Until the last few weeks I have been fairly cautious about airing in public that I would be once again be doing this race. However, after a solid 4 months of incredible training, nailing every session long run and build up race I decided I would once again tempt fate and head to Blackheath for the third time in as many years. 

My target was 330-340. My halves in the run up had seen me hit 1:32 in the middle of big mile weeks so the target wasn’t a pipe dream – in theory it was a realistic goal. I had smashed out 4 20mile+ sessions and to be perfectly honest had actually enjoyed the last 4months of training and breaking new barriers. I was fitter, faster and stronger. 

I wonder whether my tone is obvious already but once again the London Marathon nearly beat me but let’s get to that in a bit…

After a very enjoyable expo, bumping into Tom & Martin of Marathon Talk, Adam Phillips a fellow runner who I met at the 2010 Motivation Station in Nottingham and Noel Thatcher Paralympic Gold Medalist as well as others who I have crossed paths with in the past I was ready to roll. I even collected my number right next to Sophie Raworth although I couldn’t for the life of me remember her name so didn’t introduce myself, it transpires we would have a similar story to tell of the event.

I arrived with ample time and loitered around the green start. I bumped into Ed Coats before the start – I was pretty excited by this. I have utmost respect for what him Cracknell and Fogle did crossing the South Pole and I have followed his future adventures in Running Fitness magazine. Amazing – it was photo time  

After this it was time to chill and get into ‘the zone’. I had a loaned phone from Vodafone, again playing with the Motorola Defy. I really like this phone and was chuffed to have it with me today – although would it see me round the course?!

At 9:45 the claxon sounded and once again I was crossing the start line. It felt warm, warmer than I have run in for a while. That said I was running in my comfort zone and at pace. It was tough – but this is a marathon right, it’s meant to be tough! At the mid point I was still going fine. Checking off mile by mile – I would have a few more miles to get through before I started counting down from 100!

14 check, 15, 16,17,18 the eventful mile from last year check, 19, 20, 21 saw Adam P on side of road cheering, 21.3 collapse and 21.5 I somehow wake up in a St Johns tent.

First thought on waking up ‘bugger (possibly harsher language went through my head) not again, not this time’. I knew what to do I had to call Laura and tell her where I was as i knew from last year St Johns wouldn’t- trusty defy still working! I rung but they wanted me off the phonel, partially fair as I was close to throwing up and probably not looking too great. The next min I was vomiting so they got me on the floor. This was the last time I saw this phone, I’m hoping someone from St Johns has it as the evidence I have against them is pretty damning (as my running app was still running) but it’s early days and that’s another blog post (maybe!). As I was on the floor laid out I started cramping up – I knew this would happen. Bugger. 

How long I was in St Johns for I don’t know, I will dissect my Garmin when I have time but my reckoning is 40-50 mins, with analysis probably nearer the later. As I sat on the chair throwing up I had to decide what to do. I had 5 miles still to complete, but my legs were recked having sat in a chair and on the floor – 8min miles were not going to happen but could I run walk. I did the maths how long would it take if I tried to go again? 1 hour or so?

This time quitting was not an option for me, I would make it to the end (or at least try). I found out that the next St Johns tent was about a mile away so if worst came to worst I had somewhere I could end up! I had called Laura who had lined the pavement at 22.5miles and she tried to get down to me but it was too busy, I would head to a landmark and meet her. My legs were getting worse, badly cramping. It was time to move. 

At the 13/22miles balloons I met Laura. She said she’d walk with me but the pavements are not somewhere you can walk and it didn’t take long to realise that unfortunately wasn’t going to be possible. I was on my own. I had a stop and chat to my friends and family as I went round – I even got fed a jelly baby by little Tomas who had come to see me. It was an opportunity to thank them for coming out to support me and they deserved it!

Shortly after I bumped into Iwan Thomas, I have been in touch with him via twitter and through previous expos as well as Laura knowing him from her It Pays to Watch days. I think it would be fair to say at this point it may have been a competition for who looked worse. He’d blown at 14miles but was going to make it. I hoped I could stick with him but the state of my legs said otherwise. 

