So then dear reader, the Christmas period of feasting is behind us. The New Year champagne corks are all popped. Normal life has resumed again.
I have been building up to a very big year for a while. Last year was peppered with injury and illness and change and challenge and most of my goals went flying out of the window. I lacked motivation and was finding life hard going in general.
Whilst I am positive I am not alone in feeling this way about 2022, I did take the opportunity to educate myself on strategies and ideas to cope with modern life and with my ever aging body. I read books, listened to podcasts, engaged with people whose opinion I trust and slowly, during the final days of 2022, I started to see things clearly.
What I have lacked, what I have always lacked, is consistency. I am able to hyper focus a block of time on a particular goal or task, only to then either achieve or not achieve that thing, and then put it to one side and do something else afterwards.
A prime example of this is in my endurance feats of the past. I have been fit enough to complete Ironman Triathlons, ultra marathons and all sorts, but then let that fitness lapse. I have lost a quarter of my bodyweight (25kg), only to put it back on, and more. Each time I start again from scratch. Each time I take on a new challenge I start from zero, unable to run more than a couple of kilometres. Way overweight and unfit. And again and again and again. Repeat ad infinitum.
Well this year is when it all changes. This year is the year of CONSISTENCY.
I have some fairly big challenges to complete this year, the first of which is the London Marathon, raising money for Daisy’s Dream. Next we have The Isle of Wight Ultra (just one week after London) which is 66 very hilly miles round the Isle of Wight, raising money for SANDS. Later in the year I am running another ultra in Bath (only 50km this time), I am doing the London to Brighton bike ride, I am also planning on hiking the South Downs Way non-stop (100 miles) and maybe going to throw in an odd triathlon here or there towards the end of the summer.
I also have some much more personal challenges that I will share with you in due course, but I have aims and targets to progress myself personally that I am determined to make big inroads into in 2023
So the $64,000 question is, how am I going to do this. Well that will be the topic of my next post, but it involves getting up at 5am EVERY DAY as a starting point. That is right, I am going to be that person. It is worth saying that I hate getting up early and have always been a night owl, but as they say, the early bird catches the worm, and I have some big worms to catch.
More coming soon, so for the time being, if you are reading this I wish you and your loved ones a prosperoous and healthy 2023 and hope that this blog brings a bit of joy or inspiration into your life.
The phrase “age is just a number” may well mean you don’t approach your training any differently from a psychological point of view but as we age the physical side inevitably catches up. So, maybe the answer is coupling this “glass half full” mindset with the right physical regime to then let us enjoy our running for as long as possible.
I have been guilty of some bad habits in recent years and as we look towards 2023 I thought I’d share my thoughts, especially after watching this excellent video from James Dunne, that really hit home this point now that I’ve reached 60.
I’ve attached the video from James and in many ways you could stop reading now. Why read on ? Well I’ve been running for over thirty years so if nothing else I have some experience to draw on, even if I haven’t got the expertise like…
Hello all. I write this blog post in a joyous mood. Only about 7 weeks to go until the London Marathon and I am starting to get very excited indeed.
Those of you who have followed my blog will know that I am nursing (and continue to nurse) an injured knee. It appears that it is not actually the knee that is injured, but a weak hamstring on my right leg that is causing the knee to hurt.
This is extremely good news because:
I can strengthen this hamstring up.
I can run without doing too much damage to my knee (I think).
I can put in place a plan to enable me to train successfully.
Now, dear reader, I know you are all screaming at your screens saying something like “but Snooky, you only have 7 weeks to train up. This is just not enough time”, and usually you would be right that 7 weeks is not enough time to train for a marathon. Alas, dear reader, on this occasion you have forgotten one important thing. My secret weapon. Bloody Mindedness.
