The longest run and then the 'taper'.

This weekend will see Grumple and I running a whopping 20 miles. But the REALLY good news is that after that, we begin the great 'tapering'. This run is the longest distance we reach in our training and so from next Saturday we actually start reducing the number of miles we run at the weekend - marvellous news!

However there are downsides to tapering:

This means that the marathon is only 3 weeks on Sunday!

I also keep conveniently forgetting something of an important point which is that this may be the longest run we have to do during our training but we still have to run the actual marathon... Best not to dwell on that too closely...

only 4 weeks to go!!!

... why is it still so boring and painful and why has it made no impact on my body at all? (apart from now having the joints of a 70 yr old)?? I mean I genuinely thought that I would be walking around in a bikini at every opportunity by now to show off my toned svelte body... If a marathon ain't gonna shift the wobbly bits then I reckon nothing will- bring on the pizza, chips and couch potato in us I say- rock on the 27th!!!

Phew...

...it is not shin splints!!! I saw the osteo on Friday night and it was a big relief when he told me that the ache I felt was the same symptoms as shin splints but was in fact tension build up in the muscles - what a relief!

He gave me a deep tissue massage and sent me on my way. It means that I still need to take it easy for a little bit. On Sunday I was supposed to be running 12 miles so I went over and met Tom Wallace and we headed off round the river. I only managed just over 7 but think that with a bit more rest and an easier week I should be ok again by Saturday - our biggest yet - 20 miles...

The Quiz was a HUGE success...

Thank you so much to all of you who came to our pub quiz last night and to those of you who bought raffle tickets even though you could not make it. You were all hugely generous for a very very deserving cause.

We made a whopping £851.65 last night, so thank you so much. With other donations we have been given by cheque and with the totals on justgiving, including giftaid, we have now raised over £5,000 for the SIA.

We really, really appreciate all your support and the SIA will as well – the amount of money we have raised can do so much good and it is all thanks to our friends and family… Now we just have to run the blooming thing!!

Thank you so much again, you are all total legends. Hopefully see lots of you on 26th April for the ‘big day’.

Quiz results:

Three teams were tied at the end of the quiz: Tishy's Troops, Dream Team and Norfolk in Chance... This meant that there had to be a tie breaker to determine the winner - a member of each team was selected and Jamie Wallace (Tishy's Troops), Tom Wallace (Dream Team) and Harry Mercer (Norfolk in Chance) headed to the front of the room to fight for the ultimate glory...

Quizmaster extraordinaire Ed then listed a number of things which all happened in a certain year and the boys could shout the year as soon as they were confident of getting it right - if they got it wrong, they could not try again...

Harry shouted out 1996 after Ed mentioned Independence Day being released - the whole of 'Norfolk in Chance' wailed 'Nooooo!'. Oh ye of little faith... They were wrong and Harry was correct so the winners of the 2009 SIA pub quiz were Norfolk in Chance!

Extremely generously, the team then re-donated the cash prize of £60 back into our charity pot - very very kind of you guys, thank you!

The Auction

Bids were flying when the auction items were revealed and competition for the Baywatch Babes was hot. In the end the proud purchasers were:

Baywatch babe 1: Tom Wallace
Baywatch babe 2 (including Yasmine): Andy Willcock and Alex Aitchison

Raffle Winners

The raffle was drawn at the end of the quiz and the results are as follows:

A Gucci handbag Harry Mercer
Canapes for 20 by Abigail’s Catering Joe Motley
A timeless selection of hardback coffee table books Dans Jukes
A piece of bespoke jewellery by LEBANNA designs Tom Wallace
A pack of haribo Ali Scott
Half a Duke's Hill ham Bella Timmis
A jumper from Pringle of Scotland Claire Woolf
A one hour personal training session and training programme Emma Dawes
£50 of Prime Angus beef Helena Emerson

All the toys came out of the pram.

I had a serious tantrum last night and behaved rather like a petulant child for a full, long drawn out 30 seconds...

Grumps was running over to discuss the quiz and so I headed out for a quick trot post-work before she arrived. My shin has been aching a bit since our big run on Saturday but I had thought nothing of it - there is usually some part of us that aches at the moment; part of the fun of the whole thing I am told...

