Bloggers no more - retiring some blogs from my blog roll :-(

Photo Stuart Miles. FreeDigitalPhotos.net
Stock photo - Image ID: 100258862

Looking at my blog I realised that there are links to some blogs that look quite dated and haven't been updated in a long while. I go long periods between posts but this handful look to have properly come to natural ends.

So these are blogs I used to read but that have sadly stopped posting for over 2 years :

2 Slow 4 Boston - used to be an active and creative blog that I found a little late in its run. Jon even went to the trouble of producing a database for run bloggers that aimed to connect the community in the USA (and elsewhere). The blog though no longer updated after 3 years remains a fun read, with plenty of pitcures, charts, and chat.

La corredora - Clara, a self confessed lazy ultrarunner was never lazy about the detail in her posts. Engaging reads and a flavour of the longer run life, stopped posting 2 years ago (having blogged for 5 years).

beyond DESTINATION 26.2 - a fun and often high energy blog that came to a halt for incredibly sad and thus entirely understandable reasons. I do hope that Linz's world is now more settled and that her family are all well - her last post was titled "Life..."  Have a look back through at some fun stuff, including some interesting smoothie recipes.

Fit Goddess - adept at race reports with pictures (something I have failed at many times in the past), and with a lovely sense of fun I found this blog a bit late too. Always an uncluttered and easy read, a shame Theia didn't keep things going.

Morning Runner - looking at the four blogs above, this follows a similar pattern - started in 2008, enjoyed a posting boom, and then sadly petered out (final post). This blog followed Jen, a former college athlete, in her running adventures and the challenges / fun of balancing life - work - training - races. Like any of the previous four it is well worth poking around the blog archive for some gems of wisdom (and recipes - not that thats all I look out for).

I am off to look for new running / run fitness blogs to read and include... I am hoping the trend of dead blogs on my blog roll isn't indicative of a complete move away from long form blogging to the 'microblog' worlds of Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, et al.??

If "FollowFriday / #FF" was still a thing, and these blogs were active, I would have had these as mine today.

Ten year anniversary - on the move, or not?

Looking back at my blog it would be very easy to be confused as it pro-ports to be about movement and being on the move and so progress, whilst it is clear I haven't really made so very much. I am not, for example, now running sub-4hr marathons, or buzzing a near London marathon good for age PB.  There are cataloged here a number of failed rounds of trying to get 'fit' and pretty much failing at every attempt.

Reflecting on this apparent lack of progress there would appear to be a number of psychological conclusions that could be drawn - for example, sharing a goal taking the place of achieving it, as mentally I have perhaps felt rewarded simply for the process of typing a few posts and putting them 'out there'. Whatever truly is behind it is of course more tricky to define, as most often halts to progress stem from life, or work, or luck, or some such. What is true to say looking at this series of boom and bust endeavours is that the cycles are too short and too sharp, moreover they have settled into swinging around a constant average. Not an average happily that is moving in the wrong direction of unhealthy weight gain (or any other negative indicator), but it certainly isn't moving in the 'right' direction either.

It is fair enough that at the moment most of my times over most distances are still what they were 10 years ago in the face of an ageing chassis (in of itself I suppose a decent outcome of sorts). There is that feeling in me that somewhere the opportunity to run better times was wasted by bad habits and / or poor goal choice.

Am I lamenting and wallowing in self-pity? Well absolutely "yes", but in that lament some truths have become very very clear. The chief amongst these laments being the lack of consistency - the constant cycle swings of flirting with improvement and flirting with my old grossly overweight self. It is perhaps consistency that most people struggle with, we would surely all love to make progress in smooth linear progressions towards fitness goals.

P.S. 12 days of chrsitmas - summary

Whilst writing my last post I found this unpublished...

...this was the streak I had put together before 2016 really got going and put me in a dark place personally and also with my fitness.

2016 has not been kind so far...

2016 has not been kind so far, I completed my 12 days challenge around New Year and then tried to get going on half-marathon training. I found initially that my motivation was lacking and then in early February I did something to my back - I don't know exactly what. In the end I struggled on for a couple of weeks and then went to the doctor for an opinion, he ruled out anything other than a back problem and gave me some pain relief and advice to go away with (and the advice to return if there was no change). The result was virtually 8 weeks of nothing, no running, feeling sorry for myself, and getting heavy (not in a good way).

