My post today is not about my running or how I am progressing
towards the London Marathon 2018. It is a defence of the marathon
distance against an article by Adharanand Finn about how running 26.2 miles just isn't enough and my view on the upcoming strike that will more than likely disrupt the London Marathon 2018.
My
view about RMT's strike relating to the pay and conditions provided by
KeolisAmey is that employees should have rights to reasonable redress
when their employer treats them unfairly, and in extreme cases protest
against this matter if necessary. However in the case of the London
Marathon 2018 I think it is hijacking a high profile event to show that
they are being treated badly, which I find ironic; i.e. we are being
treated unfairly, therefore we are going to make life incredibly
difficult for people who are trying to raise millions of pounds for
charity.
Before you read any further
this isn’t a blog post about coffee or coffee making; though with my marathon
training reaching peak mileage in March it has certainly felt like I am some
sort of coffee bean. Gradually being ground down into some finer form, which
will help me achieve a smooth, refreshing run at London. Maybe I should just
stop with the metaphors now and continue with March’s entry...
When I
used to play rugby there was a moment during the match, where I felt the fear
and thrill in the anticipation of the next 80 minutes. That moment was at the
beginning of the match, when the referee blew his whistle and the opposition
fly-half kicked the ball into the air towards me and my fellow team mates.
There were generally two ways the ball would be kicked to us. The first would
be a quick short kick luring us forward to get the ball, whilst allowing the
opposition to steal the ball in mid-air or quickly allowing them to nail our
unsuspecting player (or me) to the ground. The other was a high, slow ball that
fell deep in our territory which, even though it allowed us time to gather the
ball, meant we were pinned back in our territory. Each approach presented its
own problems, but also provided the excitement of rugby and is what made the
game so fun to play.
“I’m normally a lot better going up the hills than I am
going down them” pants the runner by my side.
I look at one of my competitors; or more accurately the
person who is sharing the pain of the Southerns with me. He’s bent double,
breathing deeply as tries to take in as much oxygen as possible and all whilst
trying to avoid falling down the slope he has so painfully climbed up. I hope
that I don’t look like I am in this much pain for only the beginning of our
second lap of this dreaded hill; and realise I am pretty much identical to his
agonising form.
We are scrambling up one of the hardest parts of the nine
mile Stanmer Park course. The climb we are on resembles some sort pathway to
Count Dracula’s castle than a cross-country race to me. I know it’s cold, as
sheets of rain are pouring down, but I am boiling; a clear sign of my exertion.
My pace is getting slower and slower, whilst my heart rate soars, and it seems
as though we are no nearer to getting to the top of this climb.
My fellow climber falls over and slips down the slope, he
has realised our worst nightmare. I ask if he is okay, he grunts as well as
nods. By now I’m already a few metres away from him, we both know that this is
still a race and I also can’t afford to lose momentum going up the steepest
part of the course. I keep trying to draw more air into my lungs and, whilst I
struggle for breath, saliva fills my mouth. My feet start to slow to what
almost feels like a walk and I spit to clear my mouth, as the top of the hill comes
into view. Unknown parts of my body start to ache as I attempt to carry on
running up the hill. I try to think about how satisfying it will be to finish
the race in one piece. Then another thought enters my head, what happens if I just pull out of the race;
I am only just recovering from an injury, no one would think any the worse of
me.
The answer to that thought lies in December 2017. My mind was on not running London, as the house move seemed to be taking
up all my time and my hamstring didn’t seem to be improving. In essence I felt
like Bill Paxton in Aliens:
So after my previous post, I thought things would progress with my recovery from the hamstring strain and man-flu. I thought I would be able to walk back into my running plan after five to seven days of easy running and prepare for specific sessions. Very much like Arnie below, I was going to return with vengeance.
I’ve come to the realisation that you can learn just as much about your running, from being injured as you can when you are going through a really good period of running. Once again I find myself unable to run for a few weeks, and I am hoping this is a worst case estimate; due to a combination of ‘man-flu’ and a hamstring strain.
It’s been a far more consistent period of running for me, since my last post here. My weekly mileage has been moving up to 40- 45 miles per week, with the usual decent key sessions spread over the week. Hopefully I can start to make a venture into the low to mid 50s in the next month. In some ways it’s more than just being able to do the mileage again, it’s about having that confidence to be able to run hard without the fear of a niggle turning into something worse.
A number of things have helped during October, which were in some ways sparked by going to see Blade Runner 2049:
I am big fan of the first film and the sequel certainly didn’t disappoint. What I really like about the film is how it questions what it means to be human, what constitutes our identity and ultimately can we trust our memories of the past. In relation to running what it got me thinking about was how I thought about my running. I realise that I may have come to think about my marathon running in a way that is too narrow. What this has meant in practice is that I would only try to work around a training plan that catered for marathon running, as well as the training that went with that, and any other races that were built towards that 26.2 mile race. Simply put anything that wasn’t specifically to do with my marathon training I didn’t pay much attention to it.
That has now changed from my experiments with different approaches to training over the Summer. Whilst the Summer of 2017 did not result in the best races, or training progression for that matter; it did show me the benefit of increasing my mileage during the week ,and then doing a quicker but shorter long run over the weekend. After my marathon training at the beginning of 2017 I thought with the slightly lower mileage it would be easier. In fact I found it pretty damn hard, as the training fatigue combined with the heat made me quite tired. My track and tempo sessions weren’t great for this period, but what it gave me was a way of focussing on those workouts and I how approach them.
This has benefitted me greatly coming into the cross country season. Obviously it was not fun spending most of August and September recovering from ITB issue. Most of all I am grateful to be just running consistently again and looking forward to running through serious amounts of mud.