So I set out on Tuesday's run (1m jog, 3 x 1.5 mile steady (14 mins) and 400m slow (3 mins), then 1m jog) looking, I think, rather professional. Fozzy has lent me her running lycras so now I have proper gear rather than huge Jack Wills tracksuit bottoms (the first pair ever to do any real exercise other than walking along the King's Road) which Grumps said make me look like a shire horse, charming...

Approximately 100 metres up the road my shin was really starting to hurt so I did a few stretches and carried on, but less than 1/4 mile into the run I had to stop and could not run on. That is not strictly speaking true, I could have physically made myself run on but was worried about a real injury.

This was the point I started having a strop. It is very frustrating when you have gone to the effort of getting changed, stretching and setting out to find that you can't actually do the darn run (I was also secretly looking forward to the run). So I had a serious tantrum to myself and started stamping my feet on my way home. Unfortunately this made my shin hurt more which made me even more cross. At this stage I had the mentality of a two year old and was seriously considering lying on the pavement and beating my arms and legs on the ground. Luckily sense came through and I resisted this temptation and headed home instead.

I am off to the osteo on Friday and no running until then, please can everyone cross their fingers that it is nothing more than a temporary ache...

Sunny Shropshire and beating Neil - what more could I want?

Parted again from my partner (we just can’t go on like this!) I managed to rope the long suffering Neil in to joining me. Seeing as he never runs further than the length of a rugby pitch I was very impressed at his eagerness to join me (what is it about boys being unable to accept that a girl - especially a girlfriend - can do any sort of physical activity that they couldn’t?).

We cunningly stayed with Charlie and Rob on the flatter side of Shropshire and set off in gorgeous sunshine. When we got to the 1st marker of our journey I had to break it to Neil that we hadn’t done the 8 miles he was convinced of but a rather more meager 4.5… We continued on along the most beautiful route until it was clear that we had overshot our next turn off and had to call for directions…

Back on route and after 13 miles Neil left with Rob and Charlie who had come to rescue me with water (having forgotten my bottle I was haunted by the canal I was running along…persuading myself that 1 sip wouldn’t hurt… and anyway, how bad can viles disease be?) Luckily I shunned temptation and waited for the volvic!

The last leg, having stopped for 15 mins at mile 13, was not ideal but I was greeted by a princess in a shining Volvo (Charlie) who stopped me a mile before what I thought was the end to tell me that if I continued I would have done 20 miles. In the car I hopped! Great news. I had done 19 miles in 3 hours with a 15 min break in the middle and I didn’t feel like dying! (Well, that’s before I sat in the car for 40 mins…I felt a little crippled at the end of that!)

And the good news is...

...that there is a marathon in October which anyone can enter and all you have to do is pay £30; no sponsorship involved or anything.

I was told this by a friend (to name no names Clare Foster) who merrily informed me that this event was easy to enter. She actually told me this in all seriousness thinking that I would want to do another. I was quite speechless. At this point Harry was bent double with laughter at the thought of me voluntarily doing another marathon.

I'm not going to fib, there are days when I actually enjoy running - bizarre concept really, but there will NEVER be a day when I enjoy running so much that I want to go through all this palaver again!!

I can safely say that I would rather attempt to pull my own arms off than do another whole marathon just for fun...

A short 18 mile trot to liven up the weekend...

I did chuckle to myself as I set off on my 18 mile run at 7.30am on Saturday morning, having not smoked for weeks and not drunk for 6 days. I would have bet money this time last year that I would never willingly run at 7.30 on a Saturday morning, let alone 18 miles...

Grumps and I both ran 18 miles and actually it really was fine - both had little murmurs in various joints, shins and my hips were very seized towards the end of the run, but nothing that we are not getting used to now. In fact, by the end of the run I realised that I was going to finish in just over 3 hours and 1 minute so I decided this would not do and upped the pace into virtually a headlong sprint. I managed not to break into the minute and made it in 3 hours 18 seconds - much better!

I think both of us are amazed at the fact we can actually run that far without needing a stretcher! The main effect I have found is with my appetite: throughout the weekend I ate like a horse to make up for the big run and at Sunday lunch I ate my main and then finished up three other people's plates as well...

