The Race

Here we go again, 3rd time and the least amount of training I have done to date. Its been difficult this year balancing family and work with running as I have been traveling so much.
This year I am running to raise awareness of Meningitis due to the tradegy in Febuaey when my Nephew Leo died. Leo Good
We will see how far I get, and will try and keep a live update as I go through the checkpoints.

11 Weeks to go, 2 Weeks to Fling

Panic setting in now, a chest infection kept me out for 2 weeks started back on Thursday with a 90 min hill run, felt awful. Then traveling and parenting meant no running Fri-Sat so this morning the plan was to get up early and go do a 6 hour trail run with 2000m ascent. After finaly dragging my ass out the bed at 8:30 and getting coffee and breakfast into me the chances of a 6 hour run were dwindling. Instead I opted for a fast 20km hill run straight up the side of one of our local hills 10km up. I was about 7 mins slower than previous pb so all in all I shouldn't be too disapointed. BUT I have not done any runs further than 40km this year or 5 hours where as the past 2 years I have done several 5hour plus runs. In less than 2 weeks I will be starting the Fling an 85km trail race that has a time limit so I cant even take it easy and hope for the best. I have always said that 90% of this race is in the head so I think I will have to prove it this year, though I wish I had done the last 10% training. As there is always a silver lining the trees are pollonating today and the air was a thick yellow soup so I hate to think what my lungs are like a 5 hour run may have resulted in several pine trees taking root in my alveoli.

13 Weeks to Go

A 40km run on the Sunday with nearly 1800m ascent, climbed in the pool at the end to cool down the legs which was harder than the run itself. As it was my birthday the kids had made a cake which was just what I needed to help wash down the beer.

14 Weeks to Go

Been neglecting the blog site again, Finaly starting to ramp up to the bigger runs hope I have not left it too late this year as previously I was doing 60km+ by end of Febuary but this always led to injuries so idea this time is to ramp later.

20 Weeks to go

Skiing all day Sunday meant I had to do the long run on the Saturday and parenting dictated that it was late afternoon so not as far as I wanted but opted for a hill run on steep forest track up to Tourettes from Roquefort kept it slow but was still suffering. Did some fast 1km sections in the weekly runs plus a fast Friday run.

21 Weeks to go

A better week plus a full day skiing on Saturday. Did a flat long run on the Sunday and went through the half marathon distance at 1hr39mins and felt good not sure I have another 9 mins in me but another 3 weeks of training to go.

22 Weeks to go

Better week last week we forced ourselves to run in the snow that was beginning to thaw, and has mostly now cleared from the paths. Times are slow mixture of ice/snow and lack of speed. Need to do sprint training. Sunday run the watch died as I had not charged it most of the week so finished the run at 22/23 Km. Also skied both Sat and Sun.

23 Weeks to go

Too much snow and ice and a large sprinkling of lazy made for 3 runs last week. 2 * 13km then the prom classic 10km race yesterday, embarresed to say it was 44 mins but in my defence I didnt get time to warm up (lazy problem again) and over the past 3 weeks I ate most of the christmas cake myself! Aiming for a fast Semi in mid Febuary.

24 Weeks to go

Pain in my left foot, turned out to be an ingrown toenail and the beggar is deep. Will have to dig it out. Its from the big toenail I lost last May after the Mercontour assault coarse.
Anyway I did not do much this week, other than eat drink, ski and walk the dogs the runs I did do were all slow. Looking to ramp up over the next 5 weeks to a fast semi in Cannes.