My pace was slow I would call it a run walk as I ran for as long as I could before my cramps started then walked at short a distance possible before they went. It was slow progress though. I took on water when I could and felt in pretty good shape. Had it not been the pain in my legs (my body felt fine) i would have tried to run it. I learnt a lesson with this – keep pain killers to hand! 

Anyway to cut 5 long and slow miles short I made it to the Mall and this time collected my medal. I crossed the line in 4:40 although that time doesn’t really mean too much to me. That said without the ‘power nap’ as it has been ironically called and doing a 21.5mile run/5mile walk I would have come in about the 4 hour marker…

Thanks to getting my place through Virgin I had entry to a party organised at Planet Hollywood. This was a great opportunity to unwind, Iwan was there and we chatted some more as well as having an opportunity to be meters from Richard Branson, an idol of mine. A very rewarding finish to a difficult day!

As I sit and reflect, my legs are totally recked, to an extent I have never felt before. I went out to conquer and win and once again I had another bad day in the office. That won’t stop me. I have been quite protective about who has helped me over the last few months but at this moment I would like to thank Liz Yelling for being a great mentor. Her schedule has seen me get fitter, faster and stronger and without a shadow of a doubt I would have hit the 3:30-3:40 target if my body had let me. The question that now needs to be answered is why this happens to me. Why when everyone else can dig in and ‘zip up the man-suit’ does my body shutdown and stop me. I’m sure over the coming months I will get to grips with this through Liz and the running community at large!

Thanks again for all who have supported me upto this Marathon especially Laura who is no doubt sick of roasted veg and chicken tomato pasta! I don’t think I could have worked, eaten and got the miles in without her support. Another personalised shout out to Chris D at the Sports Clinic for massages and an ear to bash when necessary. 

Much love, remember run hard, run fast, run strong – or something like that! See you at the next race

N

Ps I have lots more photos to upload but trying to do it on an iPhone is too time consuming!

I suspect for almost everybody out there training towards a  spring marathon the past weekend saw you out pounding the pavements and putting some big miles in the leg bank. It was no difference for me as I had a 2hr30 run scheduled, the longest to date for 2011.

On Saturday I went for a service with Chris D at the sports clinic. Whilst I didn’t have any serious injuries I’m aware that it’s best to have a massage once a month or so when heavily training to flush out the rubbish that has built up in the legs. One hour later I was out and my legs felt refreshed and ready for the LSR on Sunday.

This weekend was another Training Run organised by Havens Hospice in Southend. Benfleet RC put together a number of routes covering all magnitudes of distances and at 830 in the morning everyone leaves on mass. Whilst waiting in Little Havens there is always an aura of anticipation! For a number of people there embarking on their first marathon this would be the longest run to date and this is a worry. This was me 3 years ago and I know the feeling! Fortunately, these training runs bring people together and allow people to see they aren’t alone!

As mentioned I was out to do 2hrs30 and based on previous runs I wanted to do roughly 8:15 splits if possible. I was prepared to slow it a bit to run with company as I saw no point in travelling to Southend and running on my own! Fortunately I managed to drag 2 runners along with me, Paul and Kanan(?!?!). I have run with Paul before, in fact we both started training for the 2009 marathon for Havens. Since then it seems we have both improved in pace leaving the 9min/mi group we both ran with in ’09 in our wake!

I am fairly confident when I say I pushed them harder than they were expecting. These guys are training for a sub 345/350 and for 18 hilly miles we hit an average split of 8:17. At 18 miles that would put them over half a mile ahead – let’s not forget though it’s all about the last 6miles and not the first 20!

The run was perfect and as 18mile sessions go it was certainly up there with one of the best. Two very good training sessions with havens this year and even though the weather for the  second was grey an dismal the cheeriness of those out more than made up for it!

