Tea and biscuits with Edna Kiplagat!
Jan24201211:35 a.m.
Hello realbuzzers! Well, I’ve survived my second week of living and training up here in the Kenyan mountains and I seem to be adapting to the skinny air quite nicely. With just under 13 weeks to go to this year’s Virgin London Marathon, I’m starting to turn my attention to 26.2 mile training. On Saturday I did my first ever hill session at altitude and it definitely lived up to its lung burning expectation! A group of about 10 of us drove down the valley and then proceeded to spend the next 40 minutes running back up. Talk about self-inflicted torture! The climb resembled something like a Tour De France mountain stage and I’m told the views were spectacular. Not that I noticed I was too busy trying to suck in oxygen!
The session itself was 4 sets of 3 minutes, 2 minutes, 1 minute with 90 seconds jog recovery. Things were going well until the last set when I seemed to hit a lactic wall and felt as if I was running in treacle. Although there were times when I thought my lungs and legs were going to explode, I actually enjoyed the session in a perverse sort of way. Since moving up to the marathon I’ve moved away from the vomit inducing high intensity work, so it was good to put myself in that high lactate zone again. Roll on the next hill session!
As I mentioned in my last blog, Iten is quite literally the ‘home of champions’ and yesterday I got the chance to visit the home of a champion; none other than World Marathon Champion Edna Kiplagat. Myself and fellow marathoners Freya Murray, John Beattie and Lee Merrien, along with our manager Brendan, (who also manages Edna) were made to feel very welcome by Edna and her husband Gilbert. Over a chat we enjoyed some Kenyan tea with ginger and Edna had bought a pack of 300 biscuits for the occasion! I was starting to wonder what kind of reputation us Brits have for eating rubbish but I was relieved to discover that the Kenyans love their biscuits and was even more relieved to see Edna nailing them!
We were given a tour of the Kiplagat’s garden which overlooks the Rift Valley. For those of you who have seen the Lion King, picture the scene with Simba and his Dad on the top of the rock. The view was breath-taking and the photos just don’t do it justice. Apparently on a good day you can see elephants in the valley below, how awesome is that?! Unlike many other places in Kenya, the food here at the High Altitude Training Centre is 100% organic. They grow their own vegetables, potatoes and maize, produce their own milk and make their own bread daily. The Kenyan diet is ideal for athletes, high in carbohydrate and low in fat.
Breakfast is usually porridge, bread and bananas and lunch is a choice of bread, soup, vegetables, rice and salad. Most evening meals consist of some kind of stew, vegetables and ugali (which is essentially like polenta). Once a week we have a BBQ and this week’s speciality was BBQ goat, which I have to say was pretty tasty. Although the food out here has been fairly simplistic, it’s very nutritious and it has been nice to ‘detox’ a bit after eating a bit of junk over Christmas. That said, I could murder something sweet like apple crumble and custard right now! Until next time, have a great week.
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Comments (1)
Johnf 'Sound like some tough sessions but will be so good for London, though you might have to acclimatise back to current conditions, grey, wet and cold. Didn't realise you were a Poole girl, I'm from there as well although left when I was 17 for work, so almost thought of as local as well when I visit my mum who still lives very close to Poole Park. Think I may have run through/round it a bit as a lad but not quite at the pace you managed over Christmas. Good luck with the rest of the training.' added 24th Jan 2012
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