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

What to do? Crank the miles back up to five for today before hitting tomorrow’s big run as part of my marathon program for Athens. We’re endurance runners for cripe’s sake, what else did you expect

Despite the niggles and sore bits, as per usual it was fine when I got outside and started running… but then again, it always is!

Click here for a link to Garmin Connect for a map and details of the run

Miles today: 5
Target: 1029
Miles to date: 1,432.68

Please donate to my chosen charities by clicking here

When the cat alarm (thanks Mini) went off this morning at 3.30am, I wanted to just curl up and die. Luckily, I was so whacked, I managed to pull her under the covers and get her and me back to sleep.

Six am and I was up, feeling like the body weighed about 20 stone rather than 13. A five miler seemed impossible today so I Vaselined up on all the sore bits and headed out to do three at as slow a pace as I could.

At 42, I am also now discovering the joys of Sudocrem – an antiseptic ointment that helps relieve discomfort from things like nappy rash!

Click here for a link to Garmin Connect for a map and details of the run

Miles today: 3
Target: 1017
Miles to date: 1,418.68

Please donate to my chosen charities by clicking here

I got it back on yesterday but couldn’t get the Sky TV on as well – for some reason, Sky insist that you have it connected to a phone line… probably to flog you stuff like movies and the QVC channel.

Anyway, I was up at six, trying to fix it, annoying Laura who was trying to sleep and getting more irate at my inability to attach a new phone plug to a cable. I ended up cutting the cable back so  many times, it ended up being too short and so it all had to be re-laid.

The run at least dissipated some of my frustration and anger. It was a muggy day, no sun but low cloud, really heavy as though it wanted to summer thunder but couldn’t.

The result was that body temperature elevated from pissing about relaying the cable, I sweated like a b******* all the way around Tooting Common… and at one point pulled up with a really tight pain in my adductors, the inside of the thigh. Quite weird but I managed to run it o

Only 28 more runs to go now.

The best thing about doing this blog has been meeting other people through cyber space I would never have met. Three immediately spring to mind

Andy Ratcliffe who is taking on the challenge next month from me. We met via the blog, he came on the 1095th mile run and we have stayed in touch ever since. Great lad and I am so glad he’s taking on the challenge so I dont feel compelled to carry on running.

Kelly Taylor.  An American lady who started commenting on my posts just when I was beginning to feel like no one was listening and it was time to give up. She recently completed her first 5k on a C25K program. Well done Kelly (follow her blog here)

Alex Kyprianou. Alex is a Brit who has become an Aussie, living in Melbourne for the last 18 years. We’ve been in touch via email – a top bloke who is going to wear a 1095miles.com tee at his next 10k. His excellent blog is here

Click here for a link to Garmin Connect for a map and details of the run

Miles today: 5.6
Target: 1008
Miles to date: 1,395.50

Please donate to my chosen charities by clicking here

For those of you who have missed any related posts, the First Rule of Running Club was devised by my pal David. The First Rule of Running Club dictates that you must got for a number two before going on a run… the theory is that if you don’t, you’ll want to half way through the run.

Well I followed the first rule and I still wanted to go half way through the run – which made for a particularly uncomfortable second half of the run.

The strange pain in the bottom of my left foot was also playing on my mind. With every step, I get a small stabbing pain coming up in the area just before my toes… it’s not unbearable but not pleasant either.

So this evening, I decided to venture back to my running heroine, Lillian, the sports maseuse at the Virgin Active gym in Streatham. She gave me a good going over, releasing some of the pressure on my aching muscles and in particular the adductors (the ones on the inside of your thigh). But she also found what is wrong with my foot – apparently, I’ve a little bit of tendonitis and I could feel it clicking as she tried to massage it away.

Click here for a link to Garmin Connect for a map and details of the run

Miles today: 5
Target: 972
Miles to date: 1,330.75

Please donate to my chosen charities by clicking here

It could have had something to do with the fact that I woke up and, instead of going straight out, waited a while until I woke up, had a cup of tea, a banana and, crucially, some ibuprofen…

The result? I went out on my flattest route, just down London Road and back and ended up doing my best non-race time over five miles… just over 40 minutes.

Yesterday evening, I came back from work to find my Registrar of Exercise Professionals card had come through – the first step on the journey to my PT qualification – meaning I can officially practice as a gym instructor now.