With the Roding Valley half on Sunday week I believe my schedule has a ‘mini taper’ meaning my LSR this coming weekend is not so ‘L’ – at 90mins I will be looking to do 10-11 miles and just enjoy it!

Hope everyones training is going well and to plan!

N

For a few weeks I had been somewhat looking forward to last week. The schedule looked on paper to be relatively forgiving baring the weekend LSR. There were no sessions scheduled for the Thursday and in fact every run had the word ‘Easy’ by it. Jackpot!

However, on Wednesday I was about to realise perhaps things were indeed easier but they were still runs none the less. The relatively short 5k I chuckled about as I took to the treadmill, simples I thought! However, 20mins later, sweating like anything it was actually bloody tough and I couldn’t have pressed the stop button any quicker.

Thursday was similar – an easy 6 miles scheduled so I jogged back from Stratford. As I was on the tube on the way to the start I was telling myself ‘yesterday was a blip -today really will seem easy’. From the first 100m I realised once again that wouldn’t be the case and it was going to be a more challenging than expected run home. To give me a little bit of credit I did have my camelback on which adds about half a stone to my weight which doesn’t help matters!

I entered the house feeling dejected. In what felt like a few short seconds my three easy days were over – and none of them felt easy. What was that about?! After a few texts with a woman in the know I was informed this was to be expected following heavy training. That said she also informed me I could be coming down with a cold. I tried to have an early night and similarly on Friday my allocated rest day.

Once again due to plans and arrangements my LSR was shifted to Saturday and I was scheduled to run 2hr15. I sorted my kit out on Friday night, gels etc. I’m trying to get back into the SIS Tropical gels having been suggested it possibly isnt the best idea to only take the caffeine ones as I did in Dublin. Laura had to do something for her school in Bromley so I decided to go with her and run towards my nan in Kennington from the other side of the river.

I was also fortunate to have Olly company for a portion of my run. I ran a few times with Olly last year, meeting him in Greenwich and once again we met in Blackheath and following a quick handover of wallet etc we were on our way to London Bridge. I am normally pretty meticulous with gMap Pedometer and plan my route out however today I knew that I was likely to come out short so would have to do laps at the end.

The south side of the river is much less enjoyable to run along than the north. On the other side there is a footpath that runs all the way from docklands with only a few deviations for new properties this is not the case on the south! Mental note to self there!

The run itself went ok. The 16 miles turned out to be 17 but mainly because I forgot to restart my watch at Blackheath. My heart rate was up on last weeks LSR and I failed to take on a third gel which may have helped during my final few miles and where I really did slow down!

As I finished and whilst consuming a recovery shake I started to ponder more about the week that had passed. Why had things seemingly been so bad? I think the problem stemmed from my brain giving the wrong message to my body. It was a recovery week NOT a rest week. For some this may amount to the same thing, for me I now know the difference!

Recovery week done, back to sessions this week and the likelihood of having to do some shuffling about due to another busy week of commitments.

Till next time.

N

Last week on the HavensRunner site I wrote a post about my Thursday session. This was a hill session and it was the first of it’s type I had ever done. Rightly so I was anxious about what I was about to put my body through – I had no doubt this was going to be hard, it was just the question of how hard!

Throwing on my new trainers for their second run I headed towards a local hill which I had run on many times before. However, for obvious reasons I often opted to run down this mountain rather than up, finding alternative less demonic routes back to my flat. On Thursday I was aiming for it and I wasn’t going to do this hill once I had it scheduled to run it 6 times! I jogged down the hill for about 3miles (figuring that I wouldnt do much faster than an 8min mi average for this session) psyched myself up turned round and went for it. Feeling an enormous sense of pride once the two mins was up I turned round and jogged back. I think it was during the first jog back I started to realise that I had 5 more of these to do and short of giving up and calling a day there was no easy option!

6 reps later i was beaten and I jogged back home glad it was over! Connecting my Garmin I was presented with the following heart rate graph – i think it’s clear from this even if my splits weren’t entirely consistent the effort I put in each time was!