Along the way I had to miss my first go at the Admiral City of Newport half-marathon (Sunday 6th March) which didn't help my mood much. Eventually enough was enough and I just had to get out there and do something as I was desperate to run the Cardiff World Half Marathon Championships mass event this weekend just gone. All I had the opportunity to do was a fitness test to see whether it was even feasible to run, and then give it a go being as cautious as I could talk myself into being.

I was so desperate to run the WHMC event because of the untimely loss of two colleagues since the middle of December. Neither of them were close enough to be friends and I hadn't spoken to one for a couple of years, but the combined effect that they had on my career and the combined effect of their sudden demises left me wanting to do something.... run... run remembering them. I ran for charity in their memory but the money raising wasn't really the driver it was a more raw emotional thing (that I still haven't properly figured out).

After the event, my slowest ever, I feel a bit of the rawness has gone and more happily personally my body hasn't reacted as badly to running on no training as I'd feared. Indeed there have only been a few niggles in my back and 'just' the usual leg soreness. I might have gotten away with my stupid bullish emotional decision to run the thing.

I will try and get back on here some more as I do have other goals to chase this year, I just can't promise when. Hope your running has gone well.

The ninth day of Christmas - 12 days mini-challenge

The mini-challenge that I set myself of running on each of the 12 days of Christmas is going pretty well... observe, for I have charted it in Excel...

...yes, the total distances will not be making the likes of Mo Farah or Wilson Kipsang weep but the challenge was not distance (or speed for that matter) it is all about a consistency of getting my kit together and getting out of the door in the Winter.

12 days of Christmas is working a treat I am enjoying getting out and enjoying be forced to find different things - the same route everyday would be boring, the same shoes everyday would not be possible thanks to the rain, the same kit everyday would have been just plain stinky (!). That the distances haven't been huge have of course helped, I am simply not fit enough to have knocked out a string of 10 km plus days without injury risk. Although that said I am feeling the fitter for getting my trainers on everyday.

My New Year of running is going well and I hope will launch 2016 off of the right foot. I hope your New Year is going excellently too.

PS. today was a short one as it is junior parkrun day, so I ran with the lad and enjoyed jumping in lots of muddy puddles for 2 km.

On the fourth day of christmas - my 12 days of running

On the fourth day of Christmas I completed my fourth run in 4 days, and having gotten this far I thought I would share why. Just before Christmas I cooked up this plan to re-ignite my running after the post marathon challenge lull (which was utterly intentional, after two marathons in 4 weeks my body wanted the rest - or was it my brain? - either way I took a running sabbatical). The plan I came up with was a simple one, after Christmas day excesses were over I would run the twelve days of Christmas running once a day for the 12 days through to January 6th.

You can read about the actual twelve days at Wikipedia - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twelve_Days_of_Christmas

So I am now four days in and it hasn't been so bad. There has yet to be a sticky day or difficult run and I have run over 5km each time. At the moment I certainly feel my homemade scheme might just get the start of my 2016 running year off with a bit of a boost.

BMW Berlin marathon 2015 - my race review - part 2 the race

Finally belatedly getting round to the second part of my Berlin marathon race review....

Sleeping the night before a race is always an interesting challenge, and all I could manage in Berlin was a fitful broken night of trying to get comfortable while switching off my brain. We had stayed up to watch the Wales vs. England pool match in the IRB rugby world cup, which while being a great distraction was not exactly restful. I was on social media most of the time too, soaking up those sleep impeding wavelengths of light.

By the morning I was absolutely ready to get on with things wanting to turn my back on the lost sleep   and meet the day. Breakfast was great, the food in the hotel was excellent, as is my way I indulged in coffee for race day. Still caffeine is limited to green tea before midday most days, so yes I was cheating a bit 'using' the caffeine to focus my mind and quash some of the effort feedback during the run. I'm not entirely sure it isn't a placebo thing, and really more of a pre-race habit like getting a hair cut, washing favourite kit, eating the same food, and so on.

We met up with my school buddy and headed into the middle of the city, to the start area. Underground and over ground trains ran like clockwork, and we were soon looking at the thronging masses of the Berlin marathon field. After taking the obligatory photos I left Mrs.H. to her day of stalking me on the Berlin marathon tracker app and coffee shop tourism. Going into the start area I was on my own and feeling the buzz of the event grow and grow. There were banging house tracks and aerobics demos to warm us up, and booming PA system announcements to keep us focused. The start pen was a fun friendly place, and I set about my pre-race kit check loops - a mild form of running OCD I think.

