But, instead I decided running was the way forward and to be honest after I got going the wind actually stopped and the air was really still, this really did take away the cold and so my run was actually in pretty good conditions.

On the way round today I was thinking about how many days I had done so far and that it was really good that I was still going, then, I thought that actually I was even a third of the way through let alone close to the finish. It’s funny suddenly September seems a very long time away. However, I decided that you can’t dwell on those thoughts else you will break yourself mentally. Instead I thought about how many weeks I had done, 15 and that in turn that means that there are only 37 to go, that didn’t seem as bad as thinking there are still 260 days left!

Miles Today: 3.14 (5.05km)
Miles Completed: 364.17 (586.08km)
Miles To Go: 730.83 (1176.12km)
Shoes: Saucony Omni Grid 10

Then it all went a bit hazy. Genuinely, the world took on a strange soft focus. I think my blood sugar went very low. I found myself struggling to keep going, much like the last five or six miles of the marathon last year. Not a good experience. I guess I need to be very careful after a big event and make sure I have something (i.e. money or sugary stuff) to hand in case of such emergencies. This reminds me I frequently run without any ID on me and if I keel over in the street, I’m fairly unlikely to be identifiable there and then! Must do something about it…

I popped into the Marathon Store at Covent Garden today, as I had a bit of time this afternoon after the flight landed. The guy there described my Asics Gel Kayano’s as the Rolls Royce of running shoes, with a great degree of support and high levels of cushioning. He reckons if I want to try anything else, I have a choice of the Saucony Hurricanes or the Adidas Salvations. Maybe I’ll give one of the alternatives a go soon. I had my eye on the Nike Lunar Eclipse as they’re slated to be very good in the cushioning stakes and to be honest, if the Kayano’s are the Rolls Royce, I hate to think what the cheaper options are like. My ankles hurt just thinking about it! One final piece of advice the guy in the shop proffered was that being a daily runner batters the shoe much more heavily and that I should consider alternating pairs, allowing the cushioning to recover. Now, I tend be a bit cynical in most ways and this is no different. Surely, if the cushioning is going to come back, it’ll do it in 12-24 hours won’t it? It’s only a bit of spongy plastic after all! Anyway, he reckoned that may be why I struggle to get 350 miles out of running shoes (which reminds me, I’m using the excellent SportTracks from Zone Five Software to track my shoe mileage, it’s terribly effective!) and worryingly the new ones are up on a hundred miles already.

I’m going to feed myself copious calories and try to recover now. More tomorrow as always!

Andy.

Miles today: 3.60
Target: 399
Miles to date: 473.31

The Athens Marathon is approaching at the end of October, as is the Royal Parks half marathon in the middle of the month and it’s been a while since I’ve done a really long run.

One of the things about not doing the challenge any more is that I am able to take rest days and I hope this is going to improve my performance and so I set off yesterday morning at 7am with a spring in my step, despite the cold and drizzle.

My plan was to run the seven miles from home to Green Park, meet up with my pal Dave and a couple of other lads who are also training for the Royal Parks, do eight miles with them and then run as far home as I could.

According to my training program, yesterday should have been a 20 miler but with no real long for a few weeks, I’d decided to settle for 18.

Getting into town was relatively easy, I wasn’t bombing it, but neither was I taking it easy, the few days rest were obviously doing their job.

I hooked up with David and the boys at around eight, luckily, one of them was doing his first half marathon, had not done much training for a few weeks and wanted to take it easy, so we let him set the pace for the eight miles we had to cover.

We ended up doing a huge figure of eight around Hyde Park before rounding Buckingham Palace through Green Park, down the Mall to Trafalgar Square and down Whitehall, past Downing Street to Westminster Tube. It was all at a rather leisurely pace of around 10.5mins a mile.

We split up here and I headed back over Westminster Bridge to South London, we were at around the 15mile mark and I knew that every mile I could add on from now on was in the bank as training for Athens.

