Week 2 Marathon training, just the long one left

Week 2 of marathon training has been going well, had a little niggle on my left quad but moving a session to the grass seemed to help, need to remember that I am doing lots of miles for me so I should try and get a few more in on the grass. 

Firstly I was contact by the BBC and there is a chance that I may be doing a follow up interview and hopefully getting some publicity for this challenge and helping to raise awareness for Ledderhose disease, fingers crossed this comes to something and I will be contacting some more media outlets to see if we can't really kick start this. 

Monday: (4.5 miles and 7 miles)

Lunch-time run was ok, slow out and back in my lunch break and then the usual plodders session in the evening. I could really feel the 24 miles I had done over the weekend but I did it.

Tuesday rest day

Wednesday: 5.1 and 5.0 miles 

Slightly different sessions to normal as I had the afternoon of work, both sessions were ok and the second session was done either side of the Plodders AGM where I was made assistant coach. I don't have any official coaching qualifications for running but I am a badminton coach, have a science degree and have read a lot about running. Plus my plans seem to have done a great job for my wife and I 

Thursday: 7 miles

This session was the one done on the grass, it made may leg feel much better and was just done round the park next to work. It was repetitive but this is good mental training for running anyway. Had an offer from some people I work with to run with them some lunchtimes, I might be too slow for them given my marathon training as otherwise we run a similar pace. 

Friday rest day - Originally I was going to run on Fridays and I might end up doing that now I am back running on grass, still can't believe I forgot that. I have found the extra recovery really useful. Will see how things go as the Friday run was only 3 miles easy recovery run. 

Saturday: 10 miles

This was 4 miles to parkrun, 3.1 miles at parkrun and then 2.9 miles home. The parkrun was with the buggy and I did 20:30, I wasn't pushing flat out and this showed with the massive sprint finish I did that saw hold off 4 people not running with a buggy. 

Sunday to come - I have a 16 miles long run, juggling this with Katie running 12 miles will be fun but at least Katie has someone joining her for her 6 miles (whilst I cook breakfast) and then we run 6 miles together and then the tough 10 miles by myself. 

Still I am on for another 50 + mile week, have remembered that running on grass is a clever thing to do when I can (though not on long runs as I am training to run a road marathon) and running with others is great fun and should be done. 

The good news is that the above mileage is more than I need for the 2191 but of course I have races, the 5k goal and not idea whether I can maintain it!!

First week of marathon training complete

I will leave Katie to post her own more detailed updates if she wants to, however I can say that today we both successfully finished our first week of marathon training. It came with its ups and downs but overall was a great week. 

After Wednesdays run I did a 7 miles run on Thursday and then 10 miles on Saturday (including parkrun) and 14 miles today. In total this week I ran around 26 miles with the buggy and 26 miles without the buggy, Amelia was mostly good but happy that we have planned to do most of our long runs with Mia only having to come out for 6 miles. 

parkrun was a bit annoying this week, I was on for around 20 minutes with the buggy, hopefully my first sub 20 as it was our first outing back on the winter course. In all honesty I think it was slightly too warm for me to get a sub 20 but it would have been close had I not got a puncture. I think I must have picked up the puncture by or at halfway because by the time I got back to a turn the buggy just didn't turn due to the puncture. All things considered 20:38 given the puncture is a very good run and I am sure I should be getting under 20 minutes with the buggy soon, or at least a buggy PB. 

All I will say about Katie is that she smashed it out of the park and ran a cracking new PB. 

Today was the 14 mile long run, which should not have been too hard and it wasn't despite the 10 miles yesterday and doing the first 11 with the buggy I also had company for the majority of the run, this both meant the time went faster but also that I was running slower. 

So in total 52 miles for the week and although my plan may not have been strictly adhered to my plan is just that a plan, things don't go to plan life and family get in the way. Really not sure what I am doing this Wednesday as I normally do 6 miles in my lunch break but I am coming home for a show that Mia is doing, then Katie has an interview (fingers crossed) and then we have our running AGM and then we can go for a run but I would rather not go a 10 miles mid-week run my myself. Katie works Tuesday nights so I can't go out early so bit worried that I might drop some miles there but if I do I do that is all part of running, getting a good balance. 

