Bonjour mes VRBs ! How’s your running going? Hopefully you're enjoying plenty of running fun, whether that means races galore, conquering your training plan, hitting the gym, meeting up with friends at parkrun, or simply getting out and about. If, though, you're recovering from injury or illness, best wishes for a speedy recovery.
While the Great British Summer has apparently been living up to its stereotypical reputation recently, the area of France where I live has again been hit by a heatwave. Perfect for lazing about, less than ideal for a heat-averse runner who doesn’t do mornings, i.e. me. Result: I’ve been running much less, dragging myself out for a couple of dutiful 5-6ks a week.
But the other day it was a mere 23.5° at midday, slight breeze and overcast with more clouds building. The perfect time to get back to 10k, I thought. Coated myself in factor 50 and blithely set off on a route I’ve not done for ages, with the odd extra bit just for the heck of it. Around 6k it dawned on me that I was running in blazing sunshine, had no water or snacks with me, and the return route was distinctly lacking in shade. Oh, and there were no shortcuts. After 14.3km (330m vertical) I made it home, complete with minor symptoms of heat exhaustion, despite having taken several breaks and walked much of the final km. I recovered quickly, but oh, what a wazzock I can be!
My previous history of running wazzockery includes scrabbling around on the ground about 1km into my first race, searching for the dropped bite valve of my hydration pack. No, they’re not supposed to come off like that, and yes, I found it, but lost a chunk of time. I also took a wrong turn towards the end of the course. 🙄 And after the Trail du Gévaudan I bumped into a couple of people I knew and ended up chatting. Result: I forgot to collect my drop bag, which resulted in its going on holiday to Lyon 170km away and my having to arrange a rescue mission.
So, in addition to telling us about your recent running, would anyone out there care to share their own examples of running wazzockery?
Welcome to the Wonderful Wazzocks Club RunWillie ! Your almost-HM and better-do-it-again-properly-HM stories are exactly what I had in mind, and it's so reassuring to hear that it's not just me.
My first HM distance was solo and completely spontaneous and I couldn't remember whether it had to be 21.1, 21.2 or 21.4k. So I ran 21.5 to be sure.
I’m a Wazzock with you on that one RW. My fastest HM is not quite a HM because the course was short and I stopped my watch at the end of it, not 100 metres further on 😬. Very annoying isn’t it?!!
- forgetting about a race. I got an email reminder a week before. A friend had free entry passes and had done it for me months previously and I totally forgot about it.
- Picking up the gel-infused water instead of plain water at a water station and my tummy reacting immediately 🤢
- wearing a top inside out
- wearing an old sports bra and wondering where the support had gone 😳
- wiping the sweat off my face with a tissue and then wondering why a passer-by looked at me strangely only to discover when I got home that bits of tissue had been left on my face like a mummy’s bandages 😂
- running through an injury (I’ve done this too many times so I’m obviously stupid)
- running in old shoes and paying the price of a spell on the IC for several weeks 🙄
See, I told you there were lots. I’m sure there are more….. 🤔
Oh Irishprincess , I can but bow down to such a royal display of wazzockery! I think that forgetting the race is my favourite, though the King Tut look and the dysfunctional garments appeal too.
Actually that's just reminded me of another of mine: inadvertently running without any insoles in my shoes. I always take them out after a run so they and shoes can air. Forgot to put them back in. Think I got a PB too!
Believe I've also previously confessed on here to getting so hot on one holiday run that I whipped off my t-shirt and finished in my (crop top style) sports bra. Running along a main road.
I’ve often thought about just wearing my sports bra but haven't yet been brave enough to do it. The locals do walk and drive along these country roads and I wouldn’t want to scare them 🙈😂
I was less bothered because I wasn't near home so nobody knew who I was! Though nowadays I'd probably just do it anyway; people can always avert their eyes if they're that bothered by the sight of a sports bra that covers more than a bikini top would.
Ok, I’ve been thinking. Mine was when I ran 2 x HMs in two weeks. Not a biggie for some, but a huge deal for me and my little slow pins. To make life extra hard for myself I ran them both in March (2021 I think) on the sodden spongy soggy common in the wind and rain.
