Juggling Running and Life

I haven’t posted on my blog for what feels like an eternity. It has certainly made me realise how much I enjoy writing about running and where I want to take this blog. I have been coming up with some ideas about I could develop Running to Some Uncertain Purpose, but all of these will take time and some patience in how I fit all my ideas into one coherent shape. It seems to be the trickiest part of running, is having the patience to keep at something when it begins to create friction alongside other parts of your life. That has been the main reason for my lack of presence on this blog- something had to give. A number of work issues popped up in quick succession and I was left with a choice; keep running and don’t blog about it or blog about running but don’t engage in a sport that keeps you physically and mentally fit. My choice was the former, but at that time loads of things seemed to be happening with my personal running journey as well as within the running world. 

 In the world of running it would definitely have to be the allegations of Alberto Salazar participating in doping and also inhabiting the ‘grey area’ of what is and isn’t legal in performance enhancement for his athletes. From a UK perspective these allegations seem to have a global reach, as once again it brings up the spectre of doping in elite running. Paula Radcliffe has been outspoken in her criticism of doping in marathon running and it was only at the beginning of this year that Kenya’s Rita Jeptoo was found to have been doping. There have also been rumours of doping within ultra-running as well. Also by Salazar being accused of doping it has potential implications for his two star athletes: Galen Rup and Mo Farah. From conversations with other runners about this I have found there to be a variety of views about what the allegations of Salazar mean. For some it just shows that at the very highest levels of competitive running personal rivalries can lead to bitter recriminations that eventually spill out into the media, others think it is the BBC and ProPublica trying to smear one of the world’s best marathon runners, many people are worried about the damage it will do to the sport that is not as well funded or widely watched as say football and a few just want to find out the truth. I would put myself in the last two categories. Hopefully this will not be running’s version of the Lance Armstrong scandal. Whatever is going on I think that there should be consideration about how these allegations are handled (including the people who are facing the allegations), that if anything untoward has happened then this needs to be shared in a transparent manner and that we should try to remember the many positive things running brings to people all over the world. My own view is that when there is too much money at stake in terms of sponsorship, media coverage, etc. It can lead to people going too far in the pursuit of winning. Hopefully whatever happens, this issue can be resolved sooner rather than later.

Crossing the Rubicon: Joining a running club

It was a dark and stormy night; lightning periodically broke the skyline against a constant downpour of rain that showered me as I jogged across the park towards the running track. Okay well I am being a little bit dramatic. It wasn’t stormy, rainy and there was certainly no lightning! So I was probably being more than a little bit adventurous with my language. Though I did feel nervous about joining a running club, much like the stereotypical main character entering a forbidden temple or lost civilisation. Was I expecting this club to be something out of Chariots of Fire? I don’t know why I felt nervous about joining a running club. I have joined rugby clubs, a boxing club and been part of fitness classes; so it was not the fear of meeting new people. I think where my nervousness lay is with my anxiety that all that I had believed to be correct with running would turn out to be false or that I was not talented enough to be part of this running club. It is probably a very negative/ cynical view to have of myself. I also find it hard to believe that a club will cater for all abilities. These were just some of the insecurities that I was bringing along to my first track session with this club. At this point you may be thinking, why is this person telling me about how they were feeling? Or why is it such a big deal to join a running club? The simple answer to those questions is that I was joining this club to fulfil a goal I had set myself for running in 2015.

Reflections on running to date

Sunday 26^th April 2015 was a great day for me and the London Marathon. I have already talked about the joys of spectating in my previous post, but after watching Gem running the London Marathon; I knew that I needed to write about the marathon atmosphere that day and experiencing watching someone you love achieve one of their goals.

On a national (and possibly international level) Paula Radcliffe ran her final farewell marathon in London that day- finishing in just under 2hrs 37mins. A phenomenal effort considering the surgery Paula underwent in April 2013 and how she could barely run after it. For loads of people finishing in under 2hrs 37mins would be an amazing time; so it just shows how much of a world-class athlete Paula is, that she could complete the marathon in this time “unprepared”. It got me thinking about how the act of running is such an extraordinary thing. It is such a simple action, yet to get faster we spend hours, days, weeks, months, years and even decades trying to improve our race times! 

