A slow and steady pace…well, steadyish!

So there’s about 8 weeks now until the London marathon – it is getting frighteningly closer!  But I am plodding on despite the hurdles that keep cropping up in my path…I know, hurdles or excuses 🙂

I plodded a relatively respectable 12 miles along the Regent’s Canal today in alternatively bright winter sunshine, grey clouds and irregular gusts of cold wind, dodging Sunday pedestrians oblivious to anyone around them, other runners lost in the world of their headphones, and laconic Sunday cyclists, and a few pram pushers.  I’m all for sharing the tow path, but do wish occasionally that other users would just once in a while give way. But hey ho, dodging all the other users is my excuse for a inconsistent pace, although I was pleased that I clocked my 12 miles in under 2 hours by about 10 mins, so hopefully that means I’ll be crossing Tower Bridge in roughly 2 hours which is reasonable I reckon, I’m just not sure at the moment that I’ll be able to maintain the same pace for the next 13 miles!  

And at the end of the run, no niggles, no aches and pains, or mini blisters appearing anywhere – so something at least is going right.  I don’t  think my wrist being stiff is related to my running,  just post breakage stiffness, and a bit sore after my wonderful physio Brett Davison got the joint moving a bit on Friday evening.  I am of the long held belief that he is the best physio in the word, even if he does always say I present him with a challenge (normally in the shape of my back).

So, 10 years ago I was at a level of fitness to run my fastest marathon time in Dublin 2006.  London 2016 I don’t think is going to be my fastest marathon by any margin…but I have a week dedicated to running coming up back down in Cornwall – back to the scene of my wrist debacle. So hopefully notching up the miles up and down the cliff paths and along some sandy beaches will toughen up my muscles and hopefully lend a little speed to my pace….I can but dream 🙂

Don’t fall over when you run…

…is the wise advice my orthopaedic registrar Doctor gave me on Tuesday at the Fracture Clinic when I had my heavy cast removed and replaced by a splint.  Really!!! 

It does seem to be the response of the majority, laughter at the thought of someone breaking their wrist whilst running. Ok, it wasn’t my ankle or any other more logical body part to break whilst running, but to be fair it was on a very steep part of the Cornish coastal path coming down from Ephaven, and in my defence, my brother James did precisely the same thing about half an hour later just walking (although he didn’t break his wrist!)

So the one benefit, and possibly only benefit, of breaking my wrist is that I no longer have to do press-ups.  I really hate doing press ups and my trainer Jon seems to have an unhealthy liking for them – something to do with being an ex-marine I suspect! Still, he seems to have devised some rather hellish alternatives such as running up and down pulling a very heavily weighted sledge, or wearing a weighted jacket and jogging fast up and down – knees high, step ups, deep lunges…the list is long and very imaginative.

Anyways, back to the running….which I can now do much more comfortably without a sweaty cast which also caused me to run slightly off centre and becomes quite tiring. So I have to somehow pick up the mileage quite quickly over the next month to maintain any hope of hitting a respectable time in the marathon, or to simply cross the finish line in one piece.  My