Road block

If you are a friend of mine on Facebook or follow my Twitter then you will have seen an extraordinarily downbeat status update yesterday afternoon (even by my standards). It went like this:

Miserable walk. Rain, a bit of hail, hip pain for hours, and I saw a dead coot floating in the canal. Totally morale shattering.

It was honestly the most horrendous walk of my life, but I was so determined to finish it I just kept going. Even when I was starting to swear under my breath, even when the rain started beating down heavily on me, even when I was not certain my legs would keep me upright. I was going to finish those stupid 23.5 miles because I knew that if I didn't, I might as well give up this whole escapade.

So I finished it.

When I got home, my hips hurt like hell. About an hour after walking through the front door, I was certain that I would never get off the sofa again. All through the night, I was waking to shift from hip to hip. And when I got up this morning it felt as though my legs had been replaced by a pair of very wobbly stilts, painfully strapped directly into my hip joints. But it wasn't the hip that was troubling me. It was my left knee - sore and stiff and almost impossible to straighten.

My boss very kindly let me work from home today - I spent it with my leg in the air and an ice pack strapped to the back of my knee. It feels a good bit better now, easing with a little bit of wandering about the house and a couple of stretches in the front room. But I've still booked myself in to see a physiotherapist in a couple of weeks, just to see if there's something I could be doing better. In the meantime, I'll keep going. I'll note how my body feels and find a way to get through.

Last night I was ready to give up. Tonight, I'm ready to beat this challenge.

It had to happen at some point...

I managed to get myself a scabby knee just over half way into today's training walk when I slipped on a wet pavement in Dulwich. Ignoring my twinging leg muscles (I managed to fall on a previous injury - this is the leg with the torn PCL) I kept going.

Honestly cannot believe that this is the first actual training injury I've sustained. Nine months! Hopefully this tiny graze will be the one and only.

Thanks and pictures and disappointment giving way to triumph.

Before I get on with the rest of the post, I just wanted to say thanks to everyone who has volunteered to help me with my walk in May. I'm really truly touched that you'd like to spend a bit of time with me walking the outskirts of London. I'll be in touch in the next week or so and we can start working out where everyone fits together.

Also, those who've made donations to my chosen charity - thank you too! You're making this all worthwhile!

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Since I last posted, I've been out training a few times including a full day session last Sunday which saw me get lost, go on a 2 mile detour and have to cut it short by 4 miles. More on that later.

First though, I'd like to show you a photo which makes me giggle every time I see it.

I took this quick snap of a poster on Old Kent Road when I was out a couple of weeks back. You might need to enlarge it to see what I find so amusing. It reminds me of Kemp Folds.

Anyway, I see a lot of things that amuse me when I'm walking but rarely feel that I can stop to take a picture. Here's another one I saw, out and about on Sunday, somewhere near Petersham Nurseries in Richmond.

I saw that one just a few miles before I took a right turn off the Capital Ring path, got lost and had to phone my husband for directions. Getting into a right state, I managed to eventually get back on the right track, but had wandered for an extra 2 miles and was by this point pretty much soaked to the skin by the fine drizzle that had suddenly turned to rain.

After setting out with the aim of walking the near 22 miles of Capital Ring routes six to nine combined, I gave up at the end of route eight and went home. Pissed off. Cold. Miserable.

Thankfully I've got a lovely bunch of friends who, when they noticed my whiny Twitter/Facebook status update, essentially told me off for thinking that 'only 18 miles' was not good enough. That's me in my place then. I promise I won't do it again. For a bit.

Anyway, undeterred I'll be off out again this weekend to get that 22-miler under my belt. Onwards and upwards.

The first request...the first proper call for volunteers!

I'm looking for volunteers to walk sections of the walk with me. I'm not just after super-walkers but also strollers, wanderers, explorers. Whether you can walk one mile, or 20, I need you to join me!

Here's a reminder of the route of the Capital Ring. I've currently planned for the walk to start in Woolwich at about 10am on Sunday 1st May 2011. I would anticipate being somewhere between Osterley Lock and Greenford before the sun is completely down. The next few sections will be walked relatively slowly and in the dark before, hopefully, arriving back at Woolwich by 10am on Monday 2nd May 2011 completing the Capital Ring and my challenge.

I'm going to need at least one person with me for every step of the way. This is largely down to safety, but a big part of it is about companionship and morale. Here is a short list of responsibilities.

• Keep me walking
  Most of this is going to be really tough for me. I'm going to need some moral support.
• Keep me on track
  Apparently I could be quite delirious towards the end of this, so I might need some help with maps and making sure I'm still going in the right direction. I'll make sure you have everything you need to do this. That's a map then.
• Keep me safe
  This links into the above. If I start going a bit loopy, please try to help me not walk into traffic.
• Keep me fed and watered
  I'll be giving you a little pack to bring along with you to your section. I can't carry all the water or food I'll need on this walk, so there will be some snacks and some drinks in there. There will be other things in there too, like maps. And torches if you're walking overnight with me.

At the moment I only need you to let me know that you're interested in helping - we can work out logistics once I've got some names together. But here are some things to think about...

How far can I walk?
I'm looking for people who can join me for any distance - a mile, a few miles, a whole marathon. But I need to know that you can do the distance you say you can.

Of course there might be unforeseen circumstances which mean that you can't make the miles you offer. I'm not going to make you keep walking if that happens! I'm just asking that you be realistic before we get started.