Friday was my rest day and I loved it, but deep down I know the only reason I’m resting is to prepare for the next run and baring a little jog on sat, Sunday was my LSR. The schedule had me down for 1hr50 and at this stage it’s all about time on my feet. Setting off towards Stratford I was going to check out how far along the Olympic Park is…

If you live in London I would recommend you head upto Stratford. The park is an amazing sight and with the Olympics just over a year away I’m very excited to get in there and experience it! I digress…

I covered 13.75 miles in 1hr53. Tried out another gel type (Powerbar Strawberry and Banana) which weren’t too bad. This gel did not have the consistency of most of the other gels I have had. It was much thicker and less gooey. It tasted ok though! The run went well with no real issues or concerns. I tried to keep my heart rate down below 160 which I did so that was good! All in all a promising LSR covering a respectable distance.

One day off (running) and come Tuesday morning I was back out again pounding the streets. 8miles between Bank Station and work (Shepherds Bush) at a slow very easy pace. Whilst it didn’t feel easy my heart rate was low averaging low 150bpm. Just keep on reminding myself it’s all about miles on the feet!!

Till tomorrow no doubt when I’m back out again!

N

It’s far too easy sometimes to get caught up in a schedule and not entirely enjoy what you are doing and the reasons why you are doing it. This weekend, in particular Sunday was not one of these times.

Before getting into Sunday I wanted to quickly write about my warmup run on Saturday. At Xmas Laura got a bike in the hope she could come out with me when I was running training. She could be my company on some of those runs where I’m out on my own. On Saturday she joined me on my little prep jog before Sunday’s LSR. We headed to Gunpowder Park in Lea Valley and for 30mins I ran and she cycled beside me! A great way to do those kinds of runs

On Sunday morning, getting up at some ungodly hour (for me), Laura and I jumped in the car and headed for Little Havens in Southend. The charity had organised a training run and as I’m involved in the Havens Runners project as well as having run the London Marathon for them in 2009 and 2010 I went down to join them.

I was scheduled for a shorter run than normal ‘consolidating my miles’ this week and was require to run 1hr20 or about 10miles. Fortunately to cover all bases the Havens team had created routes to cover all abilities and distances.

As more and more runners turned up it was clear that this was going to be a busy run which was nice and at 830, we set off down towards the sea front. Laura was armed with her camera ready to snap away as the group of runners exited the site. The pictures really show how good the turnout was!

This is not the first training run I have done with the Hospice, however it is the first time the weather has been kind. The sun was out and whilst it is still cold it was glorious running conditions.

Forming a small pack at the front Paul M, Neil D, Ian R and I set off at an 830 ish pace up and down the many inclines. However, unlike many of my previous runs here in Southend this felt pleasant. My heart rate stayed low and I could hold an easy conversation – most would say a perfect LSR pace!

At about 6 miles is where I separated from the others in the pack who were carrying on to do an extra couple of miles but just before that I witnessed the spectacular sight of the sun over the sea front from high. It was a glorious sight – far from the normal gailing winds and lashing rain I remember from the past.

The turn around point is on Belton Way which is a pretty big hill. This hill has always been a bit of a nemesis for me. I remember ‘running’ it for the first time in 2009 and it was horrid. This time I would destroy it and with my increased fitness I duly did. That’s not to say it’s not a killer hill but all of a sudden it’s passable! Will have to go try that *mountain* in fattened again soon although I think that is still top steep!

At the top of the hill I noticed another havens runner so dropped back to run with them to the end. I figure these runs are supposed to be with company so what’s the point in running 30meters in front of someone for 3miles! Great bit of company saw the remaining, relatively dull bit of the route fly by and before long we were back at Little Havens tucking into a bacon sarnie

All together a perfect run. No niggles, pains or concerns and a bit of beautiful scenery to top it all off! Thanks to Havens for organising it. I hope some of the other Havens Runners enjoyed it as much as I did!