Why? Because I get FOMO and even though one was a virtual race (no idea which) where I’d get a medal, the other was the HUHM which I simply had to be a part of. As I was trying to avoid hills (HM distance is enough of a challenge for me without added extras), I did 42 little laps of the bit I call the Plateau both times. What was I thinking? 😳
What a wazzock, it put me off the common for months!
Thanks for the giggle cheekychipmunks , that's a perfect example of wazzockery. Round and round the common, cheekychipmunks goes, Forty-two laps, soggy squelchy toes!
42 times round the same little patch would drive me even crazier than I am already, so I figure your circuits are actually a proper achievement as well as wazzockery cheekychipmunks . Dedication and commitment (possibly to a specialised institution, but we'll let that pass.)
I took up running as a direct consequence of the ending of France's first lockdown Dexy5 , I was so fed up of being stuck at home and not being allowed further than 1km radius from home without approved justification and paperwork to prove it!
It was super-strict, with on-the-spot fines from the gendarmes for breaching the law if you didn't have an approved reason to be out, backed by the correct documents and your ID card or equivalent.
I only started C25K after lockdown, because during lockdown we were only allowed out once a day for exercise, maximum one hour, within 1km radius of home. Didn't want to use my allocation for plodding up and down (literally) the road for 30-odd minutes.
During later lockdowns I had to get creative with routes to maximise the hour. I still know the exact spot up the forest road that marks the 1km radius limit! The limits were eventually extended to 10km and then 30km at various stages of the later lockdowns. Even so, when I was teaching I couldn't go for a run if I had a long break between classes, because I was more than 30km radius from home. My husband, however, was finally able to go to play golf again, because the club was 400m inside the 30km boundary.
Mine was ten years ago, long before I even thought of running. It was the day of the Wimbledon Men's Final with Andy Murray winning there for the first time.
It was a scorching July Sunday. I'd packed some drinks. I'd planned a route to walk. It was about 9 miles in the Pennines from Windy Hill (the summit of the M62 motorway) to Hollingworth Lake.
Stupid me started at the top of the route and did it the wrong way round. My drinks ran out half way and I was faced with a long hard climb up Blackstone Edge. By the time I reached the Pennine Way bridge over the M62 I was already getting into heat exhaustion territory, but I somehow plodded on back to the car.
And then the following day I started a new job, hobbling around on painfully blistered feet.
It's stretching a point but your final sentence has clinched it nowster , so I shall accept walking wazzockery too. I love the image of you arriving at your new job hobbling around - hope you didn't have to do a tour of loads of departments being introduced to everyone!
You've also reminded me of the accidental overlong hike that my husband and I did, along with the dog, in the foothills of the Pyrenees a few years ago. Think I might have confessed to it before? We arrived back at our campsite at around 2.00am...
The one which immediately springs to mind is stopping an early career 10 mile run at 16.01k instead of 16.10. Complete brain fade. I posted about it (of course) and one chap claimed to have got a Papal Dispensation to deem it a 10 miler! Duh!!!!
Oh Beachcomber66 , so near and yet so far! As mentioned above, if I have a specific distance target but can't quite remember what it's supposed to be I tend to add on a bit more than I think it might be, just to be sure. Most of my runs are very bizarre distances anyway, it's just too much effort to run proper numbers!
I was guilty of much post-C25K pillockery, notably increasing distances sooner than recommended. Also contrived to ignore pretty much all the other suggestions that are habitually given to recent C25K graduates: running regularly, trying parkrun, using NRC, doing strength work, setting goals, following training plans, etc.
In my defence, M'lud, I like running hills (despite never having done any proper structured hill training) and I've always been good at taking extra rest days!
Tbh I'm anything but a rebel, it's more that I'm naturally curious - in both senses of the word. Finding out reasons and principles then applying them in context works far better for me than just doing what I'm told, especially when the latter clearly doesn't make sense.
I do far more rolling/ de knotting than I used to….because it works. I did follow C25k rules to the letter…because I knew nothing at that point…..that worked too.
