London Marathon 2007

Its been a while since I posted. Running is going well. Last Saturday I re-did the Rutland water loop with Jonathan. This time we included the Hambledon penninsular. Before we started Jonathan reconed that it would be about 19 miles. In the end it turned out to be just under 23 miles. It was a fantastic run, the dawn was just breaking as we started. It was clear and we had a fantastic sunrise over the water in the mist. A big change from the last time we did the run when it was wet, windy and dark.

I have just over two weeks to go. I am starting to wind things down. Tuesday was the last time I will go to the track before the Marathon. The run on saturday certainly took it out of me. Coupled with a sore throat I was defininately below par.

The previous week was relatively easy as I only ended up runnin three times. Once on the track, once for my thursday session and once round Rutland water.

This week I am going to do about 40 miles. I may substitue one of my short runs for a bike ride. Tonight I will do my shorter harder set and on Saturday I will do my longer run of 18 miles.

London Marathon 2007

Its just over 4 weeks to go and my training is coming along nicely. I did a short run of 5.5 miles to day after having had three days with no running and I felt very lively and had masses in the tank. I felt like I could have maintained 7'30 pace for quite a while which is a lot faster than normal.

On Saturday morning I did just under 20 miles. I started off from Woodnewton because PACTRAC where holding their training weekend there. Ben and Robert came with me for the first few miles. From Woodnewton we headed over to Southwick and then over the big hill and down to Cotterstock where we turned towards Fotheringhay. It was quite nice having the boys with me, but it does make things a bit stressful. After the first loop I repeated the loop two more times. By the time I got back to Woodnewton I was fairly tired.

Alex gave me a massage which really helped my recovery.

The early part of the week was very hard. After the Mondi 15 I was quite tired. At the track on tuesday night Sean got us all to do 6x800M which I found very taxing. Wednesday I swam and Thursday I did my 6x2 miles run. By the time Thursday evening came I was absolutely finished. Fortunately Friday was my day off so I had some time to recover by my long run on Saturday.

I've got a hard few days ahead of me as this week is one of my 40 mile weeks, but this time it does not seem that daunting at all. I am starting to think that given a good day I will be able to do a sub 3'50. I need to work on getting the feeding right when I am pushing hard as I think that is what will prevent me achieving my goal.

London Marathon 2007

I did the Mondi 15 over in the fens around March. I wasn't sure how I would perform, but I finished in 02:06:10 which means that I managed to do 8'24. I know that at the moment I won't be able to hold that speed for another 11 miles. However I feel reasonably confident of getting close to my target of 3:50. There are still 5 weeks of training to go and I am much fitter than I have been for a while.

The back is fine now. I am back in my own bed and not getting any pain when I lie down. I still get a bit of pain if I lift things and I am stiff when I get out of bed.

There are only 5 weeks of proper training left. Wow, I can't believe its going so quickly. On the one hand I want the day to come so that I can ease off on the training and get on with some other things. While on the other hand I don't want it to pass in a rush.

Over the next 5 weeks I have got to try and loose a bit more weight and concentrate on working on maintaining the pace over long distances.

London Marathon 2007

Things are looking up. The marathon is now 7 weeks away which means that I have 6 weeks of training left. I have just completed one of my hard weeks and although I am feeling tired this morning I know that I am not exhausted and ready for more. Last week I clocked up 43 miles on the road and a good hour swimming session. The cycling took a back seat.

Yesterday was my long run day. To make things more interesting I decided to incorporate the Frostbite at Huntingdon into my run. Therefore I started running from Stilton to the race at Huntingdon. The road from Stilton is long and follows the route of Ermine Street, which means its straight and boring. I felt good during the race and managed to get round the 5 miles in 42:50 - 8'30 pace which is faster than my marathon target pace. Hopefully this means that I am on track.

