Charlie meets Seb!

(I wrote most of this post in the week of 26th Sep - so I thought I'd better post it!)

4 weeks to the Lausanne Marathon.
2 weeks to the Phedippidations World Half Marathon Challenge (at Henley on Thames)

Week 1 - 40.
Week 2 - 39
Week 3 - 36
Week 4 - 31
Week 5 - 19
Week 6 - 26
Week 7 - 61 (!!!!) Long run 1 - 16 miles.
Week 8 - 24
Week 9 - 50 Long run 2 - 18 miles
Week 10 - 50
Week 11 - 10
Week 12 - 40 Race 13.1
Week 13 - 5 Ooops!
Week 14 - 38 Long run 12.5 miles

6 week average 32 miles. The bare minimum!

My weight is around 85 kgs.

The achilles tendonitis remains but I am still running! I had to shelve the 20 miler and review the strategy. I am assuming that this long run will leave me with significant soreness and I will need some complete rest afterwards - so it will now be run sometime between October 2 and 4, just under 3 weeks before the race in Lausanne. This will then be my only big week before the race. It feels like I am tapering already, but I have to ensure I get to the start line before worrying about my finishing time. Hopefully I can also run a 14-16 miler still this week as well.

So much for planning....
Last week's running was fairly good really, despite being again wedged in between a pretty exhausing work schedule. The overall mileage was down on what I wanted, but my long run of 12.5 miles was quite pleasing in a bizarre way. I had intended to run no more than 7 miles, expecting achilles soreness to set in - but despite wearing my "problem" Mizuno shoes this simply didn't happen and I just kept adding loops to lengthen the distance. What wasn't too clever was not taking a drink - two de-hydrating hours took their toll by the end.

At the weekend I worked at the Windsor Half Marathon, and squeezed in an early morning 6 miler through the deer park, splashing through the dew, avoiding the deer and even cruising down the long walk and through the half marathon finish. I must run this race next year as the setting and traffic free route are just great.

Later in the day something pretty special happened. Working on our family run speciality coffee bar as part of the catering set-up we often serve the officials and marshalls once the race has got under way. On this note we made a cup of tea for the guy who started the race, one Lord Sebastian Newbold Coe, and I was able to demand he autograph one of our menus because of the influence he had on my running " career". He also dropped some change in our collection pot for the Ugandan Orphans - I always knew he was the good guy and Ovett was the bad guy. He still runs daily when he can and he looked almost as fit as he did in the eighties. I bet he could break three hours for the marathon now if he put his mind to it. He is a little more than one year younger then me.

I feel that I can finish this marathon if I am not too ambitious about the time. A sub 4 hour finish may be beyond me, but we'll let the 20 miler decide this for me - if I can do it in a comfortable 9:30 pace then maybe I can be a little more ambitious in Lausanne.

Robin Hood and his merry hills conquered! Tendons not co-operating.

5 weeks to the Lausanne Marathon.
3 weeks to the Phedippidations World Half Marathon Challenge (at Henley on Thames)
I ran in the Robin Hood Nottingham Half Marathon.

Check out how no. 784 finished here.

Just select "Robin Hood Marathon" and bib 784.

Do you feel my pain?

Week 1 - 40.
Week 2 - 39
Week 3 - 36
Week 4 - 31
Week 5 - 19
Week 6 - 26
Week 7 - 61 (!!!!) Long run 1 - 16 miles.
Week 8 - 24
Week 9 - 50 Long run 2 - 18 miles
Week 10 - 50
Week 11 - 10
Week 12 - 40 Race 13.1
Week 13 - 5 Ooops!

6 week average 30 miles. It looks like an early taper

My weight is around 86 kgs still.

So after an up and down week including a five mile run with both my kids (lump in throat) and lots of doubts surrounding the state of my achilles tendons, I drove up to Nottingham on a foggy September morn and conquered the Robin Hood Half. My last battle plan involved running 8:40 pace to 10 miles and then attempting to speed up to get as close to 1:50 as I could. The logic being that I could extrapolate to a sub 4 hour marathon from this.

Perhaps I did this. It's difficult to tell. My stopwatch didn't make it through mile 1! But I know that my "chip time" was 1:49:50 and I ran the last 3 (slightly downhill) miles in about 24:10. My finishing position was in the top 25% of the 6800 field. Not bad for a V50 who hasn't raced in 6 years

Positives :

I was strong on the hills
I hit my race time objectives
I enjoyed the race and the atmosphere
I finished with my strongest miles
I have my first medal for 6 years. Nice.

