London Marathon 2012 race report

A stroke of bad luck! Then more! ! Then more!!!

London Marathon 2012

To say I wasn’t looking forward to the London marathon was a bit of an understatement! I know I was lucky that a place came up with the English Federation of Disability sport (EFDS), which I really appreciate by the way, but things turned sour with my training from pretty much day one. I originally got my place around the end of October, and as if by magic that’s when my various problems started!

I seemed to go from a ‘could do anything’ sort of runner who never got ‘niggles’ or injuries, to a ‘whats the next injury going to be?’ type of runner. My wife, and a few others, often said that it was either really bad luck, or someone ‘up there’ didn’t want me to run this marathon. Perhaps it was a bit of both?!?!?

So, around early November time, a few days after I had got my charity place and five months before the marathon, I was in the very early states of marathon training. It was around this time when I developed a mysterious illness and became generally exhausted and run down – and I hadn’t even up’ed my training yet! arrgghh!!

To cut a long story short this lasted, with other complications, for the next six months with frustratingly no real diagnosis or explanation from the medical profession on what the root problem was. I seemed to finally shift the ‘illness’ (although the jury is still out as I’m still not totally 100% well) by using alternative, natural remedies as traditional methods (pills, lotions and potions from the doctor/chemist) didn’t seem to help at all.

Iliotibial Band Syndrome

All this obviously had a huge negative affect of my training, so then came strike two in the form of Iliotibial band syndrome (ITBS) in my right knee. This little nasty, which is the bane of many runners, raised its head around the same time as the illness, fatigue and other problems.

I’ve had ITBS before, in the other knee a few years ago, but managed to ‘fix it’ within a couple of weeks by focusing on stretching and changing my trainers (which were due for a change at the time anyway). But this time it was different! I started to notice the familiar ‘stinging’ sensation on the outside of my knee and a slight tightness in my hip, and knew from past experience exactly what the problem was and what to do. STOP RUNNING!

Now this is harder than you think when you’ve only got a couple of miles before you get home. But rules are rules and the best rule for the on set or treatment of an ITBS twinge is to STOP RUNNING IMMEDIATELY!!!!! So started more months of lack of running misery. Suffice it to say this also had an effect on training, involved a number of new pairs of trainers, a Physio, a swimming pool and a sports clinic (almost sounds like the start of a joke). I’ll talk about this more in a future post.

The third strike was shine splints. I’ve read about them and always though ‘ouch!’ they sound painful! But in my 5+ years of running I’ve never even had a twinge from the shine area, not until TWO WEEKS before the marathon day (remember what I said about someone up there not liking me?!)

And yes, although I don’t think it was the worst case of shine splints in the world, they bloody well do hurt! So off to the doctors it was again. After going from a person who maybe visited the doctor every five years or so, to one who was going very five weeks or so with illness, tiredness, etc, I honestly think he was getting sick of seeing me! The doc gave me some pills, which basically consisted of a higher strength (than over the counter drugs) painkiller and anti inflammatory combo – ironically with the side effect of drowsiness – great! Just what I need if I’m running a marathon and trying to train! – is that strike four?

Unsurprisingly by the time my ‘week before event chill out’ came I had done very little training and the training I had done had been erratic to say the least, mainly due to the desperation and worry about not doing adequate post event training (catch 22)! I managed to squeeze in a number of 10 milers (my normal, old, Sunday run distance that I used to enjoy prior to my troubles starting in November) but these were not built up to and perhaps the cause of the shin splints! Doing sudden bursts of distance, when you haven’t built up to it, is such a bad idea, and I should have known better and therefore paid the price!

As a runner it’s a funny (not) and extremely frustrating situation to be in, to be honest:

You want to run, to the degree that your climbing the walls – But you can’t run because the injuries you have require rest and recuperation – But you can’t rest because you have to train for an event! – Catch 22!

Of course one option would have been to pull out altogether, which under normal circumstances, I would have. I seriously considered pulling out a number of times as April grew gradually closer, but I felt a little guilty due to the charity donations I’d raise and I didn’t want to let anyone or the charity down.

I came to the conclusion that I’d just do what I could do. If I had to walk the end of the course due to lack of fitness or injury, then I would. If it took me ten hours then it would, but I was determined to finish, but to also limit any further injury or damage.

The Sunday before the marathon I started my ‘running event gear pile’ in the corner of the bedroom, dusted off the check lists and crossed my fingers!

Marathon day arrives

As the Marathon wasn’t until the Sunday we decided to travel down on the preceding Friday morning and head for home on the

2012 London Marathon – Scribs running number

Monday afternoon. This gave my family and myself a few days to do the London tourist thing. Ideally I probably should have rested my throbbing shin, but I actually found that it was worse if I sat around, so walking around London visiting the sites actually helped and took my mind off things.

We arrived in London around midday on the Friday. I left the family to book into the hotel and I headed for the ExCeL in London’s Docklands to register. This also gave me the opportunity to get used to the DLR and get my bearings for Sunday.