Namaste – from the side of a lake in Snowdonia
Determination has seen me through tougher situations than I am in now, and determination will see me through again. I have written my training plan. 4 “runs a week”. Well when I say run, what I actually mean is walk/run, because I have been advised by Trevor (see previous post to learn all about him) that a walk/run strategy is the one for me. Run for 3 minutes, walk for 2 minutes. Keep repeating until the marathon is done.
So my training plan is to practice this exact strategy. I will be doing 3 lots of strength workouts per week too, so I have the maximum chance of success.
I am EXTREMELY confident this strategy will work to get me over the line, and also quietly confident that it could well be a record tarmac marathon pace for me. The reasoning behind this is down to simple mathematics.
Usually when I run marathons I start out at a good pace and then generally slow and slow and slow as I get more and more tired. What may be 5 min/km at the start, is probably more like 8 min/km at the end (or worse)
A walk run strategy will even this pace out. Bear with me for a bit of maths.
3 minutes running at 6 min/km = 500 metres covered
2 minutes walking at 9 min/km = 225 metres covered (admittedly this is a fast walking pace but I am not intending on hanging about)
Total distance covered every 5 minutes is 725 metres.
725 metres in 5 mins is equal to an overall pace of just under 7 mins/km. 7 mins/km, averaged over 42km would mean a finish time of 4hrs and 54 minutes. My current tarmac marathon personal best is 5 hrs and 2 minutes.
I recently did the 3 Peaks Challenge. This is the view from Ben Nevis through the only break in the clouds we had.
So as you can see we are in personal best territory. And this is whilst walk/running the entire thing, which my knee should handle and I should be able to train for.
If training goes well, I might be able to eek out the run portions a bit longer towards the end of the race and improve on this finish time, but let’s not get ahead of ourselves.
For the time being, it is time to hit the training hard, keep consistent with my strength training, diet, and run schedule and see where I get to.
I will blog about the 3 Peaks Challenge another day as there is a great story to tell with that, but for the time being I hope you are all enjoying the lovely heat we have in the UK at the moment (assuming you are in the UK) and I will be back soon.
Just writing this sentence makes me sad, dear reader, but write it I must. The three words no runner, cyclist, swimmer, golfer, tiddlywinker or any other type of sportsman wants to say.
I AM INJURED
Sadly not just a little niggling injury. It appears to be an actual proper injury. Its my knee. My right knee to be more precise. As somebody messaged me the other day, “When you are in your 20’s you have a right knee and a left knee. When you are in your 40’s you have a good knee and a bad knee.”
Well in my case this is very true, and my bad knee is my right one.
I can run about 8km (5 miles), and then at that point my knee really starts to hurt. I was once told that on a scale of 1-10, pain above a 4 means you should stop. I am easily at a 7 by the time I have done 8km.
Being as incredibly stubborn as I am, I could probably keep going (all be it a bit slower) and run further on this bad knee. But I can’t escape the thought that I am probably doing it more damage than good by doing this.
This is all fairly disastrous news when it comes to the London Marathon in about 12 weeks time, but fear not dear reader, all is not lost. Cause when the chips are down, you need a crazy plan. And I am the KING of crazy plans.
Step up somebody who has featured on my blog before. Mr Trevor Payne. Trevor is an ex-professional Ironman, who is now one of the leading biometric coaches in the country. I am also proud to call Trevor a friend. I have attended countless training sessions with him, seen him for physio assessments in the past and there is nobodies judgement I trust more closely than his when it comes to all things endurance and physiological.
Limping back from a failed run recently, I gave Trevor a call. Realising I was not helping my knee one bit by carrying on running, I had already hatched a plan, but wanted his approval. The plan goes like this.
No more running for a while. Worst case scenario, one run a week of up to 8km (stopping before my knee really hurts)
Perform the majority of my marathon fitness work on my bike. Utilising the turbo trainer as much as possible with perhaps a long bike ride outside at the weekend.
Plenty of strength work (prescribed by Trevor) to work on stabilising this dodgy knee.
Keep up the yoga and flexibility work, cause this always helps.