Negatives :

My achilles tendons got progressively more sore from 5 miles. I don't think I could finish a marathon if they behaved the same.
I nearly fell asleep on the M1 coming home, and after being cramped up in a Mazda MX5 for 2 hours, spent the next 3 hours on my feet.
I almost immediately got a cold in the days following.

The week after left me with a work schedule with practically no "running windows", and I grabbed one of the few open to me on wednesday, by running 45 minutes through thickly grassed parkland in Northamptonshire as the sun went down. This did the tendons no good at all of course. Silly arse! So the rest of the week was enforced rest, but nevertheless I spent most of it on my feet working and only by sunday could I get up without lower leg stiffness.

I ran 7 miles on the roads today and soreness in the tendon was progressive from about 40 minutes into the run. As I write this my left ankle is resting on an ice pack and I had Ibuprofen with lunch. Yum! My determination to run the "full" in Lausanne is certainly being challenged and I still want to run flat and hilly 20 milers over the next 3 weeks before tapering. The flat one should be this thursday - we'll see.

With the Lausanne course giving 2700 feet of up and down "undulation" I need in particular to seriously challenge my endurance on a long run with 2000 feet of up-and-down. That will severely test out the tendons, won't it? I've plotted a course...

Every runner I tell I have achilles tendon problems seems to pull the same face and not one has ended the conversation with the cheery words,

"You'll be OK."

So as a result I've felt duty bound to say it for them

"I'll be OK, it's under control!"

Is it hell?!

I'm going to finish off this week at the Windsor Half Marathon, one of the best organised UK halfs and wholly off public roads. But I'm not running it, merely serving the coffee! Photos to be blogged next week.

The race is being started by Seb Coe, an absolute hero of mine and an inspiration in my first running "career" in the mid eighties. I can remember vividly getting up in the middle of the night in 1984 to watch Seb retain the olympic 1500m title in Los Angeles. Watching that race again still brings a lump to the throat and sets the hairs up on the back of my neck. Coe's kick against the then world champion Steve Cram on the final bend off a searingly fast pace was as majestic and courageous a piece of running as has ever been seen in a UK vest and unfortunately only Liz McColgan and Paula Radcliffe have matched that performance since, both in the 10k to Marathon distances and neither of them at an Olympic Games. Nobody was going to beat Seb that day, although all the experts had written him off as yesterdays man by that time, due to a prolonged period of glandular illness. The fact that Seb actually set his sub 3.30 1500m PB 2 years after this final has passed largely unnoticed as by then others had lowered the world record. Seb's 800m world record set in 1981 has only been bettered by one man since in 25 years of trying with amazing progression in training techniques and athlete preparation, and this only by .6 of a second. Seb only won his first international championship at 800m in 1986 as well.

I once read an article written by his father / coach where it was claimed that one of his standard training runs was a sustained pace 10 miler in a little over 45 minutes. Heavens knows where the marathon world record would be now if Seb had turned his mind to it towards the end of his career as Haile Gebreselassie has!

The fact that this supreme Olympic runner has managed by force of will and personality to bring the games back to the UK is just further complement to his right to the status of an immortal amongst runners in the UK.

Do you think he'll let me make him a latte?

One last footnote - Dean Kanzares has now started his awesome attempt to run 50 marathons in 50 days in 50 states of the USA. Check out the website of his quest and the blog also.

And I'm worried about a bit of tendonitis!

And now for the good news.

We've had a good two weeks raising sponsorship for more of the young Ugandans whom we wish to fund at Busalamu Secondary School in 2007. And I have to get deep into the second half of this marathon now, tendonitis or no tendonitis. Here's the next list of mile per child sponsors.


Mile 11 is represented by Eseza Namulondo. Thanks to Myra and Trevor White for their sponsorship. Very old friends with kind hearts.

Mile 12 belongs to Rehema Nakiyemba. Great thanks to David and Viv Binding for their generous support.

Mile 13 and we are halfway there. I'll be turning around on the lakeside just past Vevey, hopefully not into a headwind! Zaidi Atuma will be sponsored by various small donations at Spire Park Horse Trials. Thanks to all.