Sunday morning – Marathon day – soon came. I’d had an early night (actually this was my fifth early night in a row) and, as I’ve learnt from the events I’ve done in the past, I made sure I had everything ready well before bed time. This is a good tip, you don’t want to be messing around with your running number and safety pins or trying to fasten your tracking chip to your trainers the morning of the race. Get everything ready so you literally can get up, get Vaselined, get dressed into your running gear, fuel and go. This came home to me when I saw a guy, 15 minutes before the race, in a panic because he didn’t have any safety pins to fasten his number to his shirt and everyone he asked didn’t have any spares. Whats the motto? Be prepared?!

Down at breakfast I was surprised to see how many runners there were. We were all there well before the normal guests and had the same idea of getting our pre event fuel. Most of them were easy to spot from their Virgin 2012 London marathon red kit bags and general running attire. I wished a few good luck as I was served my porridge and downed toast with jam and juice. Within 20 minutes I was walking through London on my way to the tube station, feeling a little silly wearing my running kit whilst walking. It wasn’t the warmest of days so I had an old disposable fleece on the keep me warm.

One of the many advantages of the London marathon is the free public transport for runners on marathon day. I had a few pounds in my running belt in case of foul ups (there’s that always be prepared again!), but was relieved when I entered the tube station, making sure my running number was visible, and the station master waved me through the turn styles. As I drew closer to the start, at Greenwich, the occupiers of the tube changed from your general mix of commuters to runners. By the time we reached the DLR at Canary Wharf station (a few stops before Greenwich) everyone was a runner. It was about this point when i noticed the atmosphere change. The excitement was growing, runners were sharing stories of past London marathons and other events they had taken part in, training woes (I know that one alright!), tips and exceptions.

Before I knew it we had left he DLR ‘train’ and were on the Greenwich platform shuffling along on foot, shoulder to shoulder, following the crowd all heading for Greenwich park, and the start line. I checked my watch and I had a good 45 minutes before the start which took a little pressure off. I don’t know if it just me, but I like to reach the start in plenty of time, but not have to wait around too long if I over-estimate the travel time. Navigating London in my running kit wasn’t my idea of a good time and I didn’t want to be in the situation where I’d be late and panicked.

Once I found my starting position at ‘Zone 3′ dumped the fleece in a nearby skip got myself ready and started my warm up. Before I knew it was time. The atmosphere was pretty electric by this time with everyone chopping at the bit and ready to go.

We’re Off

The count down completed, Runkeeper was started, and we were off. As I was in zone 3 I was pretty near the front, but as we rounded the corner, out of Greenwich park, I could see people running as far as the eye could see. A couple of miles down the road I was feeling good, not like the Great north run where I felt bloated and didn’t enjoy the first 6 miles, this was different. It appeared that this time I hadn’t over done the fueling. Relief!

Six miles in, I was still feeling ok. The shin and knee were fine and I still felt pretty fresh. I was making sure I was taking on the correct amount of water, from the water stations along the course, and also refueling regularly, things were looking good! The crowds were cheering away and I was quietly impressed at how many people had turned out to cheer the runners on. As it turned out this high valued support remained for pretty much the whole length of the course.

As I went through the 10 mile marker I was feeling a bit less energetic. The shine and knee were still fine, but I was feeling pretty drained. I comforted myself that this was probably pretty normal considering I had just run over 10 miles, especially considering the past months problems.

However, by the time I hit mile 12 I was starting to struggle quite badly. I could see London’s Tower Bridge as we rounded a corner and at that moment I thought ‘I can’t finish this! There is no way I can run another 13 miles’. Then it hit me that something was definitely not right as I’ve run the Keswick to Barrow (K to B) three times (42 miles) a number of times, and although I recognised this feeling, where your body says ‘NO!’, but your mind says ‘YES!’ I’d normally have gone a LOT further than this before I felt it on the K to B. What was wrong? ‘Obviously the lack of training, it must be!’ I told myself under my breath, mentally kicking myself. ‘..and the drugs I am on, I shouldn’t have taken any today!’ ‘It can’t be fuelling or dehydration as I’ve been keeping myself topped up along the course!’. As Tower bridge fell behind I promise myself that I’d switch to fartlets (running and walking) for the next half a mile after mile 13, to try and give myself time to perk up a bit. I started to pass other people walking, which made me feel I wasn’t on my own. It was turning into a matter of survival to complete the course and was soon becoming un-enjoyable!

By the time I hit 20 miles things hadn’t improved at all in fact they were worse. The transition from running to walking hurt. The transition from walking to running hurt. It hurt to run, it hurt to walk, but there was no way I was going to stop! My knee twinge had also put in, a half expected, appearance and had been aching a bit, but dulled after a while.