Fresh as daisies before the start - fabulous to catch up with an old school friend :-D

First 10k
The main (elite) field left us behind with a fanfare, and one by one the sections of the field pulled up to the start line. Crossing the line was emotional for me, being back again, being fit enough to run, and being so charged with positive human spirit. The first 10k was to be all about clock watching and trying not to overdo my pace, despite not really knowing what my pace should be. I found a rhythm well and went generally with the flow. There were pacers just ahead with 4:30 balloons and I calculated I would try to catch them by the end of the first 10k and ease away from them in the second.

Second 10k
Atmosphere! I love a run with a happy atmosphere!... apologies for butchering Russ Abbott song lyrics, but the Berlin course really does have some great support, music, and vantage points. I was enjoying myself by the time the distance began to get 'real'. I was looking for Mrs.H. at all the points she had said she might see me, was happy with my gel strategy, had gotten used to water in plastic cups again, and was pleased that I had caught and eased around the noisy pace group.

At this stage I was a little unsure of my pace, but felt it was not too excessive. The lack of a full training base meant I didn't have enough points of reference. It was becoming an adventure in what would be possible.

Third 10k
The steadiness of pace was pleasing but it was getting harder and harder to maintain. I found my breathing was a bit hard for that point in the race I knew from experience and by now I was busy convincing myself that it was okay, that all would be fine. Passing halfway was a boon and all signs seemed to be I could squeak a 4:25 out of the race.

During this phase I was double stalked though - my wife found me and we had a good wave at each other - my other stalker turned out to be the pace group. It was increasingly obvious that they were back, the distance between us was dwindling and the signs pointed to me slowing.

Fourth 10k
All I can really sum it up was is 'ouch!'... the wheels as they say "fell off". First the pace group caught and slid past me, and then I became increasingly aware that the slowdown was biting. To be fair to myself I held out until 34 km before everything really got hard. On reflection going through halfway in 2:10 was simply too hot. I fought myself and had to pull all motivation out of myself between 35 km and 40 km, pushing and pushing as best I could.

Final 2 km
My fade was only halted by finish line fever, and the elation of finishing a second Berlin after what was a flawed training / preparation period before. Heading towards the Brandenburg gate I got so giddy I was waving my bandana around above my head like a flag. After patting the gate on my way underneath the madness returned and I started waving my arm about again. Seeing the finish line I worked out I might get in under 4:45 and managed a final surge to do it.

Apparently I'm in there somewhere over the far side

My race by the number thanks to the Berlin marathon race tracker app

The post race analysis
In the end even with the horrible and painful fade I was chuffed to bits to have completed, to have enjoyed it, and to have had so much support and good will from family and friends. The time was not earth shattering but I was very pleased. The walk back to the hotel was interesting as my legs were in pieces, so much so I had to start the staircase shuffle straight away (not the next day like usual). Shower facilities were kindly extended to runners by our hotel and happily (though awkwardly) I had time to take up on it. The end of the trip was a pair of flights home which went smoothly - if a little painfully.

Super pleased and proud of my race being :-D

Waiting on a watch and a few satellites

Waiting for my watch to find the satellites again, its been a recurring theme of my runs over the last little while! Once it has successfully finished its navel gazing then I'll be off for my second run in two days - hardly a running streak but a step in the right direction after weeks of little to no running at all. I will be also taking a first run in a pair of Newton running shoes I bought back in the summer at of all places a swimming lake. Trying out new shoes usually only ends one way but I remain desperate to get out of my super heavy and clumpy Beast shoes... I am wondering just how much of a post I'm going to get written before the satellites, stars, planets, cloud formations, passing passenger jets, and international space station align and I get GPS tracking lock so I can go run.

My wife just asked me why I don't go for a run without it and that would make for a long answer-although perhaps I might have time to knock out a short essay on why I personally prefer to run with GPS! Either that or build an entire spring training schedule from scratch!

While I've mentioned it 'Spring' training will be all about half marathoning and perhaps a crack at a PB - how many other runners are plotting the same type of master plan around now I wonder? How many also are waiting for their watches? Could be a strong correlation perhaps?