Mile 14 is represented by Joshua Bamwesiga. James Eyre took time out from re-building the cross country fences at Highclere Castle to donate the sponsorship. Sincere thanks.

Mile 15 was sponsored by many coins dropped into the pot at Highclere Castle Norse Trials over the bank holiday weekend, thanks to Chris Farr and the commentary team for the plugs on the P.A. Paul Balikyaza will be going to Busalamu SS again next year thanks to you.

Mile 16 belongs to little 16 year old Samali Nakisoya. Thanks to the stable management crew and Ellen the Vet at Blenheim International Horse Trials this week for your kind donations which form the sponsorship of Samali's next year in school. And congratulations Ellen on completing that crazy race over the x-country course, with funds going to the Anthony Nolan Trust. I hope the sluggish dry run on friday that we did made a difference!

Mile 17 was also sponsored by donations given at Blenheim HT. I'd like in particular to thank Amy Tryon, recent WEG Eventing bronze medallist for her contribution. Jacqueline Kagweri will be going to school next year thanks to you and several others.

So as the crock continues his training there are just 9 miles still to sponsor! More good news next week I hope.

Running and Resting in my head

7 weeks to the Lausanne Marathon.
5 weeks to the Phedippidations World Half Marathon Challenge (at Henley on Thames)
6 days to the Robin Hood Nottingham Half Marathon.

Week 1 - 40.
Week 2 - 39
Week 3 - 36
Week 4 - 31
Week 5 - 19
Week 6 - 26
Week 7 - 61 (!!!!) Long run 1 - 16 miles.
Week 8 - 24
Week 9 - 50 Long run 2 - 18 miles
Week 10 - 50
Week 11 - 10

6 week average 37 miles (must get to 40!)

My weight has crept up to 86.5 kg (down 5.6 kgs in 12 weeks)

Not good. Not good at all.....

As I write this I cannot really decide whether I am an injured runner or not. Sometimes you read trite stuff written by life coaches, sports psychologists and business school teachers about goal setting and achieving, overcoming obstacles and using your inner resources to defeat adversity. None of these wide expanses of text give you any advice about achilles tendonitis, a frustrating obstacle that the runner comes up against that cannot be dealt with by any resources that the body or mind can call upon.

As referred to in my last training report, this bout of tendonitis has crept up on me almost unnoticed. It is not surprising considering the increase in mileage that I had subjected my 50 year old body to, but nevertheless it has dealt me a heavy blow and I am now trying to engage the intellect with a strategy that gets me to the start line in Lausanne in 6 weeks from now. At that point I will know that I can probably deal with whatever that marathon has in store for me, but I have to get there first.

After two 50 mile weeks, the last two runs during which finished in some considerable discomfort, I backed off considerably last week. In fact I completed just two runs on grassland, totalling 10 miles. Mind you, it was very nice grassland - on the Duke of Marlborough's back lawn! The worrying thing is that on the first occasion I was fine for 40 minutes or so and then the soreness began to become uncomfortable, stiffening up considerably later. Two days later this began after 2o minutes. Today I am going to run again on the roads and it will be a really important test for the next 6 weeks as I lead up to the marathon.

I've decided that this will be another easy week, perhaps with some swimming, but that I will start in Nottingham unless in pain and see how I go. I will not try to run through pain though and will pull out if it really gets uncomfortable. This race is not my key objective and I must be self-controlled and remember it. Tough for me. Next monday I will have to set my Lausanne strategy up and however demanding the cross-training parts are I will have to stick to them. It will be an incredible exercise in self-discipline, but 26 children's schooling now depend on me and I owe it to the donors to deal with this setback.

The main problem apart from the occasional bouts of discomfort is that I miss the running! I had definitely re-discovered the joy and freedom of the sport after 15 years or so of being a bit of a running lightweight - allbeit an overweight lightweight! Positive thoughts flood in as the unused belt notches come into play and the daily entries get posted on the log. I had made promises to myself never to stop running again and had even begun to think of setting some more goals after Lausanne - a late winter marathon, an ultra, a mountain race, a trail challenge, even in my most delirious moments the Comrades. An overuse injury such as I now have is something of a reality shock to all this, perhaps a timely one. Slow down, Charlie - don't get carried away...but winter is on it's way now in the UK and getting out there will be harder and harder with more goals "down the road".

So next week's report will be an intersting one. I wonder - maybe I'll go to bed one night and it will have gone away by morning........