Distractions

So no running done for a week now. Not good. Too distracted by Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 and put off by the miserable weather that I haven't been out for days.

However I did head out mountain biking on Saturday morning in the cold, the rain, and the mud, and it was fantastic. Haven't been for years, and raked around Belvoir Forest Park getting caked in muck, and whooping like a madman every time I came down a slope. I worry I may actually have been bitten by the MTB bug again, which means I could be rethinking my future bike purchase...

Anxiety

This week I have been sick, and so only got out on Monday night for a run in the rain. Managed to come in at 9m 20s, which was the exact same time as I had obtained on Saturday afternoon!

Sharon's brother Dave has asked to train with me, though was not impressed that I wanted to do the marathon in under 3 hours! But he keeps himself fit, so it's more likely that it won't be him that has any problems doing it!

However, he ran at 7.5 mph last year for the his leg of the marathon, and I worked out that if we ran at that speed, then we would complete the marathon in 3hr 49m. Which ain't a bad time, but if we're to do it in under 3 hours, we need to be running at 8.7 mph or faster! Which makes me considerably more anxious!

Every week I realise a little more that this task is actually a lot harder than it first seemed...

I'm going mountain biking on Saturday morning, so odds on I'll probably break something and the running will have to wait!

Improvement!

Ahhh, sweet caffeine.

Anyway, I went for my mile run last night, and am feeling pretty good, as I came in quicker than my first time!

1 mile = 9m 57 secs!

That's an improvement of 1m 21 secs! Made me feel like I was Usain Bolt for the rest of the evening!

So on that basis of improving over a minute a week, I should be able to run 1 mile in 5 minutes by Christmas Day. Then it's just a matter of increasing the distances! I hope...

BREAKING NEWS: A new challenge!

Well hello again blogging world!

So I thought I would let the world know that I have now set myself a new challenge, and that is to run the Belfast City Marathon on May 3rd, 2010.

Now of course, I don't do anything by halves, so instead of just saying I'm going to complete it, I decided to find out the average time for a marathon. 4hrs 30mins.

All my life I have been just above the average mark, so the first challenge is finishing earlier than 4hrs 30.

Then I decided that I should set myself a target of around 3 hrs 30. A target that many people would aim for.

And not even happy with that, I've decided that I'm going to develop my own training technique, and aim to do it in as fast a time as physically possible, i.e. less than 3 hrs. A target that seasoned and experienced runners would aspire to.

Let me share my theory with you.

• Train until you can run flat out for a mile and do it in 5 to 6 minutes.
• Once you can do that, then increase the distance by 0.5 miles, and run that in 9 minutes.
• Once you can do that, repeat the increments of 0.5 miles and 3 minutes.
• Eventually your body will be able to run 15 miles in 1hr 15 / 1hr 30. This leaves you just over 11 miles to complete the race. Continue to train, aiming to do 12-15 miles on big training days (once every 2 weeks), but only aiming to improve your time.
  

I would love to come in at a record breaking Ethiopian pace of less than 2hrs 15, but I went for a run last night and it didn't go down so well. As I have only started running yesterday, I'm aiming for the mile mark.
Foolishly I thought I had retained some level of stamina from my Mizen 2 Malin cycle (see previous posts), but alas, I have not. After running nearly half a mile, I thought I was undergoing cardiac arrest, and was trying to wave down passing cars in the hope someone would stop and perform CPR on me. I arrived home gasping to Sharon that I needed an adrenaline shot to the heart immediately or I might die.

I completed my first mile in an embarrassing time of 11m 18s.

This is going to be tough...