I decided to pick up the pace again for a mile or two but coming into where Oval starts to meet Brixton, I was getting less and less hopeful of being able to do any more than 18: my glutes and calves were on fire, though I was glad to feel mentally really strong.

In Brixton, just by the bus stop where busses come back to Streatham, I’d had enough. I’d slowed right down by now and decided to call it a day, jumping straight onto a bus – bugger it, I’ll stretch at home I thought. Bad idea.

By the time I was back in Streatham, I’d totally seized up and it was much too late to stretch out, so it was a hot bath for an hour and lots of neurofen through the day.

I’m aching like heck this morning and just glad to think I don’t have to do three miles – though poor Andy is probably about half way through his run at the moment!

We had to be on an 8am train to Shropshire this morning, meaning we had to leave the house at 7am and we hadn’t packed last night either.

As a result, it was around 5.20am this morning when I went out to run to a deliciously cool morning with cloud free skies. In fact, when I opened the door, the first thing I could see when I walked out was The Plough in the sky. Given there’s so much light pollution in the sky in London it’s very rare you see any star formations so clearly.

Predictably, the roads were pretty empty and I managed to get home just as the local milk man was doing his rounds. I even had the presence of mind to stop him and get a leaflet on milk delivery as Laura is drinking so much at the moment.

I must have looked pretty scary, 5.50 am, still dark, sweating profusely and breathing heavily and running in front of the float to flag him down, but fair play to him, he stopped and gave me some gumph.

Have a neat little plan for the last run tomorrow – I can’t believe it’s almost over – so come back and read all about it.

Miles today: 3
Target: 1092
Miles to date: 1,512.65
Please donate to my chosen charities by clicking here

Today’s run

Laura and I are going up for the weekend, so I can do a story for The Express but we set off early tomorrow morning (we have to leave home at 7am) so I’m not sure whether I will get the chance to run in London before we go or not.

This morning’s run was nothing special but quite pleasant, despite my body feeling as though it has been through the wringer. The sun was out, there was little traffic around and everything seemed rosy.

It turned my thoughts and attention to the year that’s just gone past. Today is the first anniversary of my leaving Metro – and what a year it’s been. In the meantime, we’ve got married, are having babies, have totally remodelled the house.

From a work perspective, I may not have travelled as much but I am doing well – corporate writing, consultancy, training and writing and have settled into quite a nice routine where I do two shifts a week at The Express and occasional shifts at The Sun – both of which allow me to get back into office mode every so often.

On top of it all, I am just about re-trained as well, adding personal training as another string to my bow, while I have completed a marathon and three half-marathons, while I have another coming up…

Yes, it’s been quite a year.

Miles today: 3
Target: 1089
Miles to date: 1,509.65
Please donate to my chosen charities by clicking here

Today’s run

Yesterday was a pretty interesting day on the course, we were doing a ‘training in alternative environments’ module and went to the local park and started devising programs with just tennis balls, park benches, a few cones, a football and a few dynabands (they’re the stretchy elastic things). By the end of the day, we’d gathered quite a crowd watching us.

Today I had two exams in the morning, Exercise and Fitness Knowledge Level 3 and Nutrition and Weight Management and, to be honest, I think with everything else going on, I probably bit off more than I could chew by booking them both on the same day. I think I did ok on Nutrition but the other one I might just squeeze through, I might not…. the pass mark is 75 per cent so relatively high.

Having the exams this morning meant I did some last minute brushing up from 5am and so I decided to leave the run until this evening for a change – but first I had to do a chore.

One of the things we’ve had done to the house is have a new kitchen floor laid and we had three packs of floor panels left over and they had to be returned to B&Q for a refund. Guess who tried to pick them up all at once? Yes me, and I’ve either pulled a muscle in my chest or bruised a rib when I bear hugged them to lift them at the same time.