How fast can I walk?
I'm really not a brilliantly fast walker, but I'm hoping to average about 4mph. I'm likely to be walking faster at the start of the walk than at the end but of course that leaves the slow bits for overnight which, I appreciate, may not be your bag.

A lot of the route is suitable for bikes, so if it saves your legs and means you can join me for a few more miles you might want to consider that. Or one of those little push scooters. If you want to do this with a bike, let me know and I'll let you know which sections definitely rule this out.

Can I offer to be on call?
There will be mishaps: people will miss trains, blisters will rub, promises will be forgotten. But I will still need at least one person with me for every step of the way.

If you are someone who can come and take over another person's leg at short notice, let me know which sections you can cover and how far you're prepared to walk. I'll give you as much notice as possible and won't expect you to travel across the city at the speed of light.

Still interested?
Leave me a comment or drop me at email with your contact details: kateward@quitecommon.com

Big thanks, big walks, and big yawns.

Yesterday I went out on an 18 mile training walk. Not the longest I've done, but the longest in a while, s I thought I'd give you a bit of a blow by blow account of my day.

But first I want to say a massive thank you to my lovely best friend Linzi who made the day so much easier for me. You see Linzi decided to get a new mp3 player and, in exchange for the promise of an awesome evening out in the future, she decided to send me her old one.

He hasn't got a name yet (this one's a he - I can tell) so if anyone has got a good one, let me know.

Anyway, back to the training. Here's how everything happened.

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6.50am The alarm goes off. David has a scrabble tournament and I've decided to get up at the same time and set out early.

8.00am I'm back at the flat after walking with David to the newsagents and bringing back half the Sunday paper. I sit down at the laptop and start moving music files from my external hard drive onto the laptop then onto the lovely new iPod.

08.43am I log onto Twitter and make a comment about getting ready to leave the house for the walk.

11.15am I finally leave the house and walk over the road to the bus stop.

11.24am I get on a bus and pull out the Observer magazine to help the journey go faster.

11.48am I arrive at Grove Park station, travel sick from reading the paper, and start walking towards the start point for Walk Three of the Capital Ring. It takes 10 minutes. I start the first leg towards Crystal Palace with an obvious spring in my step.



1.19pm I can see the Crystal Palace transmitter! I get a bit over excited.

1.38pm I sit down at a bench overlooking Dinosaur Lake in Crystal Palace. I have a snack. It's a Delicatoboll. Suddenly I'm very happy that we went to IKEA on Saturday.

2.19pm I walk past a very posh house. There's an empty Ab Circle Pro box waiting to be picked up with the recycling.

3.09pm Amazing campervan. No badge on the front. Instead it is replaced by a Greene King IPA pump badge.

3.41pm I bring out the big guns and start eating honey to push me through the last few miles. No, seriously.

4.33pm I arrive at Wimbledon Park. The 18 miles are over. I've done it in good time and I'm grinning. I have to wait for a tube.

6.05pm I arrive at Lewisham station. My legs are starting to ache and I decide to get a bus back down the road. I pull out the Observer magazine for the journey.

6.09pm I arrive home, travel sick from reading the paper and aching all over. I start running a bath and make myself some squash.

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Reading that back I realise how uneventful this sort of walking is. I could have included all the times I started thinking about this twinge or that, or all the times I considered opening the honey earlier and then deciding not to, but it's barely interesting as it is. It makes you focus inward, notice every little ache in your body and random thought in your head. It basically makes you a bit boring. Sorry about that.

Motivation.

This week's training has been a bit of a struggle - a busy and somewhat difficult week at work left the motivation a little low. This is not the first week that this has happened but this week I learned how to cope with it and, eventually, get over it.

On Saturday I had a 12 miler scheduled. I had my route worked out, and was all set to go, but my mind was not on the task and I wasn't exactly looking forward to 3 hours alone with just me and my thoughts. So I did something that I probably shouldn't be doing. I binned the walk.

Instead, I indulged in a little bit of stretching and pilates and then went out for a quick 4 miler.

By Sunday I was feeling a lot better. My lovely husband, David, lent me his iPod and I completed the 12 miles. In fact, it turned out to be a beautiful walk as I travelled from Lewisham to Crystal Palace, then back home via Dulwich and Crofton Park. The hills were rather steep in places, but I bounded over them quite happily.

Yesterday I was rather stiff and, perhaps foolishly, attempted my usual Monday 4 mile. Not having a day's rest was A Bad Idea and I cut the walk in half. Feeling bad about this, I jumped on a train at London Bridge and sped home.

Then, as I was unlocking my front door, my phone rang. It was a woman from the hospital that looked after me when I tore my PCL a couple of years back. Apparently they want to show my leg off to some students as I have 'a really interesting knee'. Puzzlingly, she wasn't able to tell me what was quite so exciting about it, but my knee is basking in its new-found celebrity today.

Mission Control? This is Katy speaking.

To help me visualise the task ahead, I've started turning my kitchen into Ward Walks London: Mission Control.



As you can see, that's one big map. I've started adding what I think are the most important points of the walk to remember...the toilets... Soon I'll be adding things like hourly targets and volunteers. More on that later.

In actual walking news, I'm back up on my feet and out on the road. Yesterday was a perfectly beautiful day and which helped the 9 miles fly past. Could do with some more weather like that to help the training.