The afternoon was spent in front of the tv. I put on Chariots of Fire which I had sky+’ed months ago this followed by Spurs V United, a roast dinner and bath topped off what was to be a lovely day all around! Shame it can’t last and it’s now back to work again…

Till next time

N

Its been a whole week since my last post which is poor performance on my part! However, I have been mentally busy and on top of this last Friday I started coming down with a cold which I have been fighting to get rid of!

My long run plans for the Sunday were thrown out of the window and instead I did a gentle couple of local miles slow and easy. I was out for just 30minutes and it felt tougher than usual guess that was to be expected! Monday, still recovering I worked from home so as to save my colleagues from my germs – although to be honest I think I picked up the cold from one of them so I’m not sure why I bothered

Tuesday was my next scheduled run day, 6 miles ‘easy’ this turned out to be one of those very very bizarre runs. I was expecting the worst, not feeling 100% but I was fast and finding it easy. I can only assume this was down to the rest I had since Thursday evening. In what was to be a complete accident I did a 6mile run with an av pace of 07:24 min/mi pretty zippy!

Wednesday I was out with Rich and Ath who also ran the Dublin Marathon. We did a run along the Thames from Horse Guards up to Tower Bridge and back at an 8:15min/mi pace. Lovely run! The Thames at night has some amazing views which are easily missed especially on faster sessions! Had fun

Uh oh Thursday time!

10mins easy jog, 10mins at MP, 3mins jog rec ( 5x 2mins faster with 2 mins easy ) 3mins easy jog, 10mins at MP again. 10mins easy.

How was it Thursday already! A very tough session made worse by the fact that about 2mins after leaving work the heavens opened and all of a sudden there was TORRENTIAL rain! It absolutely chucked it down…The session was hard, as expected – my heart rate went through the roof which is good. I had to cut short the 10 mins easy at the end to about 5 because of time constraints. Haven’t checked out the Garmin yet as the transfer stick is at home – one to analyse at the weekend!

Today is rest day, before heading down to Southend on Sunday to run with the other Havens Runners on there campaign towards the London Marathon, looking forward to it!

I think Fridays are going to rapidly become the best day of the week for me when it comes to running unless this schedule changes. After 3 days of back to back sessions I was genuinely happy to put my trainers away for a day. Doesn’t bode well for the next 99 days though does it?

It has actually been a while since I have written a running blog, ironic given the nature of the site! This doesn’t mean I haven’t been out there, in actual fact in the last 3 weeks my schedule has once again ramped up massively. Having looked at my garmin dashboard in 3 weeks I have covered 80 miles, done 2 long runs of over an 1:30 and done 3 variants of interval sessions.

Historically I have tried to avoid the interval sessions as these are what hurt the most, 3 weeks in it still feels the same. On the first week I did 5 x 3min on/2min off which made me cry a little, last week I did 2 x 10mins on/3min off again I shed a little tear and last night I did a ramp session 10mins steady,10min controlled pace then 5mins as fast as poss. Last night I didn’t have anything left to even begin to weep! I will admit I made the experience a touch harder for myself by not taking it particularly easily on the Wednesday night with the Serps so even before I started I was hesitant!

Anyway as the title suggests Friday is the day my legs love me and why not. I figure im mostly going to sit around and take the pressure off them. Give them a little treat before Sundays long run! 1hr 45 scheduled so guessing aiming to do around the 13mile kind of distance – hopefully with some company if possible!

2010 was a year of improving, in almost every race I entered I beat previous personal bests and on the whole I have become fitter, faster and lighter. I have had lots of highs and thinking about it now only one real low. I have taken my running to new levels and running has now become such a huge part of my life.

