Drawing to a close…

The Christmas holidays have brought a much needed rest for me, with the chance to catch-up with family and friends. I always find the period between Christmas day to New Year’s Day a strange time, as people seem to become focussed upon finding the best deals and the latest gadgets. I found myself drawn into this whirlpool of consumerism, as I tensely searching the websites of running stores to buy my preferred running shoe at the cheapest price. I convinced myself that it was necessary to obtain these shoes, as I aim to be running the London Marathon in 2019; however I couldn’t help thinking that I had become caught up in the spending rat race that characterises Christmas now. This vast splurge of spending was contrasted with the sad news in the run-up to Christmas of a homeless man dying near the Houses of Parliament. It seems that homelessness is becoming an increasing problem in the UK, with complex causes and taking place against a harsh economic climate and volatile political situation. Regardless of your political or religious beliefs I found this clip I listened to on Radio 4 to be a relevant call to action about how we – as a society – confront homelessness, as well as show some compassion for our fellow man. Whilst people may not agree with the religious message, it does serve as a counter-point to the increasing material nature of Christmas.

In terms of my running I was pleased with a total mileage of 1,625 miles for and an average mileage per week of 32 miles for 2018. Whilst these numbers could be higher, I do not see this as an issue primarily because there is nothing I can do about it and it provides the opportunity for me to improve during 2019. So my goals for 2019 will be about focussing on improving these numbers. The reason for having these as goals is that I want to focus more on process in 2019. It would be great to be able to put something down like to get a personal best in the marathon or 10k etc., but in a lot of ways these are things that can get de-railed by challenges popping up in life. My experiment with 2019 is to see if by concentrating on keeping my running as consistent as possible, getting enough recovery through a more disciplined sleep pattern and approaching my training on a weekly basis (rather than projecting into the future); that I will improve my running over 2019. I hope this will give me a certain amount of freedom, as I will not be worrying so much about the results of what I am doing, instead I hope it will mean I can change my mentality to focus on the immediate tasks in relation to my running.

It is to that end that I have made two significant changes to my running. The first is that I have gone back to my old running club and the other is that I have decided to obtain the help of a running coach. I mentioned in my last post that I did not feel like my current running club was the right fit for me and ultimately the deciding factor has not been the option to run cross-country for this club. Whilst geographically I may be distant from the club I am returning to, I will be able to run cross-country and hope to be able to run in the Southern cross-country races as well. I have also not been able to find a running group to do any sort of training runs with since I have moved to Bedford, so from my perspective it does not make it that much different moving back to my old club

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The lack of a training group, as well as guidance, has meant that I have decided to pay for a coach. Some people may baulk at this idea, but for me there are so many benefits. I feel like I have made some good progress with my running- getting my marathon time down from 3 hours 31 minutes to 2 hours 55 minutes- and learning a lot about the sport along the way. The lack of a running cohort as well as guidance up in Bedford, has meant that I feel my running has stagnated over the second half of 2018. This could be down to me not applying my knowledge of running accurately enough, but it could be argued that this is where the benefit of coaching comes from. I appreciate that I am not at the top echelons of the sport, but what is most important to me is not so much the times I get from running, but the structure a coaching plan provides. It allows me to not worry about how I progress towards London, instead I can put all of my energy into completing my running to the best of the ability.

Running is not all science, but partly an art and so there is no exact formula that can tell me if these changes will improve my running. I feel like I have turned my running around in the last quarter of 2018 and have hopefully laid the foundations for a good training period in the lead up to London. Only 2019 will tell me that, but for now I look back on a year where I learnt a lot of lessons.