No panicking.
Re-introduce some extra running closer to the marathon date and see how it feels.
Turn up on the day, man up more than you have ever manned up before, and get that marathon done.
Trevor runs APT. Click the image to visit his website
Trevor has endorsed my plan with flying colours. So, the wheels have come off for “traditional” marathon training, which involves a lot of running, but the wheels are very much back on for this alternative marathon training plan.
So my friends, here we have it. I will still be at the start line of London Marathon. But I am very likely to be there having run less that I have ever done in preparation for a marathon before.
Many people, especially seasoned runners, would consider me insane for attempting to run a marathon with only a relatively small amount of running miles under my belt. Conventional wisdom has you running up to 20 miles on your longest run, with some running plans having literally 100’s of weekly miles required. But who cares about conventional wisdom? Not me!
I am very likely to turn up on the day having not even recently run a half marathon. But I will be in good shape by then. I am determined to get as much cardiovascular fitness as possible. And Trevor will make sure my knee is as well recovered as it can be.
Bloody mindedness and sheer determination will take care of the rest.
As a great endurance athlete once said “how hard can it be”.
City dweller, successful fella, thought to himself “whoops I’ve got a lot of money”……….
At this point, you have either been ear-wormed by the wonderful Country House by Blur, or you have absolutely no idea what the start of this post is all about.
Either way, my training has begun in earnest. Ran intervals yesterday. Out for a long hike early this morning with my mate Ant, and I have a 10 mile run scheduled for tomorrow. I will probably actually run about 14.5km (just over 9 miles), just because this is a nice route from my mother-in-law’s back home.
This morning’s walk – hilly!
Combining running back from places I have been with the family is one of my little tricks for getting some decent long runs in, whilst not missing out on family time at the weekend. If you have gone further afield than your run dictates, just get dropped off at the right distance from home then run on back.
As the distance in marathon training increases, you start to face the quandary of fueling and hydrating yourself. As a rule of thumb, I tend to be able to run for about 90 minutes with no food or hydration at all (depending on the temperature). When we get up towards the 10 mile region, I am likely to be running about 2 hours as I will be going at a nice slow pace. This means I am likely to require both some fuel and some hydration.
And that’s when I developed my drinking problem
Fuel is usually in the format of gels for training runs. If you are reading this and are a non-runner, these gels are essentially a thick sort of sugary paste in a handy foil pack. Nice and easy to carry and you can wedge a few in your pockets and don’t necessarily need to carry a backpack. Very good for fueling on the go.
Water is not so easy, as to carry a reasonable amount you need to either carry a bottle in your hand (it tends to get warm and not very palatable if you do this), carry it on some sort of waist belt (I have never gotten on with these) or carry a backpack with water in it.
My main issue with backpacks is that I find that they warm me up, a lot. Not being able to lose heat through my back means that I tend to run a lot hotter than I would like (one for the pun fans).
So essentially, for these “shorter” long runs (in my case ones under 2 hours), there is not really a good option for me. As it happens, I don’t have any gels and am not going to go out and buy any in the morning, so will probably just run carrying a bottle of water tomorrow and see if I can hang on with no fuel. It is only 10 miles, so should be possible.
At the same time as the marathon training, I am also trying to train for the 3 Peaks Challenge. For those of you not familiar with this, The 3 Peaks Challenge involves trying to summit the highest peaks in Scotland, England and Wales respectively. These are Ben Nevis, Scafell Pike and Snowdon. You have to try and do all this in 24 hours. Usually this is about 13 hours of hillwalking with 11 hours of driving in-between.
In my usual style, I have just decided to randomly do this with my mate Ant. Neither of us has any hill walking experience to speak of, but he is a fit fella and good company so we just decided to give it a go. I am far behind him on fitness, but reckon I should be able to keep up. We take on this challenge at the end of July.
