Somewhere not Palmers Green

There's something to be said for taking a mid-training break somewhere sunny, overseas and near a beach. And that something is "Oh bloody hell, where am I going to be able to run which doesn't involve toiling up a gravity-defying clifftop incline, plodding over strength-sapping sand dunes for miles, or ending up on the barbed-wire strewn building site of a would-be holiday resort apparently abandoned some time in the mid-1980s?"
I'm not a huge fan of trying out experimental new courses for my runs. For me, familiarity breeds content, not contempt. I like to know where I'm going and what horrors lie ahead of me. And while going running while on holiday always seems like a good idea in theory, in practice it usually means getting up at about 6.00 in the morning so you can be finished while the temperature is still in the "stiflingly uncomfortable" range and before it hits the "actually might pass out" level.

Not Palmers Green on a wet Wednesday

This is a long-winded way of saying I spent the last week on Gran Canaria, off the coast of Africa. There are worse places to run, it's true. The broad, flat beach promenades are lovely - and would have been perfect if they could have just joined up without the steep hills in between. And some of the views from the coastal paths were simply stunning - you don't get panoramas like this (see right) when you're plodding round Palmers Green on a wet Wednesday afternoon, I can tell you.
What Palmers Green does have, however, are pavements for running on. Everywhere. No roads where I'm forced to run in the frighteningly narrow gap between the crash barrier and the Canarian car drivers whose haughty disdain for the speed limit would gladden the heart of many a former Top Gear presenter. Or roads where the pedestrian space is effectively a dirt track sporadically riddled with rocks the size of small meteorites. So if my 15-mile long run was about a minute-a-mile slower than it ought to have been (and sadly, it was), I'm blaming the conditions.

Also not Palmers Green

I arrived home from the Canaries to find an email from the charity I'm running for, the MND Association. They contact me every Friday with helpful tips and advice, and rather less helpful recommendations of how far I should have got with my training by this stage. It's very kind of them, though I could probably do without them entitling their emails with the  foreboding "X WEEKS TO GO!" (where x < any number which would represent the lowest amount of weeks in which I might feel ready to run a marathon). Chaps, I know it's only six weeks to go. Reminding me isn't helping.

I'm also getting handy tips from the lovely people at Virgin Money (the backers of the London Marathon), one of which actually made me laugh out loud. This is one of their top ten motivational tips. 

Don't take the "all or nothing" approach, they advise.If you’re short on time, they say, (err, yup) or really not feeling up to a long session (it's like they're reading my mind), just go for a shorter run for however long you feel you can spare (I'm extremely cool with this so far). And then they quote "legendary running author Dr George Sheehan" (nope, never heard of him either, but apparently he was huge in the recreational running world in his day) to ask the apparently rhetorical question “Have you ever felt worse after a run?”

Hahahahahaha. Umm. Guys? Not sure how to break this to you. But yes. Frequently. Usually in a region running anywhere north of my ankles and south of my hips, with particular poignancy in areas such as my lower calves, upper right hamstring and the whole of my groin. 

Don't get me wrong, running has its moments. But right after a gruelling training session when you've expended every last ounce of stamina and effort you have, and your legs are moving with all the gymnastic joie de vivre of an arthritic sloth, is not one of them.

On that note, it's time for my 16-mile long run of the week. I can literally hear the "FIVE WEEKS TO GO" email being prepared, ready to flutter into my inbox on Friday. Can't wait.

My Hero

So I wanted to tell you a bit more about why I'm running the London Marathon, and what (or rather who) I'm running it for. He's a man named Eric Rivers, one of the bravest men I've ever known, who died just over three years ago of the crippling, cruel condition Motor Neurone Disease - a man I'm proud and privileged to have called a friend.

