Race after race after race ....

I’m currently in an interesting period of the year.

World Cup 2006 is over, Fulham’s relegation season yet to start.
Maths project handed in, results (if I haven’t got a *:* I’ll be puzzled and annoyed in equal measures) not out for a couple of weeks
Maths teaching nicely fizzled out
Holidays (three weeks in August) very soon

AND

No more races until October but it’s a biggie (8.2 miles or 13.1k) so I’ll have to start training properly and soon

As Becky pointed out I’ve done a lot more races than actual training recently for one reason or another which probably isn’t good for a slightly overweight 5th decader like myself. Let me rewind quickly to approximately 9 days ago:

The British 10k

If it was cheaper, chipped and there was more water both en route and at the end I’d definitely do it again. The route was excellent taking in Piccadilly, Pall Mall, Embankment, Blackfriars, Westminster Bridge and Whitehall. Due to sheer number of runners it took me about 35 minutes to get through the start line (next to Hard Rock Café) on a very hot day, at least as hot as the Capital run, so some of the promised water stations were empty. Luckily I carried water with me or else it could have been dangerous, especially the complete absence of fluids at the end of the race.

From a personal point of view I finished in a slightly quicker time than the last run (1.18.20 rather than 1.19.00 from memory) although still way slower than what I think I can do. This was achieved without walking (although plodding incredibly slowly for large portions of the race) and being extremely sensible about running in the heat as I knew some were worried about me keeling over.

For a large portion of the race I had a devil on one shoulder and an angel on the other. The angel sounded a lot like Becky and was saying “Don’t run, there’s no need, take it easy, it’s hot and no-one will think the worse of you if you walk” whilst the devil was saying “Don’t stop, don’t walk, keep running, remember how annoyed you were last time when you walked 2k.”

I think I reached a decent compromise and had there been water waiting at the end it would have been a good, enjoyable race. Actually, no, that wasn’t the only thing – they posted a “400m to go” sign near the finish line. I say near, it was almost a kilometre away. Very annoying for those who like to put in a bit of a spring towards the finish line. Luckily it didn’t affect me in any way whatsoever!

Two other slightly disconcerting things were
– lack of ipod. It’s ok when there’s a crowd geeing you on but on the many quiet bits of the race I could have definitely used some stirring music
– people calling me ‘fatman’. OK so most people shouted “come on John” as I had my name on my t-shirt but because I was wearing my fatmanwalking.com t-shirt (for the very last time I might add) people were shouting “Come on fatman”. Not an ideal situation.

4 days rest later and due to my over eager planning, Thursday was the day for the 4 man GSK team to run the JP Morgan Chase corporate challenge or something similar. Except it wasn’t. Due to half-year end it was only Tim and I who set foot towards Battersea Park.

Apart from someone ‘accidentally’ knocking over my half-pint of Pimms ir was an immensely enjoyable evening. OK, we could have done with some of the corporate hospitality being handed out by some of the bigger teams being diverted our way but I managed to make do with about 6 bottles of water, a banana and 3 t-shirts. Easily pleased, that’s me.

The race itself was very, very crowded so unless you were right at the start you were unlikely to get anywhere near your personal best. It was 5.6km (3.5 miles) which was a very pleasant, doable distance although I’m beginning to get a bit of an issue with walkers. Not only do they get in your way (can’t they go to one side) but also, as I may have mentioned a couple of hundred times before, put the following thought in your head – “Go on, you can walk, they are”. The only other gripe with this run is that the route snaked by (and practically caressed) the finish line whilst still being about a kilometre from the actual finish. You could hear people being congratulated over the tannoy AND EVERYTHING. Cruel.

I wanted to do the race in under 40 minutes (did it by 5 seconds) and Tim completed in well under 30 minutes.

Next run is this 8.2mile Kingston October race – EEEEK – so I’m going to take a step back and train specifically for this race and no other. I’ve got 3 months to do it in so I should be ok. I think. This week consists of outdoor runs, treadmill sessions, weight training session and a work footy session.

Onwards and upwards

Anticipation

It's a big week in the running world next week with my British 10k (got the hat AND the t-shirt) on Sunday and the JPM Chase 5.6k on Thursday. Despite doing very little training since Hyde Park I'm looking forward to both as a result of a very, very good 40 minute treadmill session yesterday.