If I ran a lot in 2008-2009 it was nothing in comparison to 2010. Over the course of the year I have entered:
- Two 10kms (Newham, Bluewater*)
- One 10m (Stockport*)
- Four half marathons (Roding Valley, Silverstone*, Dartford, Royal Parks)
- One 24hr relay event
- Two Marathons ( London DNF, Dublin*)
( *denotes Race Personal Bests)

Over the year I have run at least 1100 miles. After a bit of google’ing this is equivalent from running between London and Gibraltar! Most, but not all, of those miles were covered in London. However, I did run whilst on holiday in Spain, attempted to run on a treadmill whilst skiing in Andora and even went out with a Running Club at 6am whilst in Fort Lauderdale. In May I joined Serpentine RC and through good fortune I managed to bump into Rich and Jim on my first night and since then Rich has joined me on a number of races including dragging me around the Dublin Marathon! Cheers Rich…

I have also managed to get an article in Runners World magazine about this blog and have been contacted by a number of people who have somehow stumbled into my little home on the web. I think this is pretty cool – the subject matter is pretty dull to most, I’m no record breaker and I say it like it is however I still get visitors and I hope this will continue on into 2011.

At the beginning of 2010 I was an 8:30-9 min/mi runner, an 8min/mi was a tough session – however, on the final race of the year I managed 10 hilly miles with an average pace of 7:25, substantially faster! Luckily I think I still have more to give, a more focused schedule in 2011 structured in a way to build my speed should hopefully see me setting more PB’s.

At the moment I am still unconfirmed of my race plans for 2011, it’s possible I will head back to Silverstone again and take on the 1:42:44. I have entered the Dorney Lakes Half and it’s also likely I will run a Marathon in the spring and, depending on how that goes, also in the Autumn. Hopefully, if Rich doesn’t continue to get quicker and quicker maybe we will head abroad somewhere for the Autumn one, possibly Berlin…?!

Bring on 2011…!

N

How do I start…over the last few months I have had my own little secret and on Monday 26th October I managed to exorcise the demons that have followed me around since that day in April.

Following the Test Adidas place at the Thunder Run, where I had the fortune of meeting Gemma and Ath, I was given the opportunity of a place in the Dublin Marathon for myself and Rich (my Weds eve Serpentine training buddy). After a lot of soul searching, I decided that it maybe an ideal event to regain some confidence in this distance and took the place. This was back at the beginning of August and I have been marathon training ever since.

Obviously I had kept my miles up pretty high following London maintaining at least one 7miler a week and a couple of other runs but now I would have to build on top of that a 3 month schedule with 2 holidays in between. At this point the runs in Spain and the 10miler in Miami may make a lot more sense – not that I needed an excuse to run abroad!

I had blogged about 16milers but failed to go into details, I definitely didn’t blog about my 20miler following a day at work and come to think of it the evening after a work meal, I ran to mum and dads and it was this day I told them following enquiries as to why I was running so far! I think I managed a couple of 18′s, a few 16′s and one 20. It was certainly less than Jan-Apr but still consistent. Factoring at least one ‘fast’ session a week to help with the limited training schedule.

The negative split at the Royal Parks was deliberate to test my legs for the second half of a marathon. That weekend would typically be the longest run but having booked into the half months ago I had to take any opportunity I could from it but racing it so late would not have been a wise idea. What I failed to mention on that blog post was the fact at the end of the race we tacked on another 3miles to make it a 16mile session which one of my colleagues actually spotted me doing!

I have trained with Rich a number of times for this race, I have been up at silly o’clock in the morning to get long runs out of the way and whilst he isn’t massively faster than me, I suspect at any race he would beat me to the finish line! As well as this I have been out with colleagues who didn’t realise I was tapering with them and other friends including a jog in Manchester!

On Saturday morning at 5o’clock the alarm went off and Laura and I headed to Stansted. A few hours later we landed in a cold but sunny Dublin and headed to our hotel. We had to pick up our numbers from the expo on Saturday so after a quick bagel we headed over to the conference centre. Saturday was always going to be a non-sightseeing day, reserving those for the bus tour on Sunday (to keep me off my feet) and then Tuesday.