Eric was one of those people who made everyone around him smile and feel better about themselves. A keen and excellent cricketer, he loved nothing more than sport, his friends and - above all - his wife and daughters whom he adored. He was a man who loved life. And then MND came along and took away all of that.
Some of you may remember Eric - he became well-known nationally when he and his family were featured on Nick Knowles' DIY SOS programme. The episode in which Knowles' team rebuilt the Rivers' Enfield home is emotionally wrought even by DIY SOS's standards. But what really came across in the broadcast was Eric's shining intelligence, his quiet courage in the face of adversity, his devotion to his family and above all, his utter humanity. If you can find it on iPlayer, I'd urge you to watch it.
Eric took the fight to the disease which was destroying his body, delaying its progress far longer than the doctors had predicted was possible. By the end, MND had taken everything it could - his mobility, his speech, even his ability to breathe properly. But it could never take his mind or his spirit - he was able to keep communicating via eye movements and a special computer, and even managed to maintain an active social media presence! The wisdom and courage of his writing in his last months will always stay with me.
Eric, and fighting MND, is pretty much the reason I started running in charity events. When I did my first half-marathon for the Motor Neurone Disease Association, Eric and his family were in the crowd, part of the charity's "cheer squad" spurring on their runners at the Royal Parks course. Sometimes when I'm training, and I feel like I'm at my last gasp and I can't go on, I think of Eric and how he'd have coped. And then the rest is easy. Well, easier anyway.
So if you can, please do help me fight back against MND on Eric's behalf. I'll be running the marathon for the MNDA - a fine organisation that finances medical research to combat this incurable monster of a disease, and supports the people and families torn apart by it.  
You can donate via Justgiving by clicking on this link . I'd really like to raise at least £1000 in Eric's memory - that's enough to fund a specialist communication app for eight MND sufferers for a whole year, or pay for a month's worth of laboratory equipment for research into a cure. That's real differences being made to people's lives.
Thanks for reading this far, and putting up me with getting all serious on you. Next time - more mildly amusing stories about the calamities of marathon training. I promise 

PS. You can find out more about MND and the MNDA here mndassociation.org

Trainers and training plans. And velociraptors

It's approaching six weeks since I started this training plan for my first ever marathon and... well, to my surprise, it's going OK so far. I'm steadily increasing my distances - up to 12 miles now (the 11-mile run the week before last was a bit of a disaster, to be honest, but let's put that one behind us). I can run up to 5 miles at tempo, or threshold, pace, which apparently should be slightly faster than the pace you're aiming to race at. And the intervals training, which looked really scary, has not proved a problem either. Yet.
I say yet because tomorrow I'm scheduled to run six half-mile bursts at a pace that equates to about 4.30 mins per km. That's about a minute and a half per km faster than my "race pace". With mere 90 second breaks in between each one. And that's just this week. Next week's intervals training is demanding three mile-long bursts at that speed. Now I know I can do one of those. But three in the same session?? Hmmm.

New shoes

This is one thing I've learned about the Training Plan method. Never, ever look at what the coming weeks have got in store for you. You just panic. It's talking about distances and speeds and sequences that may as well just be fantasy as far as I'm concerned. The only way I've found to cope with this is to concentrate solely on the next upcoming session and think, well, I might be able to do that. And not worry about the rest of the Plan until some time in the distant future. Or next week, as some people call it.
Got a bit of a boost with the training last week - replaced my old trainers with my brand spanking new exactly-the-same-model-as-last-time-just-in-a-different-colour Asics. The main advantages of which are the soles aren't yet worn down and they haven't got a hole in the uppers where my toe has inexplicably poked through. 