I am hoping that the hiking and hill walking training for the 3 Peaks Challenge compliments the marathon training, but there is a real risk of me doing too much and getting injured if I push the training too far. On the other hand, if I do not do enough training and I get in trouble on one of these mountains due to a lack of fitness, that would also be bad.
I feel that as an endurance athlete (and it is a real stretch calling me any sort of athlete, but please just indulge me) this is the tightrope that you are always walking. You need to push hard enough so your body adapts, but if you push too hard you get injured.
The good news is that the human body is capable of some phenomenal things when needed. Training for a marathon is tough. Chucking in the 3 Peaks Challenge in the middle of this makes it tougher. Plus I have a 100KM through hike with my wife at the start of September.
If there is ever going to be a time that my body decides to be phenomenal, it needs to be over the next 14 weeks.
As I write this post, on Wednesday 15th June, I am reminded of two very important things.
Today is my 10th wedding anniversary (don’t worry, I remembered and got both a card and a present).
It is precisely 108 days until the London Marathon. Or if you prefer, 15 weeks and 3 days.
Most marathon training plans are 16 weeks long (or at least the ones I write are), so you will be pleased to hear that I have been out running and the training is precisely on track. To be fair, after just 4 days you would expect it to be going fairly well, so I am not that sure this is something to shout about, but I will take any win where I can get it.
It is around this time, when marathon runners start their training “for real”, that people’s minds can drift to the big day.
For many, especially first time marathon runners, the event itself can seem very daunting. Thoughts such as “I struggle to run 5 miles, how am I ever going to be able to run 26?”, or “I don’t look like a runner. I don’t feel like a runner. What am I doing?” may start to sneak into a runners mind.
For me, I am no different to the rest. Yes I have completed a few marathons in my time, but the training and the event is equally as daunting no matter how many you have run before. But I do have one advantage. I can start to dream!
I can visualise what it might be like out there on the course. Imagine the supporters cheering me over Tower Bridge. Imagine passing all the landmarks, like the Cutty Sark, Big Ben and Parliament, the O2, Canary Wharf, The Tower of London and many more. I can wonder about what the weather will be like. Whether I will be injury free (fingers crossed) on the day. I can imagine a world of possibilities.
The dream, for me, is very real. I have always wanted to run London Marathon. It is virtually impossible to get a place via the ballot these days. I think the odds are around 40/1. This is why my charity place through Daisy’s Dream is so important to me. Such a wonderful charity, giving me the opportunity to run the race I have watched so many times on TV, and dreamt of running since I first took running up in my mid 30’s.
But sadly, you cannot dream your way round a marathon course. There is a LOT of work to be done before the big day. Lots of miles to run. Lots of preparation. I need to be both mentally and physically ready. This is where having marathon experience does come in handy. I know roughly how to train. I understand how much I can put my body through without getting injured. On the mental side of things, I am in the fortunate position of being 100% confident. This comes with experience, and willpower. My determination (others may call this stubbornness) means that if I start the race, I will finish it. After all, I managed to run almost 40 miles with 3 broken ribs (I’ll tell you that story another day), so if I can do that, I can do anything!
So as you read this, and I sit here gazing out my window at home, wondering just how hot it is today and convincing myself that running in this heat at lunchtime is madness (don’t worry, I will go anyway), please spare a thought for all us runners.
1000’s of us have just started our London Marathon training plans. We are excited and terrified in equal measure. There are so many things that can go wrong, but also so many things that can go right. This is the way of the runner. Whether we are fast or slow, old or young, skinny or not so skinny (like me), we all share the same dream. To cross that finish line in London on the 2nd October and in my case, and likely most others, to raise plenty of money for our chosen charities.
If you feel inspired, there are some exciting opportunities for you to get involved in raising some money for Daisy’s Dream, with places in both the Virtual London Marathon and the Big Half up for grabs. Follow the links below for more information.
Will be updating twice a week for a while, moving onto three times a week in the run into the marathon. So if you like my posts, please use the link at the top right hand side of this blog post to subscribe to my mailing list, so you don’t miss any updates.