Upped the ante now.... two watches duelling to be the one that comes with me- my wife has offered hers up... and in a flash it has lock and I'm off now with her watch.... wonder if her model will be discounted in the ne year sales? :-S

Footnote - the run went very well (even with an unfamiliar watch), the new shoes felt great though how my legs react in the next few days will be the real test of them. As for my watch it is definitely on borrowed time (pun intended!!).

Cardiff10k 2015 - 30th Anniversary edition - my race review

Another back log post today, this is a race report from the start of September that I didn't get around to completing and posting. I am still catching up on my blogging and I am not teaser trailing my recent marathon reports, really I am not...

Cardiff 10K 2015 

September 3rd 2015

The out of tens:
Course: 9/10 - super flat course
Marshalling: 9/10 - looked to be a really happy bunch as usual, though happily I had no need to make use of any directly.
Facilities: 7/10 - penned in by the building of the city centre the port-a-loo provision is always a small issue. The athletes village was a busy place that was jumping with a live band.
Organisation: 9/10 - Cardiff 10k do run a good simple no fuss event. As last year a single point deducted for the disposable timing chips.
Fellow runners: 10/10 - a happy and jolly bunch bubbling around the course.
Crowd: 8/10 - fabulous support in the start / finish area, crowds were patchy in the middle of the race.
My performance: 9/10 - I had a plan and I stuck to it - almost - see below.
My time: 58:10

From the Cardiff10k flickr feed - (Photo by Matthew Horwood) https://www.flickr.com/photos/136044049@N08/21251962941/in/photostream/

My Race
For me this was not so much a race as it was all about preparation, preparation for the two marathons to come. So what this meant was steady running, containing my enthusiasm and perhaps feeling about what marathon pace will be. I intended to set off at around 6 minutes per kilometre and then perhaps let my pace sneak upwards in the last couple of kilometres. On race day I planned to walk to the start and so be nice and loose before doing my training plan prescription long run after the race. In my enthusiasm (and fear of being late for the start) I pretty much ran all the way to the race adding a bit more distance. Arriving in the start village I made a rush for the port-a-loo and joined a huge queue of other nervous runners. Watching my clock I knew it was going to be tight, but as I was planning to set out slow I realised I didn't much care if I missed the start remembering that I was wearing a timing chip.

By the time I got finished in the loo the starter's horn had gone off and I joined the back of the pack to get going. The start area was buzzing with positive energy and I enjoyed the obligatory shuffle to the start line. My main goal at that point being to just go enjoy it. The weather claimed a top temp of 18 degrees Celsius but it felt much warmer as there was not a cloud in the sky. I was so chuffed with the pace that I found and that it was somewhere near what I thought might be that elusive marathon pace. Through to halfway I was having a ball.

The second half of the race I let the brakes off as soon as I hit the 5k marker I just couldn't hold back for the last 2k. That said I didn't go crazy I slowly ramped up the speed so that my watch was consistently reporting a dropping average pace. Into the last 1k I pushed along a bit and then in the height of a sense of fun 'raced' some random guy across the finish line in a 50m dash. I smiled and laughed at myself then remembered I had the long run to do, oops!

I met with my family took a drink and then set off for my long run with what I discovered were leaden legs. The heat of the day and the sprint finish of the race meant that the long run was hard, but it was the kind of day where I didn't mind too much considering it all good 26.2 mile preparation. My route for that long run was winding and rambling, and even doubled back along part of the 10k race course. The only plan I had for the route in the end was to revisit the water station and see if they had any left overs... and they did! They were tidying up and had part of a pallet of bottles left, so I helped myself and again considered it great marathon training as I would have to negotiate multiple water pickups through the race.

All in all I had a really great day, the organisation is fabulously friendly (the route green, fast and flat), and it was easy to see how they have successfully made it through to their 30th edition. Long may the race continue.

Oops, the one I didn't post - "Hills? What hills? There are hills?"

Oh dear, I didn't click 'post' on this in the build up to the marathon I did on Sunday. So to get your appetite going for my race report in a day or two here you go.... it was written around the 12th of October...