As I passed the 23 mile marker, something changed. I began to realise that I could actually finish this thing and that had a dramatic change on my performance. For the last 3 miles I managed to run, it was hard, but I managed it. At 25 miles I passed my charity supporters and saw some friends, which gave me another huge mental boost. By this time I could see Big Ben and knew the finish was literally around a couple of corners. With gritted teeth I plowed on. I was on Birdcage walk and less than a mile to the end. Through the cheering crowd I heard ‘Dad!’. I turned round to see my son and daughter waving at me and cheering me along. That was an awesome feeling and one I’ll never forget! For those of you that have run a long distant event before you’ll know that it can be VERY emotional, especially towards the end. In fact a colleague of mine who was also doing the same marathon later said that he’d experienced every possible emotion during the 26.2 miles and he is so right! As soon as I saw my children cheering me on I had a hard time from burst into tears. Luckily the draw of my attention to the side of the road caused me to trip on a sleeping policemen (speed bump, not a really person) which sent my already screaming muscles into a fit of pain, the side effect of which was to refocus me on the event at hand and drive on!

2012 London Marathon – How not to run!

One thing you hear about when trying to recover from any running injury is that you have to make sure to adopt the correct running posture to maximize efficiency and minimize stress on your body. Back straight, head up, arms at 90′ and swinging by your side ‘like they’re on rails’. But you also have to watch out that you don’t get too fatigued, which causes you to let your guard down, droop, and loose this efficient posture for a more ‘sloppy’ one, which in turn aggravates the injury further, or causes new ones. The proof of this philosophy is demonstrated perfectly in the photo (to the right) of me in the last mile. OK, I had run 25 miles at this point so I’m sure you can let me off a little But when i saw this photo I was suppressed. I didn’t release how bad my running posture had become due to tiredness. It’s a lesson worth noting.

After what seemed like an age, but was more like a couple of minutes, I saw the finish line and the clock. Now this final leg of the event
can give you a further boost. Yes you’re beat! Yes you can hardly stand, let alone run! But when you see that clock counting up the seconds you think ‘I can claw back a bit of time here! Even if it’s a second or two!’. Weather or not I did actually speed up I’ll never know, but when you actually cross that line its an amazing feeling. All the hard work and pain is over, FINALLY! I thought I would give in 13 miles ago, but I made it and that feeling, that achievement, makes the whole thing worth while.

I’d completed the marathon in 4 hours, 9 minutes and 24 seconds. Initially I was a little disappointed with this time. I was aiming for less than 4 hours and I’ve always been my own worst critic. But looking back I was probably expecting too much, considering I hadn’t been able to train as much as I wanted to. Thats the life or a runner I’m afraid. Even the professionals who run for a living have injury set backs and have to pull out of events or fail to achieve there target.

In 2009 Paul Ratcliffe successfully completed the New York city half marathon following a break following an operation. She then flew to Germany the day to compete in a marathon. Unfortunately Paula pulled out of the marathon due to ‘not being ready‘. Its a hard call, but one you sometimes have to take so you can continue to run, and enjoy the sport, in the future.

Scrib’s 2012 London marathon finish time

When I met up with the family my wife jokingly asked me if I’d do it again. I said ‘NO I bloody wouldn’t!’. As soon as I said this I knew that come the following day the answer would have changed. And sure enough, I’ve already entered the ballot for the 2013 London Marathon next year. Hopefully, this time if my health continues to stay stable and improve and I prevent further injury I’ll be able to do a better time. For now I’m taking a month off running, cycling and walking. Why a month? It seemed like a nice round number, it’s also the amount of time my medication lasts, so I figured why not. I must admit I’m climbing the walls a bit, but at least my shins have stopped hurting this week and my knee feels better than it has in months. As I write this I’ve got less than 2 weeks left before the running trainers go back on and when they do I’m going back to doing baby steps for while and work up my mileage slowly. The worst thing I could do now is to try and do a few 10 milers and injury myself again and put myself back to square one! I reluctantly pulled out of the Keswick to Barrow, which is a few weeks after the London marathon, as I think a 42 mile run wouldn’t be a good idea at the moment for me.

So why so hard?

As I had the tracking chip removed from my trainer, at the end of the marathon, and I collected my finishers medal, it came home to me how instantly better i felt – pressure gone i suppose (?). I slowly made my way to Horse Guards parade to meet up with the family and as I walked I came to the conclusion that I found the experience I’d just been through much worse than the K to B. Which sounds daft because the K to B is much, much further than a marathon and you have serious hills to deal with, whereas the London marathon is known for being a very flat course. So why did I find it harder? I’ve thought about it a lot over the proceeding weeks and I can only conclude the following two reasons 1) I definitely wasn’t at my best (injury induced lack of training, medication, etc) and 2) there where no hills.

No hills, should a flat course be easier? I noticed the same thing during the 2011 Great North run and also when I’m training on a flat route at home. If I don’t add any hills into my route I always find it harder. Now, I don’t know why this is exactly, if it’s a mind or a physical thing. My theory is that when you tackle a hill or hills your body has to work a lot harder. When you reach the top of the hill/s your body is now operating in a faster ‘mode’. This increased flow then helps you on the flat, and you find it easier. I may be totally wrong, but it seems to fit the facts, for me anyway.

