12 Marathons – 12 Months

Edinburgh Marathon

If I had to describe the Edinburgh marathon in one word it would be HOT!

In complete contrast to the weather forecast, which promised overcast skies and light rain (which would have been perfect) it ended up being one of the hottest days of the year so far. Initially, the predictions were true. Looking out from the hotel room window on the morning I was greeted with a grey sky and the city almost rendered invisible in the mist – this continued through the start but after about 6 or 7 miles the cloud cover just simply vanished and we had the full effect of the midday sun for the remainder of the race.

On to the race itself, Edinburgh is hailed as the fastest marathon in the UK and it’s easy to see why. The first few miles weave their way from the city centre down to Meadowbank through Holyrood Park and the local roads in a gentle downhill gradient. This certainly helps to up the early pace without incurring too much fatigue and of course the crowd support during this stage is fantastic. After Meadowbank, the course levels out and heads down to the coastal road where you are taken past the finish line at Musselburgh stadium before carrying on along a pretty flat out-and-back for approximately 17 miles.  It wasn’t long after mile 10 that I encountered the first of the elites coming the other way and gradually the oncoming “traffic” increased as we headed towards the turning loop. The only soul-destroyer on this route is a short spur road at mile 16 which serves no purpose other than to correct the distance – probably as a result of some other route change – but a water stop on this section would have been most welcome! The 18 mile marker was effectively the point at which we headed back down the coast road towards the finish. As we headed back down the final 8 miles the casualties of the heat became more apparent with a lot of people being treated roadside for clear cases of heat stroke (including some of the front runners!) with wet towels. The water stops seemed to be getting further apart and at one point I resorted to retrieving a half-full bottle that had been discarded by an earlier runner – yes I was that desparate!!

By mile 21 I was seriously going into meltdown myself and seeing a sub 4:00 slowly ebbing away I decided that discretion was the better part of valour and dropped into a run-walk-run pattern for the next few miles. As the 25 mile marker approached the finish boost cut in and I managed to sustain a reasonable pace all the way through to the finish line, crossing in a chip time of 4:17 in front of a Gradstand audience. Obviously, the atmosphere of such a finish is always going to get you over the line and I watched folks in clearly considerable pain conquering the last 285 yards as I filtered through the medals and goody bags queue.

Overall, it was much harder than I expected but defnitely one I would do again. Edinburgh is a fantastic friendly city and only spending a short weekend there does not do it justice.

As always, I’ve uploaded the Garmin data from the race which you can view by clicking here.

One week to Edinburgh

Just completed a 10 miler in the sunshine this afternoon. My knee is still a bit stiff but it’s not slowing me down any more so I’m just hoping it will keep improving as I go. I also just passed the 500 mile mark since I started recording my progress back in November so a bit of a milestone as that’s when I effectively started this website too. I shudder to think how many miles I’ve racked up since I started running seriously!! Looking at the months ahead I think I should definitely crack 1000 miles by the time I’ve done Luton in December, which was another little personal goal of mine

Anyway, just a few medium-easy runs this week in the lead-up to Edinburgh on Sunday. I’m not going to set a target time as I don’t know what I’ll be like by the time I get to mile 20 having not done any serious long runs since Stratford but we’ll just see how it goes. I’m hoping that the significant downhill element of this race will give me a little boost to make up for it though.

On the fundraising front I’ve had a little flurry of donations recently which has boosted the totals up considerably. I’m up to £1458 plus another £378 in gift aid across the four charities so that’s about £2964 left to go if I’m going to hit my £1200 target for each one. Many many thanks to all who have donated so far and please keep spreading the word.

Back in the game!

First run last night since I had my knee trouble and so far all is well. Just went for a gentle 4 miler to see how things have been healing and apart from a bit of mild discomfort at the start I was able to get round without any of the problems I was having before. My knee actually felt better afterwards!

My visit to the physio in the morning was quite enlightening. Basically I had no biomechanical problems that he could diagnose – everything seems to be aligned quite well thankfully. However he did suggest some VMO and glute strengthening excercises to ensure that nothing goes awry in future. As far as the pain was concerned, that was pretty cut & dried as his tests revealed that the back of the patella was roughening up and that was aggrivating the tendons so not a lot we can do about that other than allowing the cartilage to regenerate and zapping it with ultrasound to help it along. The eye opener (and probably a contributor) was the tightness in my calves. Seems like I’ve only been stretching the main calf muscle and not the secondary as I was hopeless at the mobility test for that and it explaines the achillies tightness I get when I wake up! So, lots of new stretches on that one…

Anyway, just need to start building the distance back up over the next couple of weeks – I think speework and hills might have to be neglected for a bit as I try to regain my endurance ready for Edinburgh at the end of the month. Other than that I’m just glad to be back out on the roads again!

Nothing Serious

Well according to the doc I’ve not done anything serious or permanent to my knee – probably just a strained tendon but I’m booked in with a specialist sports physio on Monday to get a more detailed diagnosis and some help. In the meantime it’s off to the gym for a session on the cross-trainer (unless it hurts) and a few weights just for some exercise. I’ll probably do the pool this week as well as I’m getting really irritable not being able to go out for a long run!

I’m still determined to participate in Edinburgh in one form or another but I will take the physio’s advice for sure. Like I said before – I’ll walk it if I have to!!