Adidas and Lifestyle sports had set up a ‘Breakfast Run’ predominantly for international runners. Fortunately (and due to Laura’s great planning) this started right outside our hotel and on Sunday morning we headed down and I went for a v gentle 2mile run to stretch out my legs. The run was pleasant and after this we were treated to breakfast (hence the name) and they also put on a show of Irish Dance and Folk Songs. A perfect start to another gloriously sunny morning. After returning to the hotel to get changed we then headed to the bus tour and saw what Dublin had to offer. At about 4pm we headed back to the hotel and used the jacuzzi/pool and generally relaxed in preparation for the marathon.

The Dublin Marathon is on a Monday, this is because it’s a bank holiday over there. At 6am my alarm went off, my kit was already prepared so just put it on and headed for some toasty breakfast. At 730 Rich and I left for the start. It was almost time!

At 8am we met up with Ath, who had also decided to run it. It was certainly chilly and for the next hour we tried to keep warm whilst waiting for the race to start. The next thing I knew I was in the starting pen waiting for the gun!

The first few miles where slow, the route was quite windy with some sharp corners. As the pack was still tight it meant coming to a stop and walking in places. Looking at my garmin, the first mile is my slowest by some margin. It took about 3miles for the field to open a bit and then our times started to better. Laura and Liz had planned where they were to be standing and we spotted them at both locations but after 11miles we were on our own until 24/25 miles…

The first half went pretty well for Rich and I but Ath was visibly struggling and just shy of 12 miles he left us to do some stretching. He had helped hold the pace back and this was shown by the next few miles being a fair bit faster.

We hit 13.1miles in 01:56:33.

From halfway through until 20ish miles things were fairly uneventful. A common feature for the run were the inclines and once again we found more and more of them. Unfortunately the downs seemed short and sharp not really prolonging their benefit! At about 22m I first started to feel it in my right leg. Almost instantly I had a throbbing pain in my right quad. I took 20 seconds to head to a wall and stretch it out but didn’t want to hang around for too long incase I started to seize up elsewhere!

Forcing the pain to the back of my head I carried on with Rich not letting me quit. The pain went until someone stopped dead in my tracks and I had to vault a cone to avoid her. Not a good idea 24miles into a run! I was dragged along by Rich who seemed to ignore my sulking – in hindsight he was right too!

The final mile or so was a blur, I think it went by quite quickly but can’t remember it, just the seeing of the finish line and the end in sight!

3 hours 42 minutes. 52 minutes faster than my last completed marathon but more important than that confidence restored. It’s been a tough 6 months, there was a lot of doubt and concern in my mind but this has now been laid to rest!

A great run and a great experience all around.

Thanks to all those who have supported me and believed in me over the last few months I think it would have been a lot easier to jack it all in but right now as I finish this post I’m glad I didn’t.

Rest time

Race Stats

Overall Position: 3181/10700
10km Time: 00:57:19
13.1m Time: 01:56:33
30km Time:02:42:00
26.1m Time: 03:42:50

Today I qualified to be a Leader in Running Fitness through England Athletics. I have been looking at the courses offered a few times but an opportunity came up through my running club and I jumped at it.

The course focused on the qualities needed to provide ‘safe and enjoyable experiences to people of any level of ability, age, size and shape. Whilst most of the information taught was nothing new to me having been a subscriber and regular reader of many mags/forums, it was nice to cement the knowledge and feel able to recommend with confidence.

We were also shown a number of new drills and exercises which would be nice to introduce into some of our sessions varying pace performance and techniques. Maybe if I can get out with my colleagues during the week I’ll try a few of these sessions.

It was good to hear how to possibly overcome newbie boundaries and barriers, how to plan a schedule tailored to the individual runners and review and reassess performance. The barriers were broad, not just fitness related in some cases there maybe cultural and monetary barriers.

As with all running events I have been to I am starting to realise the people involved are on the whole so friendly. They are welcoming and most want otherwise to enjoy their passion as much as they do themselves. Today was no exception, had a great time mixing with fellow serps of varying age, speed etc etc.

I still would like to know more about the body, correct stretches simple self massage but that was beyond the scope of this course.

Anyway, that’s my first qualification for England Athletics completed, feels good!