Lessons Learnt

Every event you do builds your experience and you learn something new. One positive point was that I was happy with my ‘fueling’. The last event I did, the BUPA Great North run, I started the event bloated which hampered me for the first half of the race. This time I started the London Marathon feeling great and I seemed to get the balance right.

Runkeeper

As always I runkeeper’ed the event, which you can see in full here.

2012 London Marathon – Runkeeper activity

So there you have it! My first, and hopefully not last marathon.

Did I enjoy it? At the time no, but in retrospect yes Brilliant!!!

Would I do another marathon? God yes!

Would i recommend to someone else to do a marathon? Yes – but make sure you train correctly, sensibly, build up slowly (10% rule) and for long enough! Most marathon websites will give you plenty of tips on how to do this. Remember 26.2 miles is a long way to run – respect that fact.

Thanks for reading!

Scrib.

p.s. My charity JustGiving page will be open until July 2012. If you enjoyed this post, or any of the other posts on ScribsBlog, then please consider giving to my chosen charity, The English Federation of Disability Sport. You can see my JustGiving page for the 2012 London marathon here.

2012 London Marathon – Finished!

ScribsBlog gets Runkeeper Healthy button!!

 Thanks to Bill Day’s post at Heath Graph Blog, ScribsBlog now has a Runkeeper Healthly button, at the bottom of each post!!

Now all I need is a ‘how to’ on getting the ‘Fitness Widget Generator’ working on WordPress.com.

Officially WordPress.com do not support the user manipulation of the technology behind Fitness Widget Generator (like you can on WordPress.org) so you can’t add it, so heres hoping someone in the WordPress.com team would be kind enough to create a widget for us to us???

Runkeeper 2.5.1.0 released

A new version of Runkeeper is out. The main update, apart from the normal bug fixes that all Apps benefit from, is support from the Wahoo BTLE heart rate monitor.

Falling behind on blog posts, running and not 100% again.

Image via Wikipedia

Its been a funny few weeks. What with busy work, busy home and being away, my normal routine has got a bit mixed up. Add to this mix a new IT band (Iliotibial band syndrome) problem and not feeling 100% – again – and you’ve got a recipe for disaster!

At the moment my IT band problem is worrying me the most! I’ve had it before, although not as bad, in my left knee and I soon ‘fixed’ it by including a few new (at the time) stretches to my warm up/warm down routine and reverting to a previous pair of trainers. This time its in my right knee and I’m sure its more painful and actually causing a limp for a few hour after running. Not good!

So, the plan of action is to revert back to my trust old Newton running shoes for the time being and increase my IT band friendly stretches. YouTube is an excellent resource for demonstrations on how to do stretches and in this link my current IT Band stretch is demonstrated in example one (of three). I’m going to also include example two in my pre and post run warm ups/downs and might possibly look into example three (using a foam roller) if things don’t improve.

The other thing I noticed was that I’ve not been doing a full set of warm ups/warm downs due to being so rushed. I don’t think this has helped the situation and goes to show how important warm up and warm down can be.

The one big lesson I learnt last time I had an IT band problem, and still have difficulty with now, is that when you feel the pain coming on you should stop running and walk immediately. This is easier said than done when you’re miles from home, or when you’re nearly home and want to properly complete your activity.  But its good advise. The pain will (should) stop when you drop from a run to a walk and it will help prevent further damage. If you ignore an IT band problem and ‘man it out’ you can cause yourself further damage, possibly permanent damage.

Doing any sport can involve injuries, but its important not to ignore them. Yes we all get our niggles and pains when running, but you should keep a watchful eye on them and make sure they don’t turn into something more serious. As I’ve said before YouTube and forums like the one on runnersworld.co.uk can be an excellent resource for information.

I’ll keep you posted on how I get along. Next run is planned on my Newtons and for a short distance, perhaps three miles, no matter how tempting it will be to go for further!!

Running while away? No excuse here!

I’m drawing to the end of a week away from home due to a work trip. Its been an interesting  week, with busy days and early nights, but at least my running – or to be more accurate – at least my keeping fit hasn’t suffered.

Living in a hotel for any length of time can be a challenge, when it’s not a holiday trip. The first day or so can be a little exciting with the change of scenery, pace, people and getting to know your surroundings. However, this can quickly wear thin and you are left counting the days until you return home again.

I don’t go away all that often, but I’ve found that my attitude has totally changed from a few years ago when I was totally unfit. What do I mean? OK here are some examples:

Food: You can easily eat a lot more than usual whilst away, and the food tends to be a lot richer than you might normally eat. Theres also the temptation of spending as much of that daily allowance as you can, which again, can result in taking in far too many calories, much more than your body needs.