Speak soon all, and for my fellow runners, good luck for your training. Remember, the event itself is just a 26 mile run. All the hard work is done in training, so make sure to enjoy as much of it as you can. The training lasts a lot longer than the event itself! A LOT longer!!!!!
Greetings dear reader. I hope today finds you well, and if you are reading this in early May in the UK, I hope you are enjoying the beautiful weather as much as I am.
Despite deciding in my last blog post that I would run every other day, in a controversial and unconventional twist to usual marathon and running training, I have not been doing any running what so ever. The main reason for this is that in the time that I would usually devote to running I have been trying to improve my golf instead, as I recently joined a golf club.
The good news about trying to improve my golf is, I find it equally as hard as I find trying to improve my running. It is like trying to improve skills is difficult. Like you don’t instantly become good at things after giving them a go for a while.
Now of course, I am aware that building skills takes time. The problem with this is, I have played golf for well over 20 years, and been running for almost 10. You would have thought this would have been enough time to build up some reasonable skill in both, and if I am being honest and fair to myself, I think I probably have.
I can play a competitive round of golf, absolutely love playing and am probably about average in terms of skill. (photos below from a recent round at Hindhead, where I am not a member, but would dearly love to be).
I am probably also an average runner. I plod along at about 10min/mile pace on shorter runs, which I reckon is about average. Maybe a bit slower than average, but never the less, somewhere very much in the middle.
Also, this birthday I am 44. And it is hard to improve your skills in your 40’s. The prime of my life is really behind me at this point. But just cause something is hard, does not mean it should not be attempted. On the contrary, the harder or more challenging something is the more it makes me want to do it.
This finally brings me onto the point of this blog post. What do you do when one marathon is not enough? Well you book another one. Then, just to double down, you also book a slightly different but equally big challenge around the same time and bingo, you have suddenly made something that is hard an awful lot harder.
Challenge number 1 take place on the 3rd/4th September and is the South Coast Challenge, a 100km hike from Eastbourne to Arundel. This challenge is courtesy of my wife, who decided to take this on to raise some money in memory of a friend of ours who died far too young, leaving behind too young kids and a wife. I love walking and my favourite person to walk with is my wife, so I thought I would join her and keep her company. Rather than me tell you about it, check out her blog to see what it is all about. And before you say it, I know what you are thinking. Yes my wife and I both have blogs. That is just how fecking cool we are. Don’t be too jealous. Haters gonna hate 🙂
Challenge number 2 will be London Marathon on the 2nd October. This is a marathon. In London. The big one. Probably the most famous marathon in the world. The one I am already VERY nervous about, despite it being 20 weeks away.
Challenge number 3 will be the Beachy Head Marathon on the 22nd October. Another marathon. Starting in Eastbourne. I have run this one before a few times. It is tough. Very tough. All marathons are tough, but this is rather hilly. And usually very windy. And often very rainy. It’s a great event.
Beachy Head Marathon. Quite Hilly!
So those are my three events for 2022. Nothing until September, then it all kicks right off! It’s going to be interesting for me, as training for a 100km hike is going to be a bit different to a training for a marathon. I have never trained up for a long hike before. Looking forward to it.
The biggest challenge in all of this will be recovery. In marathon training, your hardest week of training is 3 weeks before the event. You then “taper” (which is when you reduce your training load), to reach the start line at the marathon in peak condition. A two week taper allows your body to recover from the training load and you lose very little fitness during this time.
I am going to complete the two day hike with my wife the weekend before my longest training week. This could easily result in too much training load and that risks injury, which is the last thing I need just before the London Maraton. Fingers crossed that I will be in good shape by then and find it easier than I imagine it being.
Speaking of shape, so far so good on Project 80. Weigh in again tomorrow to see if I can continue the downwards trend.
