Darn Parkrunners!

They make a terrible mess of the path in the winter, those Parkrunners. Muddy sludge all over the top corner of the park. I'm joking though. I love Parkrun. It is a brilliant thing and long may it continue to grow. It does make it difficult for me though. The balls don't bounce well in it, it splatters mud all over my legs and shoes and makes a terrible mess of my hands.
It amazes me how different the conditions are on each side of Norman Park. On one side the wind whistles through you and it's cold, wet and muddy. On the other side there's no wind, the path is dry and in the sunshine it's much warmer. As I started on the muddy side I was immediately concerned that I'd underinflated the balls. They could've done with a little more perhaps but the main problem was the mud. On the better side of the park they weren't performing too badly.
Earlier in the week I'd been discussing with fellow Petts Wood Runners how I should approach this run. The last run I did before Christmas I was on fire. It felt really good and I did the 15 miles averaging less than 9 minutes per mile. I wasn't sure if I should let my ego try and keep this pace today or if I should deliberately slow it down. I don't think it's standard practise to do all your long runs at race pace - it's more about being on your feet for longer. Anyway, it was almost immediately clear to me that I wasn't going to be able to average under 9 minutes for the 17 miles I had planned today. I'll get to the stats later.
I measured how much water I put in my hydration pack today. I put 600ml in it. I need to get an idea of how much I need to carry for the marathon without carrying more than I need. I finished it at 16 miles. I stopped every mile for a time check, a bit of water and a Jelly Baby today. God knows what I ingested in the filth I'd accumulated on my hands each time I fumbled for a Jelly Baby.
At one point I found myself slowly catching up with a woman jogger. When I eventually got alongside her she said "I wondered what that stupid noise was". I laughed it off at the time but it was too late before I wished I'd queried "Stupid?". I don't think she lasted long.
I found it very tough today. I could've cut it short to make the average stats look a bit better but that wouldn't help me in the long term. I was set on 17 miles and it will have done me good to battle though to that today. I have to get used to running on tired legs. So to the stats:
I did the first mile in 08:42. My slowest mile was mile 17 which was 10:34 which will include stopping for water and Jelly Babies but the clock won't stop for that on April 23rd. I did 17 miles in 02:43:04 which is an average of 09:35 per mile. At that pace I would miss out on the world record by around 30 seconds. That annoys me but it was a training run and this is still well within my grasp. It's just not in the bag yet. I was so drained at the end that I have spent most of the afternoon in bed. I might give myself a light week this coming week. I think I need to recover before I try 18 or 19 miles.
STOP PRESS! My phone has just buzzed. Someone has sponsored me. A man called Robert Elbourn. Never heard of him! Not surprising though. This is the message he sent:

"OUTSTANDING you overtook me and I followed you for 12 miles today. You are well on for the record. I was following at 9.06 per mile"

How lovely! That's not the only sponsorship I got today though. Joe the cyclist stopped me and gave me a fiver after I explained what I was up to. It turns out he's done a bit of fundraising for Demelza House in the past too.
In other news, I heard from Bluewater shopping centre this week that they are going to let me do a 20 mile training run around the mall. I asked them a while ago as I read somewhere that a full circuit is half a mile. I thought it would be fun to do 20 laps on each level. Nice and flat too. No potholes. A nice confidence booster before the main event. Anyway, I've got to sort out the details with them and hopefully will have more info for my next post.



Splattered shoes

Sock mark form the mud splattering I got

 

Mucky hands. Took a bit of scrubbing

 

 

 

New Year, New Balls

...And by that title I mean when I get round to doing my first balls run of the year I need to start thinking about getting my record breaking balls worn in for the race.
It's been another month since my last post and we've had Christmas and New Year to deal with, during which time I had to take a nine day break due to illness (certainly not related to overindulgence). My first run of the new year was a track night which ended in 8 x 60m sprints. I was feeling pretty hot end enjoyed pretending I was a sprinter (having never been any good at it). I really threw myself into it - so much so that all that arm pumping made changing gear in the car painful on the way home. It also meant that I tore loads of muscle fibres in my quads, no doubt in an ultimately good way but I was genuinely feeling sore for a full week.
I've been in the gym at my son's school practising my ball handling skills this week and as the track was closed this week due to snow I had time to put together the following video:

I didn't do a balls run last weekend as I was still aching from track and was taking photographs at the Minnis Bay cross country race on the Sunday (although I did run 11 miles on the Saturday). I've been away for a family function all this weekend but did manage to get 15.65 miles in in Newton Aycliffe (without balls). Mostly road. Some of it icy. A bit of cross country thrown in, all in 02:11:57 which is averaging 08:26 per mile. I won't get to take the balls out this weekend either as I've got the Canterbury 10 on the Sunday which I ought to be able to do in somewhere between 70 and 75 minutes. So it will be the weekend of the 28th January before I have a go at maybe 17 miles with the new race balls - that's if it isn't snowy or icy.

I may have some other news to share before then and if I do I'll make another short post.