Old shoes

I don't know why this happens with my trainers. I don't, as far as I know, run with my toes turned up. My toenails are neatly clipped. One running friend reckons I have feet like a velociraptor (below) - that strange dinosaur with a raised claw that got up to all sorts of mischief in Jurassic Park. Whatever the cause is, I'm hoping this pair can hold out a little longer than the last ones, which developed the extra unscheduled ventilation within about three months. I'd really like the new pair to remain un-holed at least until they've made an appearance at the Virgin Money London Marathon.
Add the new trainers to the pile of extra equipment I've ended up buying to aid my marathon preparations. Got myself a foam roller, new socks, and isotonic jelly beans, investigated those disgusting-looking gels, even browsed through a selection of ergonomic water bottles. But by far my best new acquisition, which I managed to persuade my long-suffering wife to buy me as a birthday present, is my "recovery flipflops".
I'm not gonna lie, they aren't the most beautiful footwear I've ever donned. They look like the sort of thing an overweight German swinger might wear as he waddles his way towards the communal jacuzzi. But looks aren't everything. They are ludicrously comfortable - soft, padded, arched - perfect for pampering your feet after a gruelling double-digit miler. So much so that if it wasn't for the public shame I'd have to endure, I'd happily wear them out of the house. Even to work.
Another part of my marathon preparations is coming together - my fundraising plans. But I'll save that for another time. I have to concentrate now on panicking about my next training session.

I've got a cunning plan...

Or rather, I've downloaded a cunning plan. A plan hopefully even more cunning than Baldrick's one that was as cunning as a fox that has just been appointed Professor of Cunning at Oxford university. It's a plan to get me over the finish line of the London Marathon in four months' time in more or less one piece.
Ever since I excitedly announced I'd got into this year's event, experienced runners have been telling me to get a training plan. "Which plan are you on?" I keep getting asked, or "Have you decided on a plan?". It's almost as if I'm preparing to give birth. Now I'm not much of a believer in rigid training plans, as I know I'm not great at sticking to them. Until now I've managed to get by with a training schedule that is effectively:
Week 1 - a) Run as far as you can, b) Weep, c) Think about giving up
Week 2 - a) Run a bit further than last week, b) Over-estimate the rate of your improvement
And so on and so on.
But this marathon business is a bit more serious it seems. So I've given in and chosen one. It's called Run Less, Run Faster and I have to admit I was particularly attracted by the "Run Less" part of the title. Though it turns out it doesn't involve running any less than I do at the moment, it just means doing it a bit more scientifically.

The 18-week plan, which I really should have begun on Christmas Eve in order to complete it before race day, revolves around three runs a week. The first one involves fairly intense interval training, run at a pace 45 seconds a mile faster than your fastest 10k pace - which for me means about 7.45 mins per mile (which is roughly 5 mins per km, which is OK when you're running minute-long intervals, but is a bit harder for longer periods).
The second is called a "tempo" run, and is apparently the most useful of them all. It starts off with an easy 1 or 2 mile bit, followed by between 2 and 5 miles at "tempo" or "threshold" pace - slightly slower than your fastest 10k pace but faster than normal training pace. For me that entails running for several miles at about 9 minutes per mile (about 5.38 mins per km). 
The third is a long run, starting at 8 miles and working up to 20, at training pace (for me, 9.15 mins per mile, or 5.47 mins per km). Even at that pace, which is comfortable, that's a long hard  3-4 hour slog.
Now all this sounds almost reasonable, at least to start with. But there's a twist. You're also supposed to be doing cross-training workouts on your days off. Days off are when I normally try to recover from the run the day before by hobbling around like a 90-year-old with mobility issues. I think I also saw something about following a proper diet, which is also not going to happen.
Anyway, I've already started, sort of, with an 8-mile run, followed about my first tempo run about a week later. A further attempt at running 9 miles was not a huge success - at the moment, it seems, I'm doing one decent run followed by a bad one. This week, however, we really start in earnest. I'll let you know how it goes

Oh. My. God!

So it's finally happened. I'm actually doing it. Shit, as the young people apparently say these days, just got real. On April 28th next year, injury, illness and natural disaster permitting, I'm going to be running the London Marathon.