Anyway, enough of my ramblings. Wherever you are reading this I hope you have a great day/evening and if anybody fancies a round of golf, let me know.
As keen readers of this blog will be aware I had a bit of a disasterous run last week. (link here)
My solution to this bad run is the same as my usual solution when I face any sort of adversity. To dig in and to try harder. After my awful run, I resolved to keep doing the exact same loop that I was attempting until I can run it with ease. After all, the thing to do after you fall off a horse is to get back on (apparently). To be honest, I have never ridden a horse and I imagine if I did fall off it would hurt like hell, as I am old and feeble these days, but the analogy still works.
So two days after my disasterous run, I went out on the same 4 mile (6.4km) loop and this happened.
A HUGE improvement on the 55 minutes it took me 2 days before, and much closer to the pace I would expect. Before you start high fiving yourself with joy, this is not all good news. My HR was a lot higher than I would have liked at that pace.
Under ideal circumstances the pace that I was running at (which is about 10 minute/mile pace for those of you who live in the stone age and still calculate your running in miles) should be in Zone 2. My HR should be hovering around 140 at that speed. As you can see it was mostly up in the 150’s.
The problem with this is that to train effectively, the majority of your training should be at an “easy” pace. Slow enough you can have a conversation. This is the 80/20 rule, which I will post about properly some time soon, but essentially 80% of your training should be easy and 20% should be hard. We are talking really rather easy and really rather hard. here. Opposite ends of the scale.
What lots of endurance athletes do (me included) is complete the majority of their training somwhere in the “comfortably uncomfortable” range, which for purposes of the diagram above is Tempo moving up to Threshold. I can run in this zone for a long time, which is all well and good, but 80/20 research shows that the fastest fitness gains are made when you avoid training in Z3/Z4 almost entirely.
The problem I have is that Z1/Z2 is so incredibly slow for me that it is practically walking and often my ego gets in the way and I just wanna run. Somthing for me to address in the future.
Anyway, the first run after my disasterous run was good, so 2 days later I set off again on the same course, and this happened.
Same route, with almost exactly the same time and pace, but the HR was higher again still. Now the explanation for this is an easy one. It was much hotter. Like over 20 degrees. And Snooky does not cope very well when it is hot. I love the heat. It does not love me.
Taking the positives , that is two runs on the same route that are getting somehwere back towards the pace that I would like.
The plan is to keep running this same 4 mile route once every 2 days until I can complete it in around 40 mins and my HR stays mostly in Zone 2. As you can see below, I have run this pace before, but it was a while ago now.
28th May 2018 – same route
So above is the same route (actually 480 metres further) in under 40 mins. Sadly, there is no HR data for this run, but I imagine this was close to flat out for me 4 years ago, so likely to be high. Anyway, it proves that the speed is possible. Now just to get the HR down.
It’s only 7 or so weeks until my proper marathon training plan kicks into place. If all goes well, by then I will be running at sub 10 minute mile pace (sub 6 min/km) with a HR around the 140 mark and will be in a good spot for starting my marathon training. Also, I should weigh a lot less than I do now (see Project 80 for more details).
Hope you are all keeping well out there in the world and for those of you in the UK you are enjoying the good weather.
If you are not familiar with DEFCON statuses, then you have clearly not seem the 1983 film War Games. And if you have not seen the film War Games, then you should immediately stop what you are doing, go and watch War Games, then come back and read the rest of this. Because you clearly have not lived.
Now you have seen War Games and are familiar with the DEFCON statuses, you will understand that DEFCON 4 is not good. We are very close to full blown panic here people. And this is precisely where I find myself. Let me tell you a little story, dear reader.
War Games – Its got Matthew Broderick in it
So today is Good Friday. Which is something to do with Jesus. Anyway, it is a bank holiday which means that you don’t have to work. Except in my case I did do a bit of work this morning. Even though it is bank holiday. But that is not the point so I will shut up about it.