Oh dear, I hardly ever do foam rollering either, unless my legs are really complaining.
There is no doubt that C25K works, but even there I was very bad and started at week 3. I'd been doing a bit of yoga, plus hour-long hilly forest walks daily for weeks, see my replies to Dexy5 re lockdown! I lurked, read and learnt a lot on the C25K forum. Didn't have the app, only the podcasts, so no bells and whistles, no measuring pace or distance or vertical, I just got on with it. Truly.
That’s me perfectly! I’ve just never had the vocabulary or finesse to express it! Thank you Cmoi. I won’t do a drill or exercise unless my coach explains exactly why we are doing it and how to then apply it in a sprint.
Thanks RunBrianRun . I think I see rebels as those who respond with "No!" (on principle) when you tell or even ask them to do something. With me, it's "Why?"
While I had no patience with my apprentices and other students in the former group, if someone asked what the point of an exercise or activity was, I was happy to explain. That quite often surprised them because they were used to hearing "Because I say so!"
That word Cmoi, love it!!! Sounds like you were enjoying the run so much you just got carried away - nothing wazzocky about that, you were just a bit out of practice? We’re all wazzocks occasionally surely? I think my biggest wazzocking moment was that time when I tripped over at parkrun, over a tree root I’d been over hundreds of times, concentrating over the lady in front of me’s 100 shirt rather than what I was doing. Still can’t quite believe I did it, I’ve been over that tree root hundreds of times since and I treat it with the upmost respect now.
Meanwhile, I had a bit of a surprise yesterday, the Solihull HM was a big success! I’d only run up to 10 miles last week, and that 10 miles was a horrible, horrible slog, so I wasn’t expecting much of the HM. I didn’t sleep well, I had a funny tummy and I was just plain worried about it all. But I bumped into my old boss, got chatting to fellow Fordy’s and just got on with it. I had to nip to the portaloo after the first 1km but once that was out of the way I was set up. I’d made some chocolate energy bites from my Anita Bean book to keep me and Katnap going, and they seemed to do the trick. Ended up with my second fastest HM at 2hr 16mins even though it was a bit of a lumpy course! It was a really fun run, loads of camaraderie amongst the runners and we went to have a beer with the other Fordys afterwards. I hope all the long runs and the other HMs we have booked over the next few weeks are as fun!
Yes! Sunglasses are a pig for that ☹️ Mine weren’t entirely innocent with my tree root either. I ran past my tree root again tonight and called it a Wazzock. I think it will now be the Wazzock tree root forever more 😅
You're both a superstar for that whizzy HM, and very kind TailChaser ! I was, however, being an utter wazzock. I hadn't even run 10k for weeks, let alone 14k, so adding in the extra bits (ahem, inclines and ickle baby hills) at the start was daft to begin with. And as for picking a route with no shortcuts and going out without water in the heat - it was over 29°C when I got back - that was just dumb of me.
Your tree root wazzockery sounds not totally dissimilar to my full-on idiot face-plant, as that was also down to lack of concentration, though in another wazzock move I was also wearing the wrong shoes.
Enjoy your forthcoming races, whether or not they end up with such delicious-looking Guinness!
Ok, maybe a little silly but I bet you won’t do it again in a hurry. We do learn by our mistakes (mostly).
There was something very odd going on at the time with people tripping up, we all did it around the same time and had similar injuries (queue ‘Twilight Zone’ music…😅). My shoes were pretty new at the time but they didn’t look like it after.
