Growing old disgracefully by Growing_old_disgracefully

Well I guess that proves that no matter how fat and unfit you may be, a few months training and self-discipline can get you into some kind of shape! At the end of June/early July last year I was touching 19 stone and hadn't laced a training shoe in anger since 1997 - 9 months or so later and my time of 4.31:50 in yesterday's marathon was only slightly slower than my average time all those years ago. 

Of course being so overweight and unfit has meant i've had to concentrate on endurance more than any kind of speed work so I can now take some time to reduce the weekly mileage and get in some of that speed training and try to get down to 4.15 by October or with a bit of luck 4.00 dead!

I have to say that the marathon itself was a great experience with the crowds making a huge contribution to that, I don't know if it was better organised this year but I was jogging at a fair pace as soon as I went over the start line and can say that apart from one bit of congestion - that was handy because I used it to ditch the iPod which had been getting on my nerves - I had a pretty straightforward run. But it definitely isn't the greatest marathon in the world, that honour still goes to the Comrades in South Africa, sorry London but there you go, second isn't always such a bad place to be.

During the run itself there was a stage at around the 25 km point where I looked ahead of me and saw a bloke running with a sandwich board and I thought to myself 'you're not coming in ahead of me mate', and as that thought went through my head Orinoco the Womble jogged past me, which I thought was quite ironic really!

Anyway, I hope you all achieved your personal targets and raised the funds you wanted to raise; My own target was almost reached but as I always planned to contribute something anyway it's no big deal that I have to do so, but as i've said previously, it's the ballot or bust next year.

Comrades marathon 2009 is looking like it's achievable so will be training hard once the qualifying period opens, which is after June 19th this year so can look around for a marathon to qualify in, the Dublin is looking favourite at the moment and is apparently a fairly easy one.

Cheers, Dave

18 km last Sunday as the last long-ish run and after spending 4 hours driving didn't do enough stretching or warm-up, much as I thought I had done, and ended up pulling a muscle in the lumbar region of my back.  Not impressed! Consequently have managed 22 minutes on the treadmill yesterday  and, with just over a week to go I finally got out for a short run tonight, 3.7 km in 20 minutes, dead slow as planned.

This isn't exactly how I planned the last couple of weeks but at least I felt pretty good during the run tonight and will see how I feel tomorrow when I am going to do 13 km slow.  I had planned to start tapering as per the schedule but feel I need to do 3, maybe 4, 10 km between now and next Wednesday and see how the back's holding up once those are completed.

Other than that little problem i'm feeling pretty good, a nice win on the national on Saturday would be nice!

Hope you're all injury free and looking forward to the big day.

Cheers

Well well, after a few scares along the way it's only two weeks before the London marathon and everything seems to be coming together nicely. Did a fantastic 15 km run the other night from Towersey to Aylesbury running at around 5:30 per km and felt I was holding myself back and could have gone quicker - I even did Fartlek for the last 1.5 km between lamposts! Whatever i've been eating I hope I can get some of it on the day! 

Also done a couple of 10 - 12 km and a 3.7 km recovery jog last night after the 15 km and have no injuries or worries to speak of, with any luck i'll hit the sub-5:00 hour time I had as an objective when I first started running again in 2007 after the ten year gap.

I am reliably informed by a mate who has run this a couple of times that i'm going to be frustrated by imbeciles who have put their times down as something way beyond their actual ability, and will be held up by them.  As this chap ran a few races with me a decade and more ago I guess he knows what he's talking about, so will have to see what it's like on the day. Not being the most patient bloke in Christendom will probably not help as these idiots will just stress me out, as my boss said in my annual report a while back, 'Dave doesn't suffer fools gladly'! And before anyone starts, please, if you're going to exaggerate your capability then you should expect to be treated like an idiot!

Otherwise, I hope everyone is feeling well and your individual training has gone as well as mine has - I never expected to be pushing a 50 minute 10 km at this stage when I started so to all those who've encouraged me - Duda, Janis, SeeAnnieRun, Bruce, Alex, James, Elaine, Steve the carpet and the others, thanks a lot, your support really has helped get me to this stage.

I hope you all enjoy your run and achieve your aims, whether they be personal or for a charity (still way short of my target BTW, LOL).

Cheers

Well, after the nice comments from Janis and Duda I decided to take Saturday as a rest day in-line with the program and Easter Sunday's run was much better because of that rest. 

I decided on doing 13 km or so which was completed in +/- 70 minutes which wasn't bad considering the calves were still only about 80% and that it was snowing and blowing a gale when I set off! The weather got slightly better about 5 km in though and te countryside around Stole Mandeville and Bishopstone was really quite picturesque after all that overnight snow. 

We have loads of Red Kites in this area following a very successful re-intro program some years ago and they are always nice to see gliding around, but whatever iot was I saw in a field outside Bishopstone I am convinced wasn't a Red Kite, and was very big! Something had obviously been caught for breakfast, I regretted not having the binoculars with me, not that I normally have them or am a Brid-watcher of any kind, those sights though are just one of the reasons tha jogging in the local countryside is so nice.

I haven't decided yet what i'm going to do today but am thinking of a 10 to 12 km flat route as i'll do hills when on the way home from work during the week.  Whatever it is, it's a bonus that it's not snowing or blowing a gale, when I went out for a newspaper earlier on it was actually quite pleasant.

Well, enjoy the rest of the holiday.

Cheers