So far in the build up to the second marathon of my two marathons in a month challenge (for DiabetesUK) has gone really well, but I see a potential bump in the road ahead - hills!! I didn't notice the size of the hills, there are two that are four times larger than anything I regularly run which is something of a training oversight to say the least. In fact I saw the hilly profile but didn't look at the y-axis on the graph and consider what the numbers truly meant for running, falsely assuming they were gentle rolling slopes. So with under two weeks to go until the Bristol-to-Bath run that is not a great deal I can do about it, it is a little late to start cranking out hill repeats or hilly long runs.

Happily last night I ran 25.25 km with the biggest and steepest hill I could think of in the middle, and it wasn't too bad but I clearly noticed I have no clue how to run down hill (running uphill was almost more comfortable). I can't run pan flat Berlin type marathons all the time so it is something that I have to address living in the UK and do more of in future training blocks. Quite what I do about my pacing for the Bristol-to-Bath marathon I am not entirely sure, indeed my current best guess is to go out super conservatively and save energy for the hills (all of which are deep into the second half of the race).

How I made better use of a calorie tracker app

The run up to my marathons this autumn has had many ups and downs, and I thought I would share one of my better 'discoveries'. I have been using a calorie tracker app MyFitnessPal for a long time now (I first blogged about it in 2011 - "Calorie counting no really") - it is as far as I know one of the most popular. Every now and then I find more people I know are using it.

You might be wondering... "So what? People use it to keep their calorie intake in check?" Yes, of course this is its primary function, and one that I have made much use of in the last few years. I have set it up to loss weight slower or faster (once even to maintain weight) and I discovered that if I set it to lose relatively steeply that over the course of several weeks I got increasingly tired, with feelings of zero energy. Granted this could have been any number of things, but what I discovered lately is the most likely cause - hidden activity!

What is it that I am labelling hidden activity? Well the tracker does a great job of logging your training, your food intake, your body metrics, and your baseline activity levels. It is in the last one that I found I had issues. The baseline activity asks for your job type / daily activity levels. Upon discovering that my smartphone was tracking my steps (yup, some phones have pedometers in them that you would struggle greatly to switch off apparently - some suggested you can't turn them off!), reasoning if it was there I might as use it I linked this pedometer to the myfitnesspal app.

Bingo! I now have a day to day gauge of how active I have been and thus a better feel of my calorie 'needs' - some days I have had to pack a bit of extra food down so that I am not in crazy sized deficits. What was happening before the tracker was that when I started a training plan I would also start walking to work when I could, taking the stairs, walking the dog a bit further each day, etc. and making no allowance for it over and above the baseline option I had ticked in the app. So when I was hitting my targets I was more often than not in big deficits leading to the tiredness, grumpiness and increasing energy deficit.

The moral of this story is thus - if you track calories for restriction make 110% sure you have a good handle on just how much activity (including and on top of training) you really are doing.

Over 9 weeks before the marathon I dropped 10 lbs, and unlike in the past have not seen any of the niggles, grumps, and fatigue in the process by linking in my pedometer. Yup I dislike technology's ever increasingly pervasive intrusion into day-to-day lives, but if you are going to utilise things like lifestyle apps make sure you view them 'in the round' and use them intelligently (if only so that way they work so much better at the job you have tasked them with).

BMW Berlin marathon 2015 - my race review - part 1 the travel log

This is part one of a couple of blog posts about my experiences at the Berlin marathon last weekend. Part 1 is something of a travel journal, part 2 will be all about how the race panned out for me...

Berlin marathon 2015 

The fine city of Berlin  - September 27th 2015 - website

My overall impressions from the day:

Course: 10/10 - flat, quick, great start area.
Marshalling: 10/10 - supremely friendly and always helpful.
Facilities: 8/10 - the race the facilities are simply really good.
Organisation: 10/10 - you couldn't fault the event organisation, or the energy they that generate around the event.
Fellow runners: 10/10 - as a World Marathon Major this has everything you would expect including the vibrant knowledgeable field of runners.
Crowd: 10/10 - vocal, enthusiastic, encouraging and all around the course.
My performance: 9/10 - so so pleased to have completed gave the struggles that impeded my preparation this year.
My time: 4:44.24

Travel
We opted for an early departure on the Friday before the race from Cardiff International airport (the oddly small trying to be big airport) on KLM to Amsterdam. We got up before dawn and arrived in the departure lounge in time for a very early breakfast, well what looked like breakfast - mostly on offer were pale imitations of pastries and strong chain store coffee. The flight itself was fine except for the an odd offering of an in-flight cheese sandwich - a step up from nuts? Sure! But breakfast?