Hi Cmoi and all running buddies! I think my best wazzockery was during the Great South run a few years back , when refilling my hand held bottle with the screw on top I managed to lob the lid on the ground as well as the disposable bottle and had to run half the race with my thumb over the top to stop it all slopping out . There was a sea of bottles on the water stop floor so no chance of spotting it! 🤬 and also after running a big hill I thought I heard a car with loud beating music so stood on the side of the lane only to realise it was my heart thumping v loudly! 🤣🤣
Well I did my 1st 5k this week at parkrun, a slow one with friends celebrating a club mates 250th run. Another friend had made up a song for us to sing to the tune of D-I-S-C-O but as
B-E-C-K-Y, so it made for a comical run! My foot was OK,it's still a tiny bit puffy but infection gone according to blood results so going to club tonight for another 5k run. Fingers crossed on the up! 🤞
Delighted to hear that the infection's gone and you're out running again aliboo70 . I'm kinda pleased that I'm not the only one to have experienced a bottle-top incident, and impressed by the high quality of your OMG what's that booming sound oops just my heartbeat wazzockery!
Hope you're continuing to run happily and enjoying being back at your running club.
Hello Cmoi and running buddies. I have just done my first run in 10 days because of a sciatica problem. I’ve been doing 2 sets of 5 exercises a day to strengthen my back and improve flexibility and I’ve been told to exercise as much as I’m able so have been walking and taking painkillers. It has been improving gradually and this morning it was “do I or don’t I ?” as UpTheStanley was putting his kit on. A very tentative 2k along the eastern esplanade at 8:42 pace. A beautiful sunny day with a gentle breeze. Just perfect!
My wazzockery is my insistence on running the full distance (according to Garmin) when doing a race or parkrun. I’ve been known to pick up my finish token and then carry on running until I get to that full km! Mad I know.
What a beautiful photo Dexy5 ! I'd like to try running that surface, on the basis that I never have (and I'm weird.)
Sorry about the sciatica, that's horrid. Sounds like you're doing really well with your exercises and it's paying off - hope you continue to recover and will soon be back to full strength.
To me your must-run-the-round-number wazzockery seems quite logical in the context of measured distance events. I suspect I'd end up doing the same, except that I've neatly averted that problem by not taking part! Though I once got in from a run to find I'd done 799m vertical that week, whereupon I promptly went back out and ran up the incline to the neighbour's garage and back, simply to get over 800m.
And yes I have seen people training on the shingle. My only attempt was when we had to take a diversion on the pebbles at parkrun to avoid a gathering on the prom for the Pride Parade. It was hard work.
What lovely weather and gorgeous beach photo for your first run for a couple of weeks. Its good to know you are healing and back out there in the lovely sunshine
My biggest mess-up was in France. I wanted to run back from a nearby village, a nice downhill easy 7 KM. I got my husband to drop me in, I didn't think I was up for running both ways. As he entered the village, he drove around several times looking for a parking space, and I completely lost my sense of direction...
My Garmin was mucking about, wouldn't find a signal, then telling me I was running at less then 4 mins per km - yeah right...I wasn't paying proper attention to where I was going....
You know what's coming next don't you? That part of France is very hilly, and I got onto the wrong side of a ridge, and couldn't cross back. I had no idea where I was... I flagged someone down but they were very local and spoke in an unintelligible accent...I kept running... I tried to phone home but my phone wouldn't get a signal and anyway, what could I say? I'm out there somewhere.... lost?
Eventually someone stopped and told me I was 12 KM from Cordes...I eventually recognised where I was and realised it was a very fast stretch of very narrow road, with lorries and caravans etc. At least I could phone home!
He couldn't believe it when I told him where I was, how on earth did you get THERE??? I still don't know...I ran 9KM to get there, and could have completed my first HM if the road home had not been so dangerous!!
So much sympathy and empathy for you there Curlygurly2 , especially re the wrong side of the ridge and loss of phone signal. I remember a Magic Plan run on holiday - fortunately in a fairly flat area - when the phone signal went awol. No way to call, no Strava, no people around to ask! Ran and walked until I found a signpost to the main road. Nowadays I try to memorise maps, road numbers, village names and landmarks before I set out, just in case. I also take photos of signposts on the way!
What a wonderful word wazzock is. I think the description is onmatapaeic (can’t spell that and neither can my iPad 😂). I find myself using it far more frequently as the years roll by and my tolerance of wazzockery (is that right?), depletes and wanes.