Or at least I was looking forward to both until ............

THE BLOODY WEATHER FORECAST

Apparently it's going to be another very hot weekend. Aaaarrggghhh. Does anyone know any rain dances?

My tactics for Sunday are as follows:

Start slow
Start in either the 50-60 min pack or the 60-70 min pack so I don't spend the first kilometre weaving in and out of people
Not worry about the time
Finish it

Ideally, of course, I don't want to walk any of it but if it is as hot as last time and it's a choice between walking or lying on the ground struggling for breath I'll take the former. My priorities have changed so much that I'm even thinking of leaving the new flash stop watch at home. Maybe.

With a sort of reversed, warped logic I'm planning big changes from next weekend onwards including changing my eating habits, going on a strict training plan geared towards the 8.2 miles in October (it's actually geared towards 10 miles but I'll adapt slightly), running with boys from work every Monday (hate running with other people although as I've never tried it ....), doing a class in the work gym with the rather dodgy title of 'Body Pump' which is basically a lot of weights work (I read somewhere that this will help your overall strength, especially at the end of races. Makes sense really).

That's it really, quietly confident about next week and thanks for the £1,078.72 from the BUPA Capital run. I've taken the link off for now.

Plodding on

No excuses for carrying a bulky water bottle on races now.

The main news to report, and you know this already, is that my near final total (still a couple of stragglers to come, possibly) is £1,008.38. Not bad for an hour’s work. Many thanks once again to all (and indeed sundry) for stumping up their hard-earned cash.

Further proof of my participation can be found by going to http://www1.sportcam.net/site3/public/browse.php?event=673&competitor=cf0f3e96-4b3d-4d54-9428-9b3da3a6c7c3&mode=full. Not sure I’ll order any prints at their exorbitant prices but they make interesting viewing.

Speaking of cash, as we were a minute ago, this whole sponsorship thing is very tricky. Who do you ask? Can you hassle them? Why do some people ‘pledge’ by email rather than going directly to the website? I appreciate that sites such as justgiving.com have made the whole process much easier but I’m very glad that, following my ONE sponsorship run a year rule, I don’t have to go through the begging process again for another 6 months at least.

Nothing much has happened since the run about 10 days ago. The only exercise I’ve taken has been a fairly hot and immensely enjoyable game of indoor 5-a-side last Thursday. I was due to do a run on Saturday night but, having spent a day with the girls, returned home exhausted and fell asleep on the sofa just after Brian McBride (one of only three Fulham players representing the mighty whites at this years World Cup) got elbowed by an over eager Italian defender.

Hoping to get at least 30 minutes on the treadmill at work this afternoon as last night I increased my ‘organised runs to do by the end of 2006’ by 50%. I’ve now got 3 little beauties of varying scariness lined up. They are as follows:

http://www.thebritish10klondon.co.uk/

This is the British 10k run on Sunday 2nd July at 9.35am (please don’t let it be hot). The website will give you all the details you need. Currently doing it alone (although possibly with a neighbour) and my reason for doing it is very, very simple. I want to do a 10k without walking. I honestly don’t care if I do it in 1 hour or 1 hour 30 as long as I run (or plod) all the way round. It is however in under 2 weeks so I need to get back into training pretty damn soon hence treadmill this afternoon.

http://www.jpmorganchasecc.com/events.php?city_id=10

This is the JPMorganChase Corporate Challenge on Thursday 6th July at 6.45 pm which describes itself as a 5.6km run-walk in Battersea Park. I’m doing this with Garry, Anthony and Tim from work and for some reason we’ve all set ourselves target times. From memory their target times are something like 22, 23 and 24 minutes! Mine is 33 minutes which won’t be easy at all. Should be interesting.

http://www.humanrace.co.uk/festival/index.html

This final one is a bit scary. It’s an 8.2 mile race along Kingston on the morning of Sunday 8th October. In an example of running before you can plod I booked into this ages ago as I thought it would be a decent step up from the BUPA Capital 10k also giving me 4 months extra training. I’m now dreading it but have persuaded Mark H (in my mobile I have numbers for Mark A, Mark H, Mark N, Mark R, Mark S, Mark C and I thought John was a common name) and Alma to join me whilst Andrea and Neal will be doing the 16 mile version on the same morning. Nutters.

Sweaty doesn't even begin to describe it!