Week 1 Marathon Training - so far...

So marathon training kicked in this week.

Monday - Double day (3 miles and 7.5 miles) 

The first run was without my watch as I left it at home, I looked at a clock before and after and ran much quicker than I should have. 

The second run was tough and I felt my ITB a bit, this was with the club and was at an easy pace. 

Tuesday: Rest day

Wednesday: - Double day (6 miles and 4 miles) 

First run was very gentle along the sea front, let people overtake me that were clearly much slower that me, marathon training is about doing the runs and not running fast, certainly worked well for me up until now. 

The second run was a gentle run with my wife and daughter, Amelia fell asleep but was a nice catch up with my wife, the runs are as much about socialising with each other and others as they are anything else (other than running). 

Not as thrilling as I was hoping for but it is a start and I am tired! Amelia has not been sleeping great. Sleep and recovery are so important to running, there is a great podcast called Marathon Talk and I think it was the interview with Kirk Fernley (sp??) that was on the importance of sleep. Recover is after all what makes us faster and not enough of it and we break.

2191 Challenge

It is not long now until I embark on my next challenge to raise awareness for Ledderhose and hopefully at the same time some money for the British Dupuytren's Society. Please do follow the 2191 blog and share the campaign with family and friends. Please also like the facebook page for the 2191 challenge. 

If you have any contracts that you think might be worthwhile getting in touch with as they might be able to get some information out there that helps us raise awareness then please do get in touch. 

Thank you everyone for your support and hopefully I will be posting some good updates. This week is the first week of marathon training so going to be interesting fitting everything in around work and family etc etc. 

The time is almost here

This week we are at the end of a 2 week period of more relaxed running after the Poppy Half Marathon. The Poppy Half went great for both of us and was a great way to set us up ready for next year. It also popped up that it was 2 years since I was on BBC news to promote awareness of the conditions. 

https://www.facebook.com/BBCSouthEastToday/videos/10152868506228648/

Feel free to watch the video and comment so that BBC know that this is still a big deal. I will certainly be getting in contact with them again to try and get another appearance on the news, would be great to have a follow up and go into details of the challenge we are doing next year. 

The challenge starts in just over a month, we have started to arrange people to look after our daughter for some of our longer runs so we aren't out all day and we are really starting to mentally prepare ourselves for the challenge. As part of this we went to a running shop to see how we were holding up. It turns out that my running style has changed a lot since I was first analysed for running shoes, apparently I now have a fantastic running style. I land on my mid-foot and I do not over-pronate any more. Hopefully these can help keep me injury free. 

We will try and keep updating the blog a lot more, hopefully next year it will almost be a diary and generate some more interest in the awareness and fund-raising campaign we are working on. As for now, next week marathon training begins, should be the perfect time to start trying to keep the blog up to date so hopefully there will be more updates coming quick and often. 

Getting back into the swing of things

In preparation for next year I was taking a look at the following page on the blog;

Track our progress

Looks scary when I am only on 1100 miles for the year, only two third's of the way through the year though so hopefully in the next few months with my ankle on the mend I can get another good 500-600 miles in and start the push for next year. 

I have made a general plan for next year just to make sure I can get all the miles in, as part of marathon training I am currently due to start the new year and therefore the challenge with a 20 mile run, which as it is New Year's day should also include parkrun as the first "race" of the year. 

It will be interesting to see how well things go and what injuries come up, a flawless year would be incredible but I do have some wiggle room and some easy short miles I can drop in to top up if I have to but whatever happens it is going to be hard-work, especially during the summer and especially learning not to race all the race otherwise I will break quickly. 

Anyway now for something very important to a runner, sleep, well as long as my daughter lets me as she seems slightly under the weather this evening and has (very unusually for her) cried out a few times. 

Running vests for the challenge

They are starting to look good, can't wait to go running in them.