Well well well, it's been a while. A long while and a lot has happened.
I realise my last post was about Ride London! So a few things have happened since then, I'll try to summarise
- Ran some more
- Signed up for a marathon (Edinburgh again) with my fabulous backpacker running crew.
- Trained well for said marathon
- Reached 15 miles (comfortable) in training.
- A pandemic hit
- Everything cancelled (including Edinburgh Marathon 😢 )
- Tried to continue running
- Struggled to run (and well to breath)
- Tried running some more.
- Got diagnosed with Long Covid
- Gave up on the marathon dream
- Did take up paddle boarding
- PadddleBoarded a marathon.
- Continued to age and aches and pains caught up with me and not let me go.
- Continued signing up for the London Marathon ballot (I mean why not I'm never going to get in)
- Got in on the ballot for the 2025 London Marathon - whoops
And this is where I find myself. Training (nervously) for the third time for my first marathon, whilst not at my finest when it comes to running.
My VMLM goal: to get round under 8 miles and not die.
But I have learned some valuable lessons over the last few years which I hope will help get me through. Such as the importance of strength training, stretching and yoga. The importance core strength. That I love Peloton (that's a whole other blog post!!). That sometimes I'm going to have to take a step back and rest even if it screws up the plan (Long Covid makes me do that). I'm also fully aware that if I have a long covid relapse come April then I won't be able to even get to the start line, so that's a bit of an unknown at the moment, but I feel it will become more apparent as my training progresses.
Things I haven't learnt; not to beat myself up about how I'm not where I was (fitness-wise) 5 years ago. That staying slow is better.
On the plus side I'm 3 months into my training (well I got the results 3 months ago) and I'm making slow progress on my running (some weeks better than others). And most importantly I've fallen in love with running again (of course not every run is a great run, but for the most part I'm enjoying it). I think part of that love is the fact that I'm recently running without backpain for the first time in over a year (so I'm making the most of it).
I'm taking it slow. I'll also try to update my progress here, for my own record if for nothing else.
Who knows what will April will bring, but for now I'm up and running!!
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| Running at the Westminster Mile this weekend. |