This week is bit easier I've only got to do 31 miles which means that I will only do 4 run sessions

London Marathon 2007

I am back runnig again. A very easy 3+ miles on Monday and a decent track session on Tuesday. My back has been really troubling me lately. I am not sure if its something to do with the illness or running. I have ended up sleeping in the bottom bunk of the boys bed. It's softer and I have got something to grab onto above me to haul myself up.

I should be swimming this evening.

I am feeling a bit more positive.

London Marathon 2007

To day is a low point. Its Friday afternoon and I am feeling very lethargic. I have a mild temperature, a very croaky voice and aches and pains all over my body. I've got the bug which is doing the rounds.

On days like this the goal seems unachievable. I haven't done anything since Monday and the way I am feeling at the moment I can't see myself being fit before the middle of next week. Yesterday I thought that I was getting better, but today its all change.

London Marathon 2007

The middle of Februrary is looming and there are now less than 10 weeks to go. My body has changed over the last few weeks and I am making improvements. Yesterday I ran just over 17 miles. The last 5 were at my target marathon pace and were part of the second biathlon. I started runing with Jonathan at 6:30am. We returned to Oundle pool at just after 8:30 and I changed into my tri suit. Swam 800M and then continued with the last 5 miles of the run. Everything felt good.

Over the last few weeks I have been building up and I am starting to feel like things are taking shape. I still have aches and pains - my lower back has been quite uncomfortable for the last two weeks, but it feels like it is getting better. I also have a pain around my right shin. Again this seems to be improving slowly. I am looking forward to the day when all the aches have gone and I have that feeling that I could run for ever,

I think that towards the end of Janurary I must of had some sort of bug as I struggled on the running track. It was especially cold and my lungs were very tight. Possibly this was caused by being run down from over doing things. The week that I ran round Rutland water was probably too much.

I have cut back on the swimming and started to make sure that I do a reasonable cycle ride each week. Therefore at the moment my week goes something like: monday do a short recovery run to get the legs going from the previous days long run; tuesday evenings I go to the track and do the session there; Wednesday I do an hour long Clike Tuke swimming session; Thursday I do my second key run of the week which concentrates on speed; Friday I go out for a 1:30 bike ride; saturday is my rest day, which usually involves gardening and other jobs at home; Sunday sees my long run.

London Marathon 2007

I have done quite a bit since my last post.

Last wednesday I started by doing the Woodnewton, Apethorpe, Nassington circuit. My legs were very tired as by the end I had clocked up nearly 35 miles in 6 days. Two of the sessions had been hard - the frostbite and the track session. This was followed by a Clive Tuke endurance session.

Therfore by Thursday morning I was very tired. My initial idea was to do the turbo session in the evening and not venture out for a run. However Thursday saw the worst winter storm for nearly 20 years pass over the UK. By 1:30pm the electricity had gone and I was forced to spend the afternoon reading. Had I not been so tired I think that I would have gone out for a run in the wind just to see what it was like. By the time the turbo session came around there was still no electricity, so it did not go ahead.

Friday was my rest day and despite the fact that I had done nothing the day before I decided to keep it as a rest day. Bliss!

Saturday started very early. D4 the dog started barking in the middle of the night, which woke me - 2AM. I was quite excited about the impending Rutland Water challenge and could not get back to sleep. I ended up listening to the world service until about 4:30am when I finally got out of bed. The wind was howling outside and the conditions did not seem ideal. Between Nassington and Apethorpe, the rain came down so hard I had to slow as the wipers could not keep up with the volume of water. Fortunately by the time I got to Rutland Water, the rain had abated a bit. Rupert was sitting in his Land Rover relishing the thought of doing something a bit off the wall. Robin turned up, followed by Jonathan and Julia. We all got togged up and started on our way. Jonathan, Julia and me on foot going clockwise round the lake. Rupert and Robin going anti clockwise on bike. The wind was sill very strong and the rain reasonably hard. Once or twice I had negative thoughts about stopping, but you just put the thoughts behind you and keep going.