Anyway I woke up, did a bit of work, tidyed up the garden and got ready for our friends who were coming round for a BBQ. Now usually this would be a good opportunity for me to relax and have a few beers, but I wanted to go for a run, so no beers for me.
We had a lovely BBQ, the kids played in the garden, it was warm (but not too warm) and all was well.
After everybody had gone about 7.30pm it was time for my run. A simple 35 minute route that I have run 1000 times. I was happy with myself for eating well during the day and not having any drinks and was ready to run.
No sooner had I set out of the door and started running that my right hip flexor immediately screamed out in pain. Now I had warmed up properly and was running slowly, but it instantly hurt, a lot. Now this is nothing new for me. My hip flexors fail all the time and they hurt a lot when I run, but usually after about 20 miles or so, not 20 metres.
On I plodded, hip flexor screaming with every stride and then I started to feel like I was running through treacle. Like the air itself was thick. Like running in a swimming pool. Goodness me it was hard. My heart rate was way too high for the pace I was doing and I could not get any air in. I checked my watch, I had run 800 metres!
Slowing down, I kept on going, hoping these early run niggles would go away and I could get into my stride. How wrong I was. The hip pain was then joined by knee pain on the same side. I could not shake the thought in my head spinning round and round. “You are going to have to walk” it kept saying to me. Walk. Fecking Walk! I had done just over 1km and I was having to walk. But walk I did. I had absolutely nothing in the tank.
Now this was not a great situation to be in. I am not the best runner in the world, but I can run a bit. Under normal circumstances I can easily run for 35 minutes, but this is clearly not normal circumstances.
I was angry with myself. Angry that my lungs seem to have packed up and not get any air in. That my muscles and body seemed to be as tired as it would be at the end of an Ultra Marathon. Understandable in an Ultra Marathon. Not so understandable after 1km of running.
Now there is nothing wrong with walking. In fact, I walk a lot during my marathons, but this was not a marathon. This was a 35 minute run that there should be no walking. So I decided to run again. And run I did, slowly, for about 100 metres, and then I had to stop, again. And this is how it went for a while. Run for a bit, get exhausted, walk, run for a bit, get exhausted, you get the idea.
20 minutes into my “run” and I had covered just over 2km. Not good. I felt awful. I was very sad and angry and I did not understand. A mental checklist went through my mind.
Am I overtrained – No
Did I sleep well last night – Yes
Any boozing – No
Diet decent – Yes
Did I run recently and that is why I am struggling – No
There was no obvious reason. As the time wound on I was just getting more and more upset. I felt so sad I could cry. How the hell am I ever going to be able to run a marathon for Daisy’s Dream if I can’t even run for 35 minutes? I am a better runner than this. But clearly that is not the case.
40 minutes into the run and the 5km distance clocked up on my watch with a unceremonious beep. The beep almost felt like it was mocking me. Stupid watch. I was about 1km from home and it may as well have been 100. There I was, in my full run gear with running vest, cap, shorts and trainers walking down the main road back to my house. Like an overweight fella who thought he could run but clearly could not. Shuffling along like a useless blob. I was sad and angry in equal measure, so I forced myself to run. I can run 1km. Just run. Run Snooky, run.
So I ran, for about 200 metres and then my back started to hurt. So now I have the following things wrong with me.
My right hip flexor is agony each time my foot hits the groud
My right knee is hurting me
I cannot get any air into my lungs at all
I feel like I am running through treacle
My back hurts
All this after 5km of “running”. A marathon is 42km. I have done many of them. I quickly worked out that at the pace I had run I would be looking at a 6hr 30 minute marathon finishing time. You can walk one faster than that!
So I walked, again. All the way home. It took me 55 minutes to complete a loop that normally takes 35. For those mathemeticians amongst us, that is an increase of 57.14%.
And now I am sitting here, writing this blog. My hips are aching me. My shoulders ache. My left knee is now a bit sore. From a 6km walk with a bit of running. Absolutely and completely pathetic.
