12 Marathons – 12 Months

In a bit of a lull

Although it’s been good to get back into the regular routine I had before Christmas it does feel like things are going quite slowly now after a hectic start to the year. Doing three races quite close together has left me with a 6 week gap until Stratford in April. I’m just treating this time as if I was training for the first one again though to give me that little spark of incentive that gets me out of the house. The relentless rain and drizzle over the last 10 days has made that pretty hard to do but despite that miserable feeling you get as you step out of the front door into the rain it soon wears off and you hardly notice it once you’ve wound yourself up into the training zone (well it works for me anyway).

The weekend was a good confidence booster, I went out to do 12 miles and ended up clocking just short of 15 as I changed the route a little. I took the car for some new tyres and since I knew it was about a 90 min wait I thought that would be a good time to to a big loop and arrive back to the job all finished. However I did slightly underestimate the extra distance starting from the garage would add on but in the end it was no problem at all. That particular route has a couple of challenging gradients (they don’t call that area Northwood Hills for nothing), both of which I attacked viciously and managed to maintain a good pace all the way round. Click here for the Garmin track of that day.

Anyways, hopefully I’ll be able to stick to this routine now and get some quality speedwork done this Wednesday and another good long run at the weekend.

Cheers

Cool Runnings

Well after three months of mayhem at the start of this year I’ve finally settled back into the routine I had before marathon number one which was a long Saturday run, easy short-mid distance on Monday and speedwork/intervals on a Wednesday. Long run distances increasing by 2 miles per week etc. That got me to a sub-4:00 at Gloucester and I’ve managed to maintain that so far. However, even though I’m back into a familiar routine I’m now feeling the need to ramp things up a bit as I’m starting to feel ever more “agitated and jumpy” between runs and just have the urge to go and run off all the excess energy!!

I think I’m going to have to up all my distances by 10-15% and maybe do some work in the gym in between runs, either that or add another run into the weekly calendar but I may have to do that on a lunchtime rather than encroaching on even more home life – the bathroom tiling has taken long enough to finish as it is!!

Anyway, tonight was an easy 5-miler with me making a concerted effort to keep it easy, despite the urge to break 40 mins again!

Fundraising Update

Just added up the total donations across my chosen charities to date and the running total so far is £1220.64 including gift aid which is fantastic. Many thanks to all who have donated so far as I’m just about a quarter of the way to my total target now!

Please keep telling all your friends about this site though as I still have a long way to go

Fame at last!

Picked up a copy of Running Fitness magazine in the station on my way home and was pleasantly surprised to see an almost full-page article about my challenge. I’d had a telephone interview a few weeks ago that was kindly set up for me by Asthma UK but I’d only expected a couple of paragraphs in a column somewhere so that really put a smile on my face for the journey home

Went for my first post-marathon jog this evening too, just a little 2 miler to flush out all the waste metabolites from the muscles and shake off the remaining stiffness – which it has done. It’s a good 6 weeks or thereabouts to the next marathon now so I think I’ll revise my training programme a little and see if I can shave another couple of minutes off the next one with some focussed HR training to see if it really works. For the next couple of nights though it’s feet-up, telly on and perhaps a couple of beers…

Duchy Marathon, Cornwall – a new PB!

Well that’s the Duchy Marathon ticked off the list and a new PB of 3:52:17 despite a route that had some pretty mean gradients and an unwelcome headwind so I’m very pleased with that.

This was a two lap race around the local roads of Redruth and across the downs along the Cornish coastline. Aside from the wind (around 17-20 knots) the weather was very pleasant – chilly but very sunny throughout so none of the hailstorms and rain that apparently plagued the event last year. However, during the first lap you could be fooled into wondering where the hell the wind had gone because after the initial 1 mile run down to the first turn into the loop the wind just disappeared and throughout the next 7 miles the route was very encouraging with a good pace and easily manageable gradients. However, the bogey man was waiting around the corner after that when you turned a sharp left and suddenly there was a mean looking hill with a headwind that just appeared out of nowhere! It became apparent that the hedgerows and rolling hills were sheilding us from that wind and now it was payback time. Just to add insult to injury as this was all piling on we passed the 20-mile marker (for the second lap) and at that point you realise that this is what would be waiting for you with 6 miles to go! From this point on the winds and gradients were relentless. There were a couple of lulls as we disappeared into a small stream valley but then we started to head back into town onto a very undulating road. I was relieved to see the sign directing you to hang a left if you were doing another lap or going straight on to finish as I now had a landmark for the second lap. After turning left we were back into the windless wonderland which helped regain some of the pace but as expected, at 20 miles the conditions were not what you wanted!

As the last three miles approached the “finish fever” took over and I was constantly watching the pace/time on my Garmin as I was fully confident by then that a sub-4:00 was within reach and the route had a nice suprise up it’s sleeve with a long easy downhill section to the finish

This is one I would do again but weather is definitely a limiting factor and being coastal you have to expect the sea breezes. Having said that, the organisation was first rate with helpful friendly marshallers and a good degree of support from spectators. Having the start and finish in the hotel car park was fantastic as all the facilities were there and as you might expect, traditional Cornish pasties were waiting for all finishers.

So, onto the next one and this time I have a bit longer to recover as the Stratford Marathon is much later in the month which will be very welcome after the first three were so close together.

Eve of the race

Just thought I’d make a quick post as I’m sat in the hotel watching The Matrix (again) before tomorrow’s race. This will be the third one in the series so that’ll be a quarter of the way through the challenge – which sounds a lot better!
Anyways, better get some sleep – I’ll post my race report tomorrow evening and let you know how I got on.