Mum’s been over from Greece for a couple of weeks and moaning about not feeling fit enough, so I put together a little program for her and took her out onto Streatham Common after the run to put her through her paces. My first training client, albeit non-paid

Click here for a link to Garmin Connect for a map and details of the run

Miles today: 5
Target: 966
Miles to date: 1,321.25

Please donate to my chosen charities by clicking here

For some reason, on the Tube into work, I started sneezing… no rhyme nor reason, but I could not stop. And I still haven’t stopped more than 12 hours after first one. I reckon I must have done in excess of 100 sneezes and been through a whole box of Kleenex, but I don’t feel ill. Quite bizarre, unless I have got hayfever for the first time in my life.

The good thing is, it at least has taken my mind off another annoying niggle that has cropped up from nowhere. On my left foot, just before the toes, there’s a small stabbing pain that sends just a little jolt up my leg with every step I take. Again, no idea what it is, but it shouldn’t stop me running.

Click here for a link to Garmin Connect for a map and details of the run

Miles today: 5
Target: 963
Miles to date: 1,316.25

Please donate to my chosen charities by clicking here

Fitness training in the UK is monitored by the Register of Exercise Professionals which has various levels of entry. Gym Instructor, which allows you to work in gyms, set up programmes for people and do most of the cleaning (!) is level two on the Reps scale, whereas a PT is level 3.

Despite some initial nerves and forgetting a couple of tiny bits, I did okay on the test, the examiner saying I was largely excellent…. my Reps card should come through in the next week or so!

Click here for a link to Garmin Connect for a map and details of the run

Miles today: 5
Target: 924
Miles to date: 1,244.83

Please donate to my chosen charities by clicking here

I’m incredibly busy at the moment, a fact made worse by a last minute commission to do a story for The Times that needed turning around in less than 24 hours. When Mini started miaowing at 4am, I took here down to the kitchen and went back to try and get more sleep and failed… the mind started whirring and I started writing.

Great idea, right? Get it out of the way and then the day can start. Wrong! By 6am, I was knackered, shut my eyes for a second and woke up at 8.30 with a very warm lap from where the laptop was still whirring away.

Anyway, I dragged the kit on and set off but I was unmotivated, uninspired, it was hot and my right calf muscle has started to develop a little niggle. To top it all, the roads were jammed and everywhere smelt of choking car fumes.

I’d decided to just do a three miler but once out, I thought ‘in for a penny’ and carried on past the 1.5mile point of return and began to head into Croydon.

I’ve never suffered from hay fever before but there is certainly something going on this year where every so often, it feels like I have a bit of pollen or twig or something or other stuck in the back of my throat and I start coughing uncontrollably. This happened at about mile 2.2, causing me to stop just outside an NHS dentists in West Croydon, and stick my fingers in my throat, which just made me wretch more.

Luckily, I’d taken a water bottle with me and after downing half of it, the niggle had eased enough for me to run home at a really slow pace with no more dramas … but it really was an unsatisfying morning and my leg hurts even more now.

Click here for a link to Garmin Connect for a route map and details of the run

Miles today: 5
Target: 870
Miles to date: 1,146.61

Please donate to my chosen charities by clicking here

Anyway, I was pretty shattered when I woke up: a week of increasing my mileage to five miles a day plus three days of cycling too and from central London, along with a long shift on Friday, staying up and studying and the mental preparation of studying for the first time in nearly 20 years had all caught up.

And so, I did just three miles this morning – I like to call it a recovery run

The course is getting more interesting now. We’ve paired up and are working out gym programmes for each other that we have to demonstrate in our assessments in a couple of weeks and have to learn correct teaching methods for all the equipment in the gym, from cardio to the resistance machines.

The way back was an interesting one: when I got back to Streatham, there was a bit of backed up traffic, so I decided to jump a curb on the bike and ended up with a flat… With no puncture kit on me it meant a nice mile and a half walk back to the house.

Just round the corner from home, there was a young couple, Im thinking 15 or 16 having a massive row in the hot afternoon heat. And so heated were they that all their pals had got involved, so there was pushing, shoving, slapping and all sorts going on. thankfully the slapping was the boy punching himself rather than his girlfriend.

Click here for a link to Garmin Connect for a route map and details of the run

Miles today: 3
Target: 864
Miles to date: 1,136.61

Please donate to my chosen charities by clicking here