So, so early - even the sun hadn't woken up

Amsterdam airport was alive and rammed with busy busy people rushing between gates with smartly suited aircrew sliding in between the masses. Once we got across to our boarding gate we found the flight packed with marathoners in expensive shoes, race finisher t-shirts from around the world, carrying triathlon bags, et al. Which made for a nice ambience, and added to my already growing excitement about the event long long before the expo!

It was during this second flight that I discovered I had a blown headphone (one of those expensive Apple ones!), also I discovered that the back of the plane is very very noisy, that 'chips' (nachos) are little better than sandwiches, that it is possible to develop a dad crush on stewardesses at my ripe old age, and that there is no such thing as 'knee room'! Oh, but at least the back of the plane gets food first :-)

Through out our travels we went hand luggage only rather than checking a bag, it was brilliant and made the airport experiences that bit less painful (though conversely of course initial bag packing a bit more of a challenge).

Berlin - a great kind of town
Arriving on the Friday afternoon we had time to do a classic sightseeing tour bus ride around the centre. This is not something I have ever felt the need to do in Berlin before as I used to live there, but it was a good use of time and allowed Mrs. H. the opportunity to get a much better feel of the city. She after all is the one who has to kill several hours whilst I try to get around a 42.2 km course marked out with blue lines. To say that I spent some of the tour looking out for the blue course markers was a bit of a understatement. Happily all kinds of spotting were aided by the great clear weather - an omen I hoped for race day.

Views from the tour bus montage

That night we met up with a school friend who I hadn't seen in far far too long, and went for pizza (I have always assumed pizza = pasta = carb loading??). Meeting up with my friend who was also set to run the race was fabulous, it kind of put the whole weekend into another (quite unique) framing as an event.

expo BERLIN VITAL
Saturday morning we all set off to hunt down race packs and race numbers with the promise not to spend a fortune in the many many stalls we were sure to face. On the way we rehearsed the route to the start, took selfies at the Brandenburg Tor, and had a goodly walk across to the Expo at flughafen Templehof. The expo itself was huge, though gratefully the queues were well managed, and it didn't seem to take any time at all to get sorted out with number, security band, bag and all the necessary bits and pieces.

I don't take many pics inside expo halls - but the queues were pretty good

Feeling happy and fresh (and not just a little déjà vu) in this expo essential photo

The rest of the day before was spent trying and failing (because of time) to visit the area of the city I used to live in, catching up some more with my school friend, enjoying the hotel marathon inspired pasta buffet, and staying up a little too late to watch Wales play England in the IRB Rugby World Cup (thank you Eurosport for saving us, we thought we wouldn't see it in Germany). That only left sleep to be had before race day - well I tried but my brain absolutely had other ideas...

Finished my first 2015 marathon I'm really really pleased

A longer review post will follow shortly about the goings on over the weekend in in Berlin and without giving away too much of what happened I finished in 4:44.24. It was not as fast as I'd hoped but in every other respect it was awesome :-D

It should serve now as a good platform for marathon number two of 2015 in 3 weekends time... the inaugural Bristol-to-Bath marathon. If you'd like to get behind my running madness and support a wonderful charity please visit my JustGiving page at - https://www.justgiving.com/Berlin-Bristol-Bath

With the Virgin Money London Marathon ballot results due out next week I have already decided to try and extend my fundraising challenge through to that event if I get a spot (so I'm crossing my fingers even harder this year!).

Tired but happy: signs of training progress and marathon day getting closer

Monday is a rest day in the training plan that I have doing my best to follow, so yesterday was a rest and it felt great. Not great because I had a day off, no it was great because my legs felt happy and like they could do running again the day after my double runs of the Cardiff10k / 2 hour long run (back-to-back). The proof of this apparent training progress will come tonight when I try a cheeky pacy 9 km with my running buddy.

With Berlin drawing closer and closer I really do hope this new found consistency of training pays off. Speaking of which I had my email confirmation details for picking up my race pack this morning... this sh!t is getting real... I am so looking forward to the event now. The excitement is really taking hold!!

I am running two marathons in a month for DiabetesUK - the Berlin marathon and then the Britol-to-Bath marathon - please, if you can support my double marathon madness at my JustGiving charity page.