To be honest, I'd almost given up hope on it. Applied in the public ballot months ago. Didn't get in. Again. For the fifth year in a row. Applied for a media place - in which you are allocated a berth in return for using your position in the media to publicise the race (not that you'd think one of the world's most famous long-distance events would need the extra publicity, but still). Got a reply saying that competition for such places was fierce but they'd let me know. Then heard nothing. For seemingly ages.Until it just got to the point where you think, well, it's not meant to be.

The email from the lovely people at the Virgin Money London Marathon finally arrived on November 28th (my birthday, as it happens, which was nice). "Overwhelming number of applications" blah blah "panel has reviewed" blah blah... and then 16 heart-stopping words: "delighted to inform you that we can offer you a running place in next year’s Marathon".

I nearly bounced across the room when I read that. The excitement of finally getting a place when I'd convinced myself that it wasn't going to happen was overwhelming. For about five seconds anyway, before reality kicked in with a sharp "So how do you propose to actually do this thing, then?"

Reality has a way of doing that, doesn't it? Interrupting and being right, that is. I mean, what was I thinking? Run a marathon?? My brain is screaming at me "HOW ON EARTH ARE YOU SUPPOSED TO RUN TWENTY-SIX MILES??"

What a distance. Twenty-six MILES. TWENTY-six miles. Twenty-SIX miles. It doesn't matter how you say it, it's a sod of a long way. My mind tries to comprehend the amount of training I'm going to need, and then just shuts down and refuses to contemplate it.

In October, I completed a half-marathon and the training for that was hard enough. There were times, as I ploughed on, mile after mile, km after km, and my muscles got weaker and my joints got stiffer and my whole body just seemed to cry out with fatigue, that it felt like it was impossible to run even one more step. Now take that and double it.

I'm going to need a training plan. What sort of training plan, I'm not entirely sure yet, but my usual method of "running a bit longer each week and not worrying too much about how slow I'm going" is not, I feel, going to cut it.

And I'm going to need to kid myself. If I start thinking about the ultimate objective, I think I'll just panic and give up. I need to start out by thinking that all I'm doing is increasing my distance by a mile - that, say, 14 miles is the target - and that might seem more attainable. Then when I've attained it, I can shift the target. It's a tricky thing, trying to fool your own subconscious, but I can't see any other practical way of getting anywhere near the necessary level.

But anyway. I'm in. That's the first obstacle overcome. Now for the hard part.

Good To Be Back

Gosh, it seems like a long time since I was here. To be fair, that's because it IS a long time since I've been here. Ten months since I updated this blog to be precise. Let me just dust off some of the spookier-looking cobwebs, and I'll fill you in on what's been happening.
First of all, you've probably gathered that I didn't manage to achieve my target of running a marathon at some time in the 12 months since starting my blog. The truth is, I sort of lost heart a little after my half-marathon injury last October, and when I realised that I couldn't enter the London Marathon because I was supposed to be taking my wife to Mexico for her 50th birthday. I did think about other marathons, but it just seemed as if fate had decreed it was Not Meant To Be.
But here I am again. A year older and just as stupid, and so determined once more to push my body through the 26-mile mill. And just to prove it, I'm back running half-marathons as part of the campaign. But a little more about that later.
So what's changed in 10 months. Well, my trainers for a start. I've got through two new pairs since my last blog entry. I've broken two PBs, got a whole new collection of running event medals, started - and stopped - having physiotherapy sessions on my hamstrings, and discovered a liking for post-run strawberry protein shakes. But I STILL haven't managed to beat my best Parkrun time - two years and counting now since I saw the magic words "New PB!" next to my name on the regular Saturday afternoon email.
The PBs I have managed to achieve were for a mile (under 7 minutes, thank you very much) and, just last Sunday, for a half-marathon. It was at my favourite running course, the Royal Parks in the centre of London. It's leafy, it's scenic and there's not too many long straight stretches to sap your will to keep going.