I know what I am going to do about this. The same thing that I always do. But I will tell you what that is another time.
Enjoy your Easter weekend people. Hope that the sun shines and you get lost of nice chocolate eggs to scoff down and that if you do go out running, it is better than mine. Though you would do well to make it worse.
So, only one week and one day later than planned, Project 80 launches today.
Project 80 is simple. I need to weight 80kg or less by the time I get to run London Marathon. Ideally, it could do with being closer to 75kg I think, but 80 is probably more realistic.
Before we get into why this is important, I am aware that some of you cannot figure out kilograms (kg) and may prefer weight measurements to be in stone and pounds (st, lbs) or just pounds (lbs). I will do my best to do the relevant conversions for you as we go though this.
How we weigh ourselves in stones in the UK. This fella is around 1 stone!
So, a long time ago I wrote a blog post explaining why weight is particularly important in running. At the time I was training for a 100 mile ultra marathon (which I never even made the start line of) but if you want to read this you can find it here. Time to Address the Elephant in the Room
The basic premise is this.
When you run the ground force through your joints is 2 – 2.9 times your body weight each time your foot hits the ground
A marathon is 42,000 metres. Assuming I travel a metre per stride, that is 42,000 foot strikes
If I weight 100kg (15st 10lbs, 220lbs) then this is 100 x 2.5 (if we take the average from the first point) x 42,000 which equals 10,500,000kg of force my legs have to absorb over a marathon distance.
If I weigh 80 kg (12st 8lbs, 176lbs) this number reduces to 8,400,000kg of force, a reduction of 2.1 million kg of force my body has to absorb
The largest bull elephants weigh about 6000kg, so the reduction in impact force is around 350 elephants worth. Thats quite a lot.
Then things get even more interesting. According to a podcast I listened to a long time ago (which I now cannot find to reference) athetic performance increases roughly 5% for every 10% of bodyweight you drop, assuming that you only drop fat and maintain muscle. Now bearing in mind I want to drop about 20-25% bodyweight (I currently weight more than 100kg (220lbs or 15st 10lbs) I could be looking at a performance increase of 10% or more. This would mean that my current marathon speed of around 12.5 minute miles would improve to possibly sub 11 minute miles, which would improve my marathon finish time from 5hrs 30 minutes to around 4hrs 48 minutes.
Now all of the above is just based on weight alone. It does not factor in improvements in fitness that can be made from training. It is only taking into account my current level of fitness and my current weight vs my ideal racing weight. So if I get the training right and the weight loss right I could be closing in on 4hr 30min marathon, or perhaps less.
Whilst marathon running is not all about finishing times, believe me being out there for an hour less is a good thing. Marathons are hard. Really hard. You usually feel OK up to around mile 18-20, then you face 6-8 miles of pain and suffering to get over the line. If that pain and suffering can last a bit less time that can only be a good thing.
My knees hurt!
All things considered it is a good idea to weigh less than I do when running. Quite a lot less in fact. So, for the 133rd time of trying, I am going to have to lose weight. Something that is relatively easy to do in your 20’s, trickier in your 30’s and very hard to do in your 40’s. Combined with the fact that endurance exercise is not actually that good for weight loss (I will blog about this another time) and the fact that too much training tends to break my body anyway, basically I am just going to have to eat a lot less.
I really like food though. That is how I got into this position in the first place 🙂
Then again, if White Goodman can succeed on his weight loss journey and almost lead the Cobras to victory against Honest Joes in the American Dodgeball Association of America International Dodgeball Competition then I am sure I can do the same, and run London at a weight substantially less than I am right now.
It’s a metaphor.
So off we go. Not only do I need to train hard and rest and recover, but I will be needing to do this on a calorie deficit. Should be fun.
Next post will be about running and not about being overweight, I promise.
To track Project 80 and see how well (or not) I am getting on please use the Project 80 page
Snooky's Adventures 