One of 'those' runs - happy legs!

Last night I experienced one of 'those' runs, one that I always hope will happen when I press 'start' on my watch. It was a good run, a run where I thought "hmm, I can run". The truth of it is that after running 4 times on holiday the journey home and return to work stopped me running again for 5 days. The result of the lay off was a 'happy legs' run - 4 km of near 5 km PB pace followed by a comfortable 6 km at just over target marathon pace, followed by a recovery where my body didn't feel like it had just been smacked about with a cricket bat.

These guys have some very happy 'happy legs'
[image found on flickr posted by slalit]

The term "happy legs" is not my own it owes its origins with my physio Leon. I think he defines it as the phenomenon of setting out for a run after a rest and finding your legs want to go fast. In the settings when he has used the term it usually leads to an athlete over doing the session (for example, over cooking the first half of a marathon after a good taper period). I have in the past fallen into the overdoing it category but happily last night I sort of saw it coming, enjoyed it for what it was, and was sure to split the run into the running free bit and the big step down in pace bit.

As it turned out my feet were not all that happy this morning, but I hope to rest them a little bit now before the 3 hour long run on Sunday (my last big one before Berlin). I know this last long run is mostly about learning to handle the fatigue of the last 10 km of the 42.2 and I am hoping it will go well. The first 10km will be done during the Cardiff 10k race (my sort of marathon mass start practice) and the following couple of hours will be spent working out just what paces to think about for marathon day.

I am running two marathons in a month for DiabetesUK - support my marathon madness at https://www.justgiving.com/Berlin-Bristol-Bath

Holiday running

Just got back from holiday, and I am feeling good because it all went really well and everyone had a good time. I managed to run four times in ten days, and on top of that actually managed to lose bulk rather than gaining bulk from holiday eating (and I still enjoyed all of the usual holiday 'treat' foods).

We holidayed in France, as we do fairly regularly, travelling down through the country to a different destination as we do without fail. This was the second french holiday where I have done a decent amount of running, I blogged about my first attempts back in 2013 - My French adventures with training.

For me it was a high mileage week and actually felt very good. Some of the runs were before breakfast, not through any design and more due to time pressures I 'enjoyed' running in a 'fasted' state (oh, how my body complained). The reason I was trying to maintain a good number of runs was of course because I have the Berlin marathon coming up on my radar. It is now just crept under the month to go and three weeks remain, so I couldn't set aside my runs during my holiday as I have my biggest long run coming this weekend and I would have struggled with that.

Rolling farm land and blue blue skies

Rubbish picture but shows the fierce sunshine

Melting, I'm melting... and about to collapse in a sweaty heap (!)

The scenery was fabulous and the facilities where we were staying made the 'job' of getting the runs done nice and simple (washing machine, great shower,... patio to collapse on and recover for five minutes after each effort). In fact facilities were so good I got to pick and eat fresh grapes from the vine, which tasted sublime. I ran in the mornings where I could to avoid the 34 degrees Celsius peak afternoon temperatures, and managed to find a couple of routes that didn't have over keen farm-yard dogs on duty (always a bit of a risk in rural spots I have discovered).

Mentally running on holiday was very liberating and let my mind escape the 'usual' routes of home where to be fair I probably don't appreciate the scenery quite enough. From here now I can take on the rest of my training and the challenge of two marathons in a month with a bit of fresh gusto...

Some numbers for August - 
Runs - 13 (14 - if you count the calendar month instead of full weeks of the month)
Total Distance - 166.3 km
Weekly distances - 47.4 km, 51 km, 17.3 km, 50.6 km

I am aware that these aren't stellar numbers however there has only been one month in my GPS records where I have run further in a month and that was in the build up to my first Berlin marathon. I could only hope that that is a good sign for this coming Berlin attempt.

Almost forgot the other great number from August from our 10 day holiday... 2 lb lost (!) - while on holiday, while eating great french food, while eating french patisserie for breakfast... simply a great surprise to come home and discover.

Hiccup

Yesterday was one of those hiccup days in the training plan when I didn't run. I was experiencing aches in my ankle - Posterior Tibialis tenderness to be exact - likely from pushing the pace and over striding on Tuesday night.

This is fine, I don't have to complete every run in the plan to be in good shape for race day.... but then I got the munchies! All I can say is I'm not proud, it was a hiccup, I probably needed the blowout on some level, and move over today is back to the training plan / food plan norm.