The Joy of Spectating: Watching the London Marathon 2015

This year I have been lucky enough to have the joy of watching my fiancée- Gem- run the 35^th London Marathon this Sunday 26^th April 2015, after having completed my own marathon at Brighton. Not only does this mean that I get to relive the joys of the marathon atmosphere; I also get to a see a loved one pursue something we both enjoy, I can appreciate (arguably) one of the world’s best marathons and am reminded of why I run. There is also the added bonus of seeing Paula Radcliffe make her return to the London Marathon for one last time.

Brighton Marathon 2015: Triumph over adversity

This is my account of the Brighton Marathon 2015.

Sunday morning- 02:00hrs (12^th April).

Things were not going according to how I had envisioned on the morning of my first attempt at running a marathon in under three hours. Below my hotel room was the steady thumping of disco music combined with the cacophony of voices, laughter and cheering from a party that the hotel was hosting. I won’t try to pretend to you that I remained calm. I wished I could say I had, but even my intensive meditation this week could not contain my anger at being placed right above a party. I had even asked the hotel to put us in a quiet room. Things started to deteriorate for me when I started to hear the plumbing from various other rooms. In the end I went down to complain to the duty manager of the hotel; call me a spoil sport but they had a number of  other guests staying who were running the marathon that day and I felt well within my rights. Luckily I managed to squeeze in four hours sleep, but I knew things were not going according to plan. I knew I wasn’t in the right mind set, there was no doubt I was feeling sorry for myself and was very frustrated, but I tried to be positive. I thought about how champion runners would have dealt with the situation and realised they would have got on with the job.

08:35hrs

The final step to the start line: Tapering.

“I had as many doubts as anyone else. Standing on the starting line, we’re all cowards”. Alberto Salazar.

Running, being in general an individual sport, means that things can be quite lonely. Compared to other sports I have played, e.g. rugby, I find from time-to-time I have a certain yearning to share the highs as well as lows of what my training has been like or how a certain race went. This is probably the reason for this blog, is that I like to share what I have been through even if it only helps one other person in their running journey; but also to record how I felt at a particular time or what I have learnt from training. In this post what I am beginning to understand is that tapering is as much a mental battle to believe in the goals you have set yourself for the marathon, as well as being a chance to look at what you have achieved through training and how you will run the race you have prepared for.

Training finished, into the taper

If it was easy, everyone would do it.

It’s strange sitting here typing up this blog post about how my training has been since January 2015. The main reason is my hard training finished two Sundays ago (29^th March 2015), so I have had a chance to think about how my training regime has affected me and what my thoughts are after calming down from the constant varying workouts and mileage. So you could say it is more of a training memoir rather than a diary entry; whatever you call it, it is certainly retrospective. By its nature looking back on something means that you can recollect what happened, but may not feel what it was like as intensely or at all. For me this is certainly another cause for feeling slightly dislocated from writing about training, as I feel pretty much rested and am waiting to run my marathon. So in some ways it is hard to conjure up the initial feelings of surviving such a long and specific training programme.

Though my thoughts and emotions are distanced from completing my training, I can definitely tell you even after resting that it was a lot, lot harder than I expected. I say this to you without any guilt, but there were days when I really didn’t want to run, let alone do any speed work or distance running. If I had to pin down one part of training that I began to dread as the weeks progressed through my plan; it would definitely be the tempo running session. This is where you run at your 10 mile race pace for a certain amount of time. I got very worried about making sure I did this correctly, so I ended up running on the treadmill so as to ensure I kept the correct pace. Not only was this hard, but I also found it immensely boring and led to me using music to get me through the session for the first time in my running career. However by the end of the training I had definitely got the hang of tempo running and in a funny kind of way came to love it. There were also days were I didn’t feel like I had given my all to training, such as when I hadn’t eaten enough beforehand or hadn’t rested properly. For instance, on my last long training run- around 21 miles- my blood sugar levels completely plummeted and I found it hard to put one foot in front of the other. This was not the way I would have liked to finish my last long distance training run, but I stuck with it, did not stop and sometimes that’s all you can ask for. So in a lot of ways my training has not just been to prepare me to beat the three hour mark at Brighton, but has also been a great (if sometimes steep) learning curve about running.