For me the real killer used to breakfast! A few years ago I’d go mad on the cooked breakfast pretty much everyday. And we’re not talking small portions here. When I finally got fit I suddenly realised that eating loads of food wasn’t making me any happier, in fact it did the opposite, when I realised how much weight I’d put on. Nowadays my hotel breakfast will be a glass of OJ, fruit and yoghurt and a cup of coffee/tea. I enjoy this much more than eating the fatty slop alternative and you feel like you’ve accomplished something by looking after yourself. ‘Good stuff in, good stuff out and all that!’.

Exercise: Even in my fatty days I used to get quite a lot of exercise in whilst I was away simply by walking everywhere. Quite a few trips were to London and walking was a great way to see the sites and explore in the evenings after work. Nowadays I carry on that tradition and always make sure I book a hotel that’s far enough away from my trips work destination to give me a good walk. For this trip, for example, I have a car with me, that I used to travel to the hotel from home. However, the car has stayed firmly in the hotel car park and I have walked from the hotel to work instead of driving, which is about a 6 mile round trip. See my ‘Why drive when you can walk to work‘ post.

Would driving be quicker – Hell yes! If I drove would I get a sleep in – Yes, about an extra hour a day!

So why walk? Simple, I enjoy it, it gets me out, it keeps me fit, it clears your head and sets you up for the day. The return walk is also a great way to unwind and I often look forward to it. A lot better than sitting in a car! There also the obvious environmental benefits to leaving the car behind also. We all need to do our bit don’t we!

I’ve also learned that when booking a hotel to always try and find one with a gym. As some of ScribsBlog regular visitors know I normally hate gym’s and much prefer the great out doors, but they do have there uses on occasion. Its also a bonus if you can get a hotel with a gym and swimming pool.

I’ve said before, in previous posts, I always take my running kit with me when going away (work, holiday, etc), and this is also the case on this trip. But due to a potential oncoming knee injury I’ve purposely reduced my running this week and mixed up my exercise between walking (daily), running (back from work to hotel) and using the hotel gym and swimming pool (daily). This has been a good mix and has worked out well to help sort out my knee. Don’t get me wrong, I would have much preferred to do more running and explore the area, but I also don’t want to exacerbate the knee. So this week has been a sort of rest from running and more walking, elliptical equipment in the gym and swimming.

So remember, just because you are away from home doesn’t mean you can’t keep yourself in shape. Eat sensibly and use the time to your advantage. Try and get a hotel a few miles away from your destination and walk or use the hotel gym and/or swimming pool.

The only person stopping you is you!

Scrib.

Running baby steps – Part 2.

Baby Harry running

I did a brief blog post a while back about ‘Running Baby steps‘ and after talking to someone in the Runnersworld forums, who had just taken up running to loose weight, I wanted to add some more meat to the subject, based on my own experiences from when I started out a few years ago.

I won’t go over my weight loss and get fit story again (but if you’re interested read my story via the Runkeeper blog, who did my story, or read the older posts in ScribsBlog) but I took up running to loose weight and it worked as I went from 14 stone to 11. The one thing I remember, and it brought the memories flooding back after talking to the newby runner, was what it was like to start running!

O MY GOD! I look back now at my early running attempts and I can still see myself running (or perhaps to be fair ‘wobbling’) down the street, reaching the end (it wasn’t far, perhaps less than quarter of a mile) and having to sit down, exhausted! If you’d told me then that I could run a half marathon or a 40 mile event I’d have politely told you to stop taking the mickie as that was impossible for someone of my physical stature!

But I did it, and I did do those things but, and there’s a lesson coming, it took time, patience and work!

We are ‘lucky’ enough to live in a society where we’re used to things being done for us with little input on our parts – the ‘instant society’ as I call it. Can you imagine life without your car, washing machine, dish washer, etc and having to perform the functions those items do ‘manually’. It might take a little longer to do the laundry and lets face it, all we have to do today is load the machine, put in the detergent and press the ‘ON’ button. Can you imagine washing each item of clothing by hand?! Unfortunately getting fit has no short cuts and that is what puts people off.

The future instant Fitness Pod?

The machine doesn’t exist – yet – where we can walk in, select our fitness level, press ‘GO’ and we’re instantly transformed into the selected body configuration. To be honest would you want such a machine? Yes it sounds like a great idea but such a device would miss one important side effect of doing it the ‘old fashioned way’ and that is the sense of achievement when you’ve completed your chosen fitness session and you think ‘YES!’.

Getting fit takes work, patience and determination (sweat, blood, tears!). Obviously the more unfit you are the more work will be involved but the sense of achievement can be a driving force for your motivation. I gave up a number of times, but looking back I know why:

1. I tried to do too much, and expected to become fit almost over night:  There’s the ‘instant society’ attitude for you. There was zero chance of running 10 miles on my first trip out and I expected too much to soon.
2. I then gave up too quickly & didn’t give it a chance: As soon as it became hard, with no instant results, I gave up.
3. Self doubt: I thought I couldn’t get fit because it was just too hard! “Being fit just isn’t for me”, “I can’t do it!”, “I’m not built for it!”.