Is this true???

I am not sure what to believe about the marathon these days, please can someone let me know what is true??? Unfortunately I am extremely trusting (or gullible if you prefer) and will believe everything that people are telling me.

The latest little delightful snippet is that apparently we are going to shrink by the end of the marathon.

Yes, that is correct, we are going to get smaller. Apparently the impact on our bones of pounding round 26.2 miles of roads is actually going to make us lose height.

True or false?

I am prepared to be a guinea pig for this so please can someone meet me at both the start and the finish with a tape measure to test this crazy theory...

No more big booze ups...

We have given up drinking until after the marathon... I know that many people say you don't need to give up drinking at all but we want to give ourselves the best chance we have of completing the darn thing.

There may possibly be the odd glass of apples or wine that we drink on special occasions but our days of jaeger bombs (which Grumps drinks ALL the time) are over for 6 weeks.

Oh and I am bored of the Marathon Urban Legend...

If I hear one more story about somebody's "friend's gym instructor's cousin's sister" who did no training, got smashed the night before the marathon and then ran it in 3 1/2 hours I will scream - that has to be an urban legend. And if not, then why are these people not properly training because surely with that much natural talent they could beat EVERYONE!!!

Maybe Grumps and I are being quite strict with ourselves and putting in more than we need to, but why not? Let's face it, we are only going to do this once!!!!

Why doesn't it get easier??

People keep telling us that we won’t want to stop running after the Marathon… who are they kidding?! Clearly we’re not communicating our dislike for this sport clearly enough. I nearly died after running 4 miles in to work last week- I felt worse than I did during 16…it really makes no sense!

We were split up again this week and I was faced with another Scottish climb- I thought the sand dunes in Montrose were bad but the hills and gale force winds around Edinburgh proved a serious challenge! We were supposed to do a ½ marathon- Abbs tore around London in just under 2 hours with our tireless and slightly loco trainer Roro whilst I aimed for a much smaller treck around Edinburgh. I thought 5 miles at a good pace up hills would be OK (I had promised Neil I would take it easy as it was his birthday and he didn’t want me falling asleep at the rugby). I mapped out a route and it came to 7 miles- a good enough distance. Needless to say my sense of direction stayed at home as always and I somehow managed to lose Arthur’s Seat (the Mountain in the middle of Edinburgh that I was running round) and when re-mapped on my return realised that my initial idea of doing 5 miles had in fact turned in to 9… Oh well, much better for me and I managed to stay awake for the rugby! No idea how long it took (Abbs is much better at monitoring the technical stuff!) but at points the wind was so strong that I’m sure I was running on the spot!

Anyway, this week looks tough- 10 miles on Thursday- This schedule must have been written by a student! Also my boss has just said that he won’t sponsor us unless we do it in sub 4 hours- does he not think 26 miles is going to knacker our bodies enough?? Luckily we have incredible support from lots of other wonderful people who understand that not only have we set ourselves a ridiculous enough challenge but the money is not for us but rather a very worthy cause!

Quiz night....

Play the games, win the prizes and let the fun begin...

The SIA pub Quiz, as run by Abbs and Grumps... so much more than a quiz!

Date: 25th March 2009
Time: Quiz starts at 8pm
Quiz Prize: Cash…
Location: The Alma pub, Wandsworth Town
Price: £5!!!

If the thought of firing up your grey matter on a Wednesday evening is too much to handle then there’s also a raffle full of fantastic prizes as well as a short but very sweet auction to be held.

Raffle Prizes include:
A Gucci handbag
Canapes for 20 by Abigail’s Catering
A timeless selection of hardback coffee table books
A piece of bespoke jewellery by LEBANNA designs
Quel que chose from Pringle of Scotland
£50 of Prime Angus beef
And more…


As for the auction…you’ll just have to wait and see!

All that excitement and all for a fiver!

Proceeds are going to the Spinal Injuries Association as part of our fundraising efforts for the marathon, to check out more about our chosen charity please go to www.spinal.co.uk.

Tickets are available now; please let us know if you’re coming so that we can get an idea of numbers. If you pay in advance you will receive 2 complimentary raffle tickets.