The Rutland Water circuit is quite hard - up and down all the way. It's difficult to get into a rythm. After about 40 minutes we rounded the west end of the water and our direction changed. Also there were a few steady miles where the track was flatish. Rupert and Robin passed us just as we were about to cross under the railway line.

London Marathon 2007

Even though I thought that I was feeling tired on Monday, my run to Woodnewton and back was not too bad. I took things fairly steady and did a few high knees etc on the way back. In the evening I did an hours swimming. A reasonably hard set.

On Tuesday I went with Adrian to the athletics track in Peterborough. It's a great facility. We started with a warm up and then did a few drills and stretching. After that we did some sprints. I was teamed with Annette and Sam. 2x50, 2x100, 2x150, 2x200, 2x150, 2x100, 2x50. It was good to run next to Sam as she is a good sprinter and I found it very hard to keep up with her, especially on anything over 100M.

My legs are a bit sore, but at least it's only a couple of days before my rest day. This week is a hard week. I should have done about 35 miles + 2 hours of swimming. Next week is going to be easier.

However before next week comes I have been persuaded to go round Rutland water with Jonathan at 05:30 on Saturday morning. Yuk! It's somewhere in the region of 15 miles. Lets hope the rain and wind has abated a bit before then.

London Marathon 2007

Feeling tired after a lot of running in the last three days. Friday started with a progression run of 5.5 miles. The first part was very windy and hard work. On the return I pushed harder and felt quite good. I followed the run up with a Clive Tuke swim session.

On Saturday, I ended up doing slightly under 10 miles. I had a course change halfway round when I saw David and Bruce out with the novice cyclists, which meant that I came back over Southwick hill. I was very tired at the end - I am not sure if it was the fact that I eat my breakfast shortly before setting off for the run, the fact that it was hillier than I planned, or the swimming from the night before. Possibly all three contributed to making me feel very tired.

Sunday was Frostbite race 4 over at Ramsey. The sun was out and the ground was not too soggy. My legs felt very heavy. I went round with Carol with me leading most of the way. Not exactly sure what the time was, but even if I was slower than last year I will be happier as I had done quite a bit in the two days before the run and my legs were extremely tired. But to put things in perspective Carol had cycled over 65 miles followed by a three mile run the day before and come down on her bike from Peterborough to do the race.

One encouraging thing is that I have done roughly 29 miles running along with 3 1 hour swimming sessions in the week. Therefore enven though I am feeling quite tired this morning, I know that in a few weeks I am going to be able to cope with running over 40 miles in a week. I will probably have to cut the swimming down to 1 session a week and maybe introduce a sysle ride instead of a run session.

London Marathon 2007

So far this week I have managed to run on Monday and Tuesday. Tuesday was very windy which made the start of my run up the hill to Woodnewton very difficult.

Running wise Wednesday never happened as I got stuck in Stamford until 4pm so ran out of time. I did do a hard swimming session behind Clive Tuke. I managed to complete the full session bar 100m, an improvement on Friday. I did 3100M and don't feel too tired this morning.

I have also purchased a Navman R300 Sport Tool, which is a cheap (£50) GPS tracking device giving information about current speed, distance covered etc. It sits on your arm and is quite useful as an aid to make sure that you are running at the desired pace.

London Marathon 2007

The boy's rugby was cancelled so Defor had a bonus run which she was not expecting. We did about 5.5 miles. I pushed quite hard on the last half doing a few hard sprints towards the end. Things felt quite good and I remembered to do my stretching at the end. Stretching is something I often forget to do when I come in after a run.

London Marathon 2007

I have just done my first two proper training sessions of the new year. An hours swimming following in the bow wave of Clive Tuke and this morning a 40 minute run of around 4 miles.

I had planned to start my training earlier this week, but unfortunately I got the cold which is doing the rounds. I am just about over it. Hopefully it is the last of the winter.

I have worked out a training plan to get me to my target of 3:50. I have a three week build up before the plan proper starts.