The above three ‘failure’ points are interesting in the fact that they feed and lead into each other. One leads to two, leads to three and BANG you’ve failed. Fix point one and two becomes less of a threat, which in turn annihilates point three! Do this and you’ve got a much better chance to achieve your goal.

We’ve all know someone (or done it ourselves) who has bought a load of new fitness kit only to give up a few sessions later – I talk more about this in my ‘Running Kit‘ blog post. I’ve done exactly the same thing myself, I remember buying a weight bench and dumbbells some years ago. The bench came flat packed so I spend a few hours one Sunday afternoon putting it together. Once finished I stood back and admired my hand work. That was the last time I ever touched the bench or dumbbells, until I sold them. Just because you have the kit, or an expensive pair of running shoes it doesn’t make you an instant runner, muscle man, super fit person, etc (‘instant society’ again).

So how do we fix this? How did I fix it and pushed through to loose the weight and more importantly keep it off? Easy, although hindsight is a great thing!

B A B Y   S T E P S !

What the heck are “Baby steps?”.

A baby does not learn to walk straight away, it takes time and patient (sound familiar?). One step leads to another, to another, to another and before you know it little junior is walking. Its the same with getting fit. What would happen if you tried to get a baby to walk across a room before they were ready? They would fall, fail, possibly with tears.

Instead of trying to go for long runs I set myself goals of short runs and built them up slowly. Try it!

Remember, before taking any exercise, if you are not used to it, if you feel you might have medical difficulties talk to your doctor BEFORE hand!

Start off with a small five – ten minute walk. Do this three to seven times a week, perhaps do it instead of taking the car to the shop down the street? After a couple of weeks increase the speed and time of the walk. As you get used to it keep increasing the speed/time/distant. Try to throw in some hills and different terrain to your route. After four to six weeks of doing this try breaking out into a slow jog. Perhaps mix in a burst of jogging with your walking. One good idea is to walk for 10 minutes and run for 1 minute and keep repeating. Over time increase the jogging time and you’ll soon find you can jog for longer as your body becomes stronger and fitter. Keep this up until you can run for 100% of your activity. Don’t forget to mix up your route so you don’t get board of the same surroundings.

Notice that I didn’t suggest you start running straight away. That’s one of the key lessons I learnt. I started by walking to work, which was about a 6 mile round trip. I did this two-three times a week and increased my walking speed, over time, as I got fitter. I then extended the route on the way home to increase the mileage. After doing this for a few months I started to run in the evenings and found the transition a LOT easier than if I’d tried to run from day one.

Build it up, take baby steps. Yes we can all be impatient at times, but do you want to fail or achieve? You’ve not super man and you need to build up your body and to do that you’ve got to take baby steps. I did and it worked out for me after numerous failures.

Good luck,

Scrib.

BUPA Great North run 2011 – Run report.

2011 BUPA Great North run - Scrib happy to have finished in front of charity Village

WOW! Its done! And it took me 1:43:45!

My first, and not last, half Marathon – The BUPA Great North run is completed! It certainly was an ‘experience’ and one I’d hope to do again.

Its been a full week since the event so its been a good time to reflect. Last week the original plan was to travel up to Newcastle on the Sunday morning. This would have meant at least a 05:30 get up, followed by a 2 to 3+ hour drive, depending of traffic. Rumour had it that traffic was a nightmare, like it is at most large events I guess.

The Friday before we decided that this was ‘doable’, but a bit crazy when considering we were travelling home after the event, and not forgetting that being rested before a 13.2 mile run is always a good start. So we managed to make a last minute booking into a hotel just off the M6 at Carlise, about a 70 minute drive away  from Newcastle upon Tyne and the start line. This knocked a good 80 minutes off the journey and allowed a ‘sleep in’ until at least 6am. As it turned out we could have slept in longer!

We left the hotel bang on 7am, after getting up, eating a large bowl cold porridge (first mistake) with honey, raisins, milk and OJ, and then heading east to Newcastle. The weather looked promising, with little cloud, and the sun coming up. It was certainly better than the past few days of torrential rain and strong winds. My wife was driving and I remember looking at what I was wearing (running vest, shorts, sock & trainers) and then glancing at the external temperature readout on the dashboard, 5 °C!

The road was clear and we had been told by many, many people of the extreme traffic jams leading up the the Great North run start line, and also when leaving at the end of the run at South Shields. At the moment the road was clear and, on a normal day, it would take us 70 minutes from the hotel at Carlise to Newcastle.

The previous night I had calculated we’d be hitting heavy traffic, all trying to get to the start line, at about 7:50am. Assuming the worst case scenario, an hour delay stuck in traffic (again, going from what I had read and been told) I figured I’d be dropped off at around 9:30 – 9:45am (worst case) which gave me plenty of time to get to my starting zone ready for the 10:40 start.

‘Should be a little warmer by 09:30′ I though, so I didn’t get too worried about the temperature outside. As sods law would have it we’d (OK, I’d) drastically over estimated the travel time and traffic conditions. We hit ZERO traffic and before we knew it we were at a red traffic light right beside the start area. I was hurriedly ejected from the car, between traffic light changes, and dumped at the side of the road at a chilling 8:15am! It was still cold!