I hiccup therefore I am :-)

The selfish motivation of a charity runner

So I have opted to run for charity, and though of the face of it it looks totally altruistic it can be viewed as very much a somewhat selfish approach. 

• Do I want the kudos of a recognition from the charity? No. 
• Do I want all my friends and family thinking "wow, what a guy"? NO.
• Am I selfishly seeking some other form of notoriety? NOPE.

Why am I then selfish in choosing a charity to raise as much money as I can for in the run up to my running events (two marathons in a month)? Well for me simply this... to get me around the course! It is no more complex than simply the raw motivation of knowing that people have given money to see me do this thing.

The nature / scope of my challenge is explained on my JustGiving charity page (follow the link)...

Andrew's 4,3,2,1 challenge - two marathons in a month

When the going gets tough (and it very definitely will) then I simply use the warmth of knowing a collection of people have given hard earned cash to a charity in the name of my madness (marathon running is likely considered a form of insanity in many circles). I want nothing more from the process than that simple support, I don't mind that I don't reach an arbitrary target, it is that a charity receives some benefit that is enough for me. Yes, this sounds very slightly conceited, and it possibly is, as like I said it is a selfish motivation but one that I don't think harms anyone.

I am running for....

" Diabetes UK is the leading charity that cares for, connects with and campaigns on behalf of every person affected by or at risk of diabetes.
We provide information, help and peer support, so people with diabetes can manage their condition effectively. We are one of the largest funders of diabetes research in the UK. "

This quote was taken from their website on 18-8-2015. 

Last week - turned out to be a big week

That was a hard week, in fact I covered the third most kilometres in a week (51 km) since I started GPS recording my runs (the only bigger weeks include marathon events!). Four runs in all capped off with a long slow Sunday run (24.9 km) that left my limping. With 6 weeks left until Berlin I had to make sure I upped my time on my feet in line with the training plan, and at this point try to figure out my likely race day target pace through testing out higher paces at the end of the longer runs.

I now know much more about my current state and can project forwards to Berlin where I will need to curb my enthusiasm for sure. It is clear that I am not where I was before I attended Berlin last time, not really a surprise given the broken year of training, but I am happy at least having assessed and set my range over the last 10 days. From here it is about staying consistent and staying injury free. For the first time in a while I am doing lots of extra post run recovery stuff - even putting myself through the 'fun' of icing my legs (!!).

In terms of the challenge I have set myself of two marathons in a month in aid of Diabetes UK - this last week has framed the size of the task all to clearly. It will very likely be a very painful experience, but now at least I am readying myself properly for it mentally as well as physically.

Where I am with my challenge...

Time has literally dashed by over the last few weeks. I have done some training then had a two week break (thanks to work and then a holiday) and then done some more training for this crazy (for me) two marathons in a 4 weeks challenge.

From previous experience I know I will complete the two courses, but it never is really about completing it is about doing it in a time I am happy with. This is where I am falling down because at the start of the year I had a grand 'faster marathon plan' and set about it with great gusto. Of course life happened, things cropped up, and the plan dissipated into nothing much really. I have the realisation now that I have rediscovered my motivation and momentum all too late for these next to events. Following a training plan is necessary for me to get this done and of course stirs my inner geek with all the numbers and outputs. This time the training plan is serving as a nagging reminder of all those sessions I've missed.

I am doing these two runs as a personal challenge obviously, but moreover as a charity event for Diabetes UK. The charity is one that seems to creep closer and closer to me as more people I know suffer with the condition. A former work colleague confessed their recent type 2 diagnosis when I bumped into them a week or so ago and it utterly rocked me. I am at least 15 years their senior, I have known them since they were an undergraduate project student, and I was just struck dumb by the news that they had such news. They are not overweight or fit into any of the easy Western diet trigger categories (that I know of), their case like every case is individual and all I could do was offer words of support and encouragement on their journey of discovering how to manage things going forwards.

So whatever speed to travel at around the course, however imperfect my training, whatever the two days through at me I will be remembering them and my reason for putting my shoes on.

Follow the link to my Diabetes UK JustGiving page...

Note: I had my first 4 sponsors in the first 24hours of letting people know about the JustGiving page, which was just simply fabulous. It is really the charity aspect that is fuelling my running at the moment.