WE'RE HERE (Nice day 1)

 Heaven. (picture taken on our tour of the city)

Yesterday, at 2pm, Ellie and I hopped on the train and 5 hours of coastal scenery later we arrived at our destination... Nice! After walking round what seemed like half the city, we finally found our hostel and were directed to our dorm, which is a mixed dorm of 16 people. Quite the experience, needless to say. We (obviously) went straight to the bar where we bought a cocktail each for 4 euros to help us unwind after our long and arduous journey and were offered free pasta for dinner with it. Absolute bargain! As we both have a fair share of course work to do we wolfed down our pasta and rushed upstairs to do some work before going out to experience the night life. While working hard we got chatting to some American boys in our dorm who were absolutely charming and invited us out with them, so after doing a little more work we went on our way to a bar called "Wayne's bar". It is brilliant! There was an extremely good live band performing covers of popular songs and everyone was dancing like mad on the tables. British health and safety would have gone mad! One of our new friends got a group photo taken, so once I have the opportunity to steal it I will do so and upload it on here.

Hurdle #10000

When my brother, Franck, decided to run two half marathons at the beginning of the year, all he had to do was sign up, train, turn up on the day and have fun. So you would think the same would apply in France. But no. This is France, where even the simple is not, in fact, simple.

How I imagine most French people react when naïve foreigners think things will be simple in France.

Let's start at the very beginning, A very good place to start...

Yesterday I was feeling very lethargic after waking up from a very long nap so at 7:15pm I decided to go on a relatively short run. I loved being able to run so late and it still be light and warm outside!

My original intentions were to start from the very beginning of our training plan, and run approximately 2 or 2.5 miles, just to get me moving and wake me up, but for the first time ever, once I had started I just could not stop! I ended up running 4.5 miles without stopping or walking once (which is a big deal for me, trust me) and I only stopped because I ended up feeling revolting because it was a little too warm, and definitely more than a little too humid.

After a month long break I was really pleased that A) I managed to run without my running buddy, B) I managed to run that far and C) that I didn't stop! A few months ago that definitely would not have been possible.

Today I didn't run due to feeling a little peaky, but tomorrow I will put my trainers back on and run like the wind, I might even not set a distance goal and just go as far as I feel able to (mad, I know) to see how far I am capable of without being egged on by Ellie. And Friday, despite being my birthday, I will attempt to do the same again. We're running out of time now so there is no time to waste!!

Marie x

Glam Pams hit the slopes

Ellie and I have clearly been slacking on our blog posting, it's been a while! After our run last Monday Ellie's shins were causing here a lot of pain, which we believe to have been shin splints. Not ideal during half-marathon training! Dr Allen (aka Molly) prescribed rest, so on Wednesday I ran solo. I am TERRIBLE at running alone, and my GPS on my phone went haywire and told me I'd ran 2.5 miles when I was 100% sure I had only reached 1, so that threw me off track a little. Anyway, as I ran the same path as usual I have calculated that I ran about 5.8 miles, which is very impressive considering I usually need Ellie there to spur me on, and only a few months ago a 1km run would absolutely floor me. But it is week 4 of training so I'd be very disappointed if I was still so unfit. As I ran the sun was setting and I had some cheeky breaks to take some photos. It's always nice to be reminded just how beautiful nature can be.

Firsts all round

So this is my (Ellie) first post for the blog, and today Marie and I accomplished our first 5 mile run!

Tough is an understatement, naively I thought an extra mile would not be too strenuous but going from 4 miles to 5 is actually upping the distance by 2 km and by George, did we feel it. My legs reached the point of no return; I was unable to stop running, even at the traffic lights (we really are getting quite serious now). Marie seemed on top form, that’s my girl! 

Unrealistic expectations

Just now I was browsing through Pintrest, wasting my time well and I stumbled across this image.