A had a plastic bag with me, containing a bag of nuts, water, energy drink and a poncho. I quickly put the poncho on to try and retain some heat and wondered off towards the starting zones.

2011 BUPA Great North run - Waiting at start zone. Over an hour to go.

The zones run from ‘A’ through ‘K’, ‘A’ being the Elite Athletes. My zone was ‘C’,so I found a nice spot on the grass verge, beside the road,  and settled down for a 2+ hour wait. As soon as I had sat down the sun came out from behind a cloud and things started to warm up nicely. I sat there  listening to the DJ interviewing runners who were taking part. There were some really heart clenching stories of runners who were running for depart loved ones. It really puts things in perspective!

Its often said ‘its a small world’, and on that day I had to agree. After being dropped off, whilst walking to the zones area, I bumped into a neighbour. We had no idea that the other was taking part. We wished each other luck and went our separate ways.

Then whilst sitting on the grass verge, warming myself in the morning sun, I saw fitlesley, a friend of mine from Runkeeper. I’d never actually met Lesley before and we’d only spoken over Runkeeper, our blogs and Facebook, so it was great to meet at last! We joked at the fact that Lesley spotted me in a crowd of 50,000 people. Small world indeed, or just good eyesight!

Eventually, around 10:15am, I made my way into my starting Zone, dumped my plastic bag in the central reservation along with thousands of other bags, clothes, ponchos, thermal blankets, etc and started my warm up. It was a little cramped and it felt a bit awkward doing lunges and stretches in such closer quarters. Everyone seems to have their own warm up routine and I picked up a few new ideas to add to my own. It was interesting to watch what routines people had and how they differed.

10:30: Warm up complete. The zone gate is now closed, meaning anyone not in their allocated zone would have to go right to the back behind zone ‘K’.

10:35: Poncho now joins plastic bag in central reservation.

10:38: Runkeeper started on my iPhone, iPhone put in zip lock bag (in case of showers later on), finger ready on ‘Start Activity’ button.

10:40: The starting gun fires! We start walking forward, and I can see from the mass of bobbing heads in front that we’ll be speeding up to a slow jog within a minute or so as we cross the start line. ‘Start Activity’ pressed and Runkeeper announces ‘Activity Started’. iPhone screen lock pressed and iPhone put into armband, just as the crowd breaks into a run. And we’re off!

As you’d expect there was a LOT of noise, what with air horns going off, music playing, the DJ shouting out encouragement – pretty awesome! Within a few minutes the speed had increased, but was still at a slower pace than felt comfortable, so I joined with some of the other runners in weaving through the slower competitors. A trick I leaned on the Keswick to Barrow was to find a runner who is ploughing through the crowd and stay on their heals. They’ll do all the hard work for you and clear the way. A few minutes into the run and we go though a tunnel. Suddenly the noise levels increase from the runners as they take advantage of the echo’s from the tunnel walls. A few ‘Oggy! Oggy! Oggy!’ chants start up, and you can’t help with the reply of ‘Oi! Oi! Oi!’. Everyone is excited and full of adrenalin!

1 Mile: Runkeeper announces the first mile and there is a bit of relief that I managed to start the activity recording successfully, considering everything that was going on at the start.

2 Miles: We’re now well into our stride. The crowd has thinned out slightly, but only slightly, and its still shoulder to shoulder. We make our way across the famous Tyne bridge and soon hit the 2 mile mark, its about that time that I release something is not right.

Scrib running acorss the Tyne bridge on the BUPA Great North run

Yes I am in this picture.

If you don’t want to play ‘wheres Scrib’ then I’m on the left hand side, about seven people from the left, about eight people back.

I’m not relaxing into the run as I normally would at the two mile mark. I’ve been running for a few years now and I’ve also noticed (for me) that it takes a couple of miles for my body to kick into life and go into ‘running mode’. This wasn’t happening and I didn’t feel ‘right’. Was it nerves? Had I eaten too much? Was it that cold porridge? Did I drink too much energy drink, What was wrong?

I knew from doing other events that nerves wasn’t really a problem and I had a sneaking suspicion that I had too much swilling around in my stomach, which was making my uncomfortable and stopping me entering my ‘zone’. I’d had my breakfast, at the hotel, some 3 -4 hours eariler, but I had also been snacking on nuts, water and half a bottle of isotonic drink (that I don’t usually touch). Nothing I can do about it now, grit teach and keep going!

4 Miles: I was in trouble. My mind was not on my run at all and I was starting to panic. I did the classic mistake of worrying about when the next mile marker was, how far it was, ‘surly it can’t be this far to the next marker!’. A classic mistake and I knew it! I kept getting bottles of water at the water stations and making sure I kept hydrated and cool, but also ensuring I wasn’t taking too much in.