Please make payments via internet banking to my bank, you can email me for details at abby@wavescarwash.co.uk.

Thanks and we hope to see lots of you there!!

A half marathon was bad enough...

While Grumple was running around Arthur's seat in the Burgh this weekend, our coach extraordinaire, Roro, ran with me around the slightly less dramatic scenery of Battersea Park. The aim was a half marathon (13.1 miles) in sub-2 hours. And we did it! 1 hour 57 so only just under 2 hours but still, a big acheivement.

At the end the feeling of elation was quickly diminshed when I thought about having to run the same length again on top, 13.1 was bad enough!!

I have also been told that there is a blue line one must follow when doing the marathon and if you don't then you end up running further. I am also worried about the huge numbers of people we are going to be surrounded by; apparently there is the chance of actually being run over by everybody else and trampled! The whole thing sounds frankly terrifying to me and now I am not worried about not making the distance, I am worried about not surviving full stop!!

Week 10 - another fun week...

Training programme this week:

Monday Rest
Tuesday 1m jog then 3 x 1.5m quicker (14 mins) with 3 min slower jog inbetween, 1m jog home
Wednesday 7 miles slow (82 mins)
Thursday 1m jog, 3m steady (30 mins), 1m jog
Friday Rest
Saturday Half-marathon in sub-2 hours
Sunday Rugby and lots of cider - last Sunday session until after the marathon...

How strange that a half marathon seems like an 'easier' run - 13 miles easier? What has happened to me???

Team Effort.

Grumps and I were seperated this weekend and Grumps ran around London whilst I ran on the Isle of Wight. Luckily we have back up team support (thanks guys!) and on Saturday Grumps met up with Roro (Rosie Donaldson; coach extraordinaire) and they went for a 16 mile trot around the streets of London.

I was supported by Jamie (brother-in-law and runner bean) and we pootled around West Wight, 16 miles in about 2hrs 40 mins. There were a LOT of hills but the scenery helped to distract us, it was a stunning route - for those how know the area; we ran onto Headon, almost to the Needles, up and over Tennyson and round the River Yar. Then back along the coast and past Colwell Bay. That was only about 12 miles so then we trotted back up Headon. The route is below:

It was exhausting and the depressing thing was getting to the end and realising that on the day we will have to keep going for another 10 miles...

We are now pinning a lot of hope on the adrenaline rush that everyone keeps talking about for the actual day although we are not sure we are supposed to rely on it for 10 whole miles???

Thank you, thank you, thank you...

Thank you to everyone who has donated to our cause so far; we are now more than half way to our target which is phenomenally generous of you all. We feel that it is such a worthy cause and the money you have all given really will make a difference to the lives of others...

Hopefully lots of you will be there to see us cross the line and now, thanks to all of you, we really have to do it. No dropping out now - the pressure is on!!

Thank you xxx

A strange revelation.

That is two runs in the space of two days that I have actually enjoyed. Seriously, you have understood correctly; I actually enjoyed running. Simply extraordinary.

Of course it does put it all into perspective when you get to the end of 6 miles and think what a nice distance the run was, only to realise that if that was the marathon we would need to keep going for another 20...

Oh well, it probably won't last but still... Small steps...

Week 9 - following a slight blip in training!

Unfortunately, my training went a little awry this weekend and for the first time in ages I did not run; ALL WEEKEND... So much for my good run with the Wallace pace to keep me going. I am quite disturbed by the fact that I actually felt bad for not running and I felt guilty - a bizarre emotion and one I never thought I would be possible of in a running context! Don't get too excited though, still don't have the "bug" or "addiction" that all runners assure us we will get...

Week 9 of the training programme and the distance is hotting up:

Monday Rest
Tuesday 1m jog, then 10 x 1min (200mtr) fast with 1min (100mtr) slow in between, then 1m jog
Wednesday 6m jog (70 mins slow)
Thursday 8m jog (82 mins steady)
Friday Rest
Saturday Rest or 3m jog slow (35 mins)
Sunday 16m jog/walk (approx. 3 hours)

Anyone want to join in???? The runners are to be seperated again this weekend as I am heading to the IOW and Grumple is in London but we should be back together again soon...

Less than two months to go to the big day...

We are planning on leaving the country.