Saturday 28 April 2007

An Idea

After completing the London Marathon and recovering sufficiently after 3 days (well my legs stopped hurting), an idea started to fomulate in my head. I am 37, going to be 38 in August, I wonder if I could run 40 marathons by the time I am 40.

Bearing in mind I only had 27 months to go and I had only completed 3 marathons, it seemed impossible. On searching the internet (www.runnersworld.co.uk) I discovered that my challenge was going to be difficult not because of me but because there just are not enough races for me to run, certainly not in the UK.

So, not to be detered I decided to change the criteria slightly and that I would attempt to run 40 long distance races (minimum distance half-marathon) before I am 40. This sounds better, I had already run 9 marathons/half-marathons so only 31 to go. It was at this point I decided I had better ask my running coach, Richard (www.momentumsports.co.uk), after all there is no point attempting the challenge if he did not think I was up to it. Well he actually liked the idea, with a little tweaking to make it harder for me (I'll tell you about that later) and so I opened my spreadsheet I started working out how I could schedule 31 races over the next 27 months....

Sunday 22 April 2007

Flora London Marathon 22/04/07

Well I have just completed the London Marathon, as ever it is a great experience and I managed a respectable 3:45:46 which considering the heat was not bad. However I did not suffer to badly from the heat (must have been my Aussie training) what I did suffer from was just the vast amount of people I had to try and run around.
I was actually quite close to the start (it only took 4 minutes) and everyone in front of me was suppose to be doing sub-3:45 marathons, however the first mile took 10:30 minutes. As I was suppose to be averaging 8 minute miles, I was devesated and it meant that I just could not get into my stride at all.
It did not stop there, I spent the whole 26.2 miles going around people walking, even worse walking along the magic blue line.
I do feel more can be done to stagger the start a little more so such bottle necks are avoided and also (as suggested by another runner at the end) anyone who peels off there pen sticker (it can;t come off it has to be peeled off) automatically goes to the back of the queue and is not allowed to jump in.

What do other people think about this or am I just being a boring runner, all comments welcome.