Was it the hills? Normally, when I run at home there are a lot of steep hills. You can’t go far without running (pardon the pun) into one. But I have also noticed that if I run, on the flat, for any distance I struggle more than if I throw in a couple of hills into the route. I’m not sure why this is and I always surmised that the hills kick your body into a higher gear so the straights are less of a challenge. The Great North run has hills, but they are very slight gradients. Perhaps this was the problem?

7 Miles: I started to finally relax! I got into my stride and stared to finally enjoy the run. Th crowd had thinned out a little more and I remember how impressed I was at the people who had dressed up in fancy dress. I was hot running in my running gear, god knows how they felt!

10 Miles: Watching the 10 mile marker go by was great. I  knew the worst was behind and I tried to pick up my speed. The road was getting fairly steep so I pushed on trying to maintain my pace. At this point the heavens opened and it started to rain. One of my favourite things about running is running in the elements and the rain was a welcomed cool off.

12 Miles: What goes up, must come down! The road has already plateaued and now there was a steep drop to the coast road and the final stretch. I had something left in the tank so I picked up the pace down the hill, remembering to keep light on my feet.

Scribs crossing the finish line at the 2011 BUPA Great North run

Final stretch: The final stretch was very flat as the road meets the ‘Coast road’ which, as its name implies, runs along the coast. I can’t see the finish because of the crowds, but its close.

I push forward figuring I’d try and burn up the last of my reserves in a final burst. It wasn’t that easy as there was still a large amount of people on the road, but I managed to do a fair job of reaching the finish line in a good time.

Once across the line I stopped Runkeeper and made my way to the Charity village to meet my wife. The rain was falling still but it didn’t matter!

Scribs Runkeeper activity for the 2011 BUPA Great North run

I completed the BUPA Great North run in 1:43:45, which you can see here.

Am I pleased with that time? Yes of course! When signed up for the event and gave my expected time (they use this to figure out your starting zone) of 1:40, which I didn’t actually expect to achieve and would have been happy with 1:50 – 2:00. So 1:43:45 was a great result!

But to be honest I’m wondering if I would have done better if I hadn’t had a sloppy first half. Its funny when you do an event, sometimes afterwards you think of things you did wrong or things you could have improved upon. With experience you get better and this is certainly true for running.

Maybe that’s just me? But in every event I’ve finished I’m always thinking ‘I could have done better than that!’ or ‘I should have done this’ or ‘I shouldn’t have done that!’.

Its a good way of driving yourself on. Accepting you did an OK job, but then trying to improve on it, never accepting you did your best and there is room for improvement, always thinking you can do better. But now and again giving yourself a pat on the back and a well done! All the training paid off, you did it!

Runkeeper blog does ScribBlogs story

The Runkeeper blog has just published my fat to thin story. See it here:

http://blog.runkeeper.com/fitnessfreaks/fitness-freak-paul-scribbans

Incorporate not Decimate!

Life can be busy and this can be a real pain for training. Its all too easy to come up with excuses why not to train, and one of the best excuses is ‘Oh, I’m too busy’ or ‘Something important (not really) has come up’. I’ve always found the best way to combat this is to have a fixed schedule of training that MUST not be changed!

What I mean is, finding the gaps in your normal weeks schedule and slotting training into those gaps and then make them a permanent fixture. It sometimes helps to make a calendar of your week to help you identify these gaps. If something unexpected crops up, then tough! You’re busy! It’ll have to be done on a different day! NO EXCUSES!

Think of it this way, if you have kids and they do Football (Soccer to my American friends) on Monday, Karate on Tuesday and Swimming on Thursday, you wouldn’t necessarily miss an activity when a little excuse comes up, especially if you pay for those activities. These are fixed events in your week’s schedule. So why do it for your training?

In the above example, assuming you wanted to train three times a week,  you could fit it into Wednesday, Friday and Sunday, remembering that there is the opportunity to train early mornings (my favorite time is early Sunday morning before everyone is awake) or later in the evenings,  or why not train whilst going to or coming home from work, as I do.

I use the above rule to make sure I stick to my training. There is the odd occasion when something comes up, but I have to put my foot down and say “No, I’ve got something on then”. It soon becomes the ‘norm’ and it isn’t really a problem anymore.

Incorporate not Decimate! What does that mean?

Last weekend was Fathers day and we had a busy day lined up visiting parents and grandparents, I also fancied having a lie in for a change. But I normally train on a Sunday morning so the plan was to get up extra early and forget about my lie in. The thing was my son had a football tournament on the Saturday in a town 10 miles away. It suddenly occurred to me on the Saturday morning, a few hours before the tournament, that I could simply run to the event and still get my lie in on Sunday! Brilliant! I was still going to get my training in, all be it a day earlier than normal, and I’d have a different & new route to run which can really make a difference. In fact I was quite excited at the prospect of doing a fresh route which I’d never done before!

So that’s what I did. My wife took the kids in the car with a change of clothes for me – problem sorted!

Incorporate your training into the stuff you have to do, don’t Decimate your training!