Spoke too soon

My weekend long run was got drastically short – it seems my knee is still not right. I got about a mile or so down the road and the pain cut in again so I thought it best to stop. Going to see the doc tomorrow to see what can be done as time is running out to get ready for the next race. I will definitely be doing Edinburgh this month – even if I have to walk all 26 miles but I’m hoping to be able to do better than that. If I can run it then I doubt I will be breaking any PBs, there’s a long way to go before Luton and so I may have to concede defeat on a sub 4:00 this time around for the sake of getting all 12 done.

Will update when I know more.

Getting back to normal

Well it’s almost a week since Stratford and my legs are fully recovered from the ordeal. I went for a short run on Thursday to loosen them off and still have a bit of a twinge in my right knee so I think a visit to the physio is unavoidable now. However, knee supports have worked wonders this week and I am planning a gentle long run over the Bank Holiday weekend but I think any thoughts of racing in the Watford 10K on Monday are out of the window as I know I won’t be able to take it easy once the race fever takes hold!!

One thing I am going to do in the run up to Edinburgh though is try to shed about half a stone in weight – whilst I’ve not been gaining much in the way of fat, my muscle density is vastly increased and the joints don’t care whether it’s muscle or fat – weight is weight! So, time to drop some of the treats I’ve been enjoying as a result of my high-calorie burn to try and shift those remaining pounds. Oh well – it was fun for a while.

Rotary Shakespeare Marathon

Well, Sunday saw marathon number four out of the way so that makes me a third of the way through now. This was without doubt the best organised race so far in my opinion. The management at the starting line, the broadcast of information, facilities and race marshalling were all first-rate. There were around 3,500 runners on the day with approximately 1,300 participating in the full marathon (the rest doing the half) so a feat of organisation in anyone’s book!

However, this was by far the hardest course I have run to date and as a result I only managed a time of 4:07 which is a bit gutting as I was hoping to maintain a run of sub-4:00 times. The first mile or so consisted of a lap of Stratford town centre which was naturally closed to traffic for the start. This provided a great confidence boost as you soaked up the cheering of the quite substantial crowds before heading out onto the local roads. This was a two lap circuit for the marathon with the second lap deviating somewhat from the first. For the road-based element of the course the going was pretty much as you would expect. There were one or two shallow gradients and only one real “hill” for which you were rewarded with a 14% downhill straight after a two-stage climb. However, the final three miles of the first lap and the last six miles of the second lap were along the “Greenway”, a disused railway bed now used as a cycle track. The surface is hard-packed gravel/grit and it is just one long straight line with a very slight incline as you head back towards Stratford. There was also little or no shade for the majority of the Greenway section so when the sun decided to reappear at mile 20 I knew it wasn’t going to be pleasant! For the final six miles I dropped into a run-walk-run cycle that I was unable to get out of until after mile 24 and that burned up all the time I had accrued “in the bank”. I knew I wasn’t going to break 4 hours at around 23 miles and as the twinge I’d started with in my right knee was now really starting to hurt I decided to ease up and save whatever I had left for the last mile.

As with any marathon the finish line was a welcome sight and a managed to squeeze out a sprint for the last 100 yards (yeah I know – crowd pleaser)! The announcer was making every effort to get everyone’s name read out as they crossed the line and like many of the larger races now they had employed chip timing for an accurate result.

All the finish line facilities were more than equipped to cope with the numbers and the weather remained bright and sunny for everyone sprawled out on the grass wondering what possessed them to sign up for such torture! As I’d arrived so early I’d managed to park virtually opposite the finishing area and thanks to a secure bag store run by the local Sea Cadets I didn’t have to run with my car keys jangling in my back pocket this time either. So, whilst I cannot fault the Stratford Rotary Club for such a well-organised event I doubt very much I will be signing up for next year as it’s such an unforgiving route. Unfortunately for me now I’m nursing two very sore knees – most likely tendonitis – so I’m strapped up with supports and hoping Voltarol will ease the inflammation so that I can get back out on the roads to be ready for Edinburgh next month.

As always, thank you for your continued support.

Next Marathon Looms…

Final training days this week before I tackle the Stratford Marathon this Sunday. Feels like a really long time since the last one because it was at the beginning of March and this one is at the end of April. My only concern is whether I’ve managed to maintain the required level of fitness for another 26 miles but I’ll find out for sure on Sunday! After the next race I’m going to be into a regular monthly cycle so should be easier to manage in terms of a routine.

So, it’s a short easy run tonight, speedwork again on Thursday and a final loosener on Friday followed by a couple of early nights and plenty of hydration (no alcohol!) as I think it’ll be quite warm that day.

Thanks for reading and I’ll be back with an update on Sunday after the race.

Speedwork Improving

Had a very good speedwork session tonight. Planned for 7 miles including 3x1600m at 7:40 and 800m jogs between but managed 7:00, 7:11 and 7:21 on the splits so I was quite pleased with that.

I’m not competitive – much

Supposed to do 2 miles easy last night after the weekend long run. Started out ok – maintaining a steady pace and then I found myself following someone and despite all my intentions to go slow and steady I suddenly broke into a full-on run and then all I could think of was putting as much distance between me and them as possible… Ended up doing about 3/4 mile more than planned and way over pace!! But it was fun