So as well as the sore legs, I hobbled another run this evening with a very sore right chest as well… and the faster I ran, the heavier I breathed and the more I hurt. Roll on the day off!

Miles today: 3.5
Target: 1086
Miles to date: 1,506.65
Please donate to my chosen charities by clicking here

Today’s run

The thing with doing the practical assessment is that you pair up with someone else on the course and then train in each other in a session. Given I practised the session I was going to teach today on Saturday, then went and practised the session I was being taught today yesterday, and then went and taught and was taught over two sessions today (anyone still with me? Im starting to get confused myself) in the actual assessment, the thread title is a fair reflection of how I feel.

The good news is I passed the practical element of the course and, providing I can pass the theory test on Thursday, I will be a fully fledged level 3 PT, though will still need to complete some more modules to get my full diploma.

The funny thing is, while I’ve been doing the course, I’ve been surrounded by some proper gym bunnies and I always thought cardio exercises were my strong point and that resistance ones were there’s.

Part of the session that Jonathan, who I buddied up with, involved me doing lactate acid interval training and so I took to the treadmill and thought I was doing it with ease.

When we finished, the assessor said to me that I really need to look at my hip flexors as Im not actually flexing enough in my running… and I think he’s right. Thanks to several doses of shin splints through the year Ive been running, I’ve started to avoid too much stride lengthening and leg raising when running to avoid the higher pressure this would involve on the legs. It seems that by doing so, I’ve compromised my running style. It’s something that in six more days, with a bit of rest, I can start looking in to!

Miles today: 3.07
Target: 1077
Miles to date: 1,496.15
Please donate to my chosen charities by clicking here

Today’s runs

So what did I do today? Three bloody runs instead.

This afternoon, I was meeting my course colleague Jonathan at the gym where I am doing my practical assessment tomorrow for my Personal Training Course. I knew we’d be doing some treadmill work while there and so I decided on the way to calibrate my new Garmin watch with my Garmin Footpod.

The Footpod is a small oval shaped piece of kit that clips onto your laces, speaks to the Garmin watch and acts like a pedometer to gauge your run when there is no satellite signal… where you are in the gym or some such.

To use it though, you have to calibrate it by running when it is locked into a GPS signal and so I ran from the house to the station to do so.

Then in the gym, after yesterdays’ sickening session, Jonathan and I beasted each other and part of my training was a mini interval session – cue the Footpod coming into play.

Finally, I decided to get a few extra miles in by running back home from Clapham Junction. Total mileage covered for the day? 5.78 – nowhere near a long run but I am battered.

Miles today: 5.78
Target: 1074
Miles to date: 1,493.08
Please donate to my chosen charities by clicking here

Today’s runs

Bloody hell. So Monday is my practical assessment for my level 3 personal training award, Wednesday I have a ‘training in alternative environments’ workshop all day and Thursday I have two exams, one in Exercise and Fitness Knowledge, the other in Nutrition.

And it feels as though I’m drowning in it all.

For Monday’s assessment, I have to give a mock session to a ‘body’, a lad called Jonathan from the course that includes a host of advanced resistance techniques in the gym.

And so I ran to the local Virgin Active and made myself do John’s whole session so I knew I could teach it properly. The problem is, the advanced techniques see you do some pretty crazy things, four different exercises, one after the other with no reps and heavy weights.

By the time I’d finished, I was ready to be sick – and then had to run home on top of it… As I said

AAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

Miles today: 3.01
Target: 1071
Miles to date: 1,487.30
Please donate to my chosen charities by clicking here

Today’s run

A couple of people have already showed interest in doing the final run with us… which should be fun if we can get a proper crowd out and will set off the idea of the weekly running club nicely.

We’ve also migrated to a new Twitter account rather than tweeting just from my personal one. If you’d like to follow 1095miles on Twitter, click on the little birdy on the left.

Miles today: 3
Target: 1068
Miles to date: 1,484.29
Please donate to my chosen charities by clicking here

Today’s run