needed by the team at this point.
A few pictures are available in the Facebook Fat Girl group so get over there and check them out. Hopefully a few more will be added in the next few days.
And so with Lauren strutting away to home Fat Girl Cabs (as driven by Sarah C-P) called through the all-night Maccy D's and delivered fat girl's back to their beds. Excellent meeting and we can't wait for the inevitable frolics to be had when all eight of us manage to get together in one place!

Which brings us nicely to a quick round-up of team members:

• Sarah C-P is 10lbs down and has had a couple of week's off training but made a return with Body Pump today - whatever wasn't hurting from dancing in six inch stilettos last night is definitely feeling the burn now;
  
• Sarah Barker was making excellent progress with her running but will now be resting her back for a few days / weeks / hopefully not long;
• Lauren is still battling the treadmill for superiority, and starting to win;
• Vena plans to begin training on 1 April and is spreading the sponsorship word;
• Sarah H was training hard but now will be limited by a foot injury;
• Ace is showing dedication to the cause with plenty of training in Londinium and living healthy too;
• Toni is in training and hoping the foot pain of last year stays in the past;
• Last but not least is Kelly, currently at SXSW in Texas most recently understood to have had a chat with Graham Coxon about Sarah C-P wanting to kidnap him. Sorry about that Graham.
  

See the pain that we go through - the least you can do is donate a few pennies :-) I am sure both injured Sarah's would welcome the healing power that comes from people sponsoring us (see side panel for links to online sponsorship sites).

In other news:

• Badges (not badgers - there has been some confusion) have arrived and will be passed out / sent to all those who have sponsored us so far. Please model your badge in a way you feel is a fitting tribute to the team and post pic to the Facebook group - there may even be a small token of recognition for the one that pleases / shocks us the most! Big thanks to Badges for Bands for making our buttons a reality.
• The total raised by the band so far stands at £149. A Blue Peter-style totaliser is over in the side panel for your pleasure.
  

Next team meets are a practice run around Holme Pierrepont over the Easter weekend and a 'tactical' meeting in May, possibly at St Pancras Champagne Bar (if V gets us all on the train for cheap!) or Derby / Notts way.
For now...keep runnin'
S C-P (hoping that injuries to Fat Girls called Sarah don't come in threes)
xxx