The three best things about the Royal Parks Half?
1/ The crowds cheering you on. There are spectators lining practically the whole route, especially in Hyde Park, not to mention the bands and drummers and even cheerleaders helping to keep you going. Even on a soaking wet day like last Sunday, people turn out in droves to show their support.
2/ The flatness. There's hardly a hill worthy of the name in the whole 13 miles. So much so that when you do get the odd tiny gradient, you groan inwardly as if you were being asked to do the Three Peaks Challenge.
3/ The organisation. It's well-staffed and friendly, it processes 16,000 runners incredibly efficiently. And it's even got a good app, which texted me my time within seconds of me crossing the finish line.
The three worst things?
1/ This year, the weather. The heavens opened just before and just after the race, which really wasn't much fun at all. Though it did have the good grace to keep to a damp drizzle while I was actually running
2/ The distance between the finish line and the bag drop. It probably isn't actually that far at all, but when your legs are just beginning to seize up, it's a journey that seems to take about half as long as the race itself
3/ (and this is a particularly personal one) The paucity of toilet paper in the portaloos at the entrance to the event village. When you've queued up for 20 minutes, that's actually the last thing you want to discover. I'm bringing my own next time.
Those three minor bugbears aside, I really enjoyed this race. Wasn't sure what to expect as the training had been a bit up and done, but I'd done my distances and knew I had the miles in my legs in theory, if not necessarily in practice. As it was, I ran one of my steadiest races ever, a metronomic nine minutes a mile for the first 10 miles without a single break. 

Finished!

Then, as I stopped to grab a water bottle at a water station and to take the opportunity to neck a couple of jelly beans that I had stashed in my back pocket, some joker in the crowd shouts out "That's it Rob, you stop for a little snack!" 
God's sake! My first break in an hour and a half. Cheeky beggar. Anyway, just to make sure I got no more caustic asides from the crowd, I ploughed straight on, even sprinting the finish, to end in 1 hour 58.37 - about a minute faster than my previous half-marathon best. And it felt great. Well, not great exactly, but not as muscle-bustingly awful as it has in the past.
Now if I can just learn how to do two of those in a row.

'Tis The Season..

'Tis the season to be jolly - jolly well wrapped up in several upper body layers, thermal leggings, jacket, gloves and a woolly hat if you're going out running, that is. It's been absolutely perishing over the last couple of weeks, and I've been caught between the need to keep warm and the need not to overheat after a couple of km. 

And it's not just me. At my local parkrun last weekend, there was enough alpine apparel to clothe an Everest expedition. At the start anyway. By the time the first lap of the course had been completed, the clothing was coming off faster than a dodgy striptease in an East London pub. Gloves, hats, sweatshirts all strewn across the path as the runners wrestled with their outer layers in a desperate bid to keep their body temperature under control. It's quite an art stripping down to your vest while trying not to break stride.
Working out what to wear isn't the only problem we cold-weather runners face. Snow and ice on the paths and streets is a seasonal hazard - though not as much in London as it is elsewhere. A few years ago, I went out for a run in Philadelphia, which was still recovering from one of the huge blizzards that hits the east coast of the US every winter. The run began ok, but the further I went, the less the paths had been cleared, until I found my feet sinking nearly knee-deep in the snow. At which point, the only thing you can do is give up and build a snowman. Ice is, if anything, worse. Nothing dents the desire to go running more than crashing head over heels at top speed. 
The cold does tend to adversely affect my performance, as well. Some runners I know absolutely thrive on it and do their best times in the winter. As for me, I've noticed a regular seasonal dip in my timings, which I'm convinced is something to do with the blood vessels constricting to conserve body heat, thus restricting the amount of oxygen you can pump round your body. That's the excuse I'm using anyway. 
So I don't expect to be setting any PBs before Christmas. I hope to get a few more training runs in before the festivities start and the mass consumption of food and drink starts in earnest. And then I'll be looking forward to the new year and setting myself some running goals for 2018.
In the meantime, happy Christmas and wrap up warm.