I don’t have any specific running related wazzockery to own up to but it’s been great fun reading of others. 😂
I must confess to being disappointed that you haven't got any tales of running-related wazzockery RunBrianRun , not that I'd wish it upon you! There again several of us seem to have contributed extra-generously, so the thread's holding up nicely. Of course, late contributions are still welcome...
Great post. Loving your story and the ones in the comments.
My best tale of wazzockery (stealing that word RunBrianRun ) was in C25K where I decided to “explore” and ended up off trail and literally crawling through a tree (full story here: healthunlocked.com/couchto5....
Also one when I was training for the Great North Run so many years ago where I felt amazing on a run and decided to add a few miles on. That got my straight to the injury coach (do not pass go, do not collect £200) where I stayed until the day before GNR.
Oh, now I’ve thought of a third. Did that Great North Run dressed as Britney Spears (it was 2006) in an outfit that I’d never run in. Including long socks which gave me double blisters. Took my trainers off at the end - quite a lot of blood in them.
I’ve also had various runs where my watch has been a wazzock. It seems to have as many incidents as me - including losing runs and turning off if a single raindrop lands on it 🙄
Can totally relate to the tree-crawling story Vespina ! Happens to me quite often, though not (yet) from going off-trail, just when the loggers have left stuff in a mess, or a storm has brought down a tree.
Even without the added urgh blisters the idea of the Britney Spears costume is freaking me out ever so slightly. Don't think I'd want to draw that sort of attention to myself while running (says the woman who's also admitted to removing her top and running in her sports bra. Yes, I know.)
Not sure I’d do Britney now. Got some great support along the way though. Thought it would be practical as it was basically gym kit - apart from those pesky socks.
Wazzock is my favourite word! My chief wazzock in chief moment was going for a speed run about fifteen minutes after eating a cheese pasty and nearly puking in a bush. Entirely predicable! There have been many other poor route planning moments, such as hitting a vertical hill nine miles into a ten mile run. Lots of unexpected events too (bee stuck under glasses being the main example) that aren’t down to my own wazzockery!
I had a week off running last week for a youth camp-brilliant but most definitely not a restful week! I’ve been struggling to get going again. I’ve managed one short run, but it was a quick one which felt really good. I’ve got a new watch and the tech is a bit intimidating. Mostly I’m worried about it showing me I’m slower than I thought I was, which I know is utterly ridiculous. If someone said that to me on Couch or Bridge, I know exactly what I’d say to them but it’s harder to listen to myself. How daft is that!
I have had some good gym sessions which I’m pleased about. I can’t wait until the GNR is done and I don’t have to think about that as much. My number arrived the other day and now it all seems a bit real!
Cheese pasty 🤮 incident is most definitely in the overlapping section of the wazzockery - yuckiness Venn diagram MissUnderstanding !
Congratulations on the watch purchase, though as you already know I am the very last person who can help you with using it. I'll happily tell you not to stress about your pace though 😉 You're doing really well with the strength work, and I so hope that it pays off as you deserve for the GNR. Have fun!
Hi. Sorry I am so, so late catching up with the week. I'm just getting myself back together after a few days away by myself in North Wales. It was a much needed trip to reset, recharge and recover; it proved to be near perfect with sunshine and blue skies, a lovely slow run along the coast one day (followed by a gorgeous blueberries and clotted cream ice cream) and a long ride that took me along beautiful green lanes with stunning views of the welsh hills and right alongside the coast with a fabulous view of the sea (incorporating a stop at the fish shop on Conway quay for a crab buttie). A proper holiday 🌞
There were no wassock moments during my trip, though I am no stranger to wassockery. I guess my most memorable wassock moment was biting the dirt and smashing my two front teeth ... (though some might say it was continuing on and finishing the remaining 10k or so of the run) 😍
Oh your holiday sounds lush linda9389 , and I'm glad it's done you so much good.
I remember your teeth-smashing face-plant, and I've absolutely no idea how you continued for another 10k. Such a superstar! When I face-planted a few days later I felt such a wimp as I couldn't even run the 1k or so to get home, I had to walk. I then took a selfie on the way home to prove it'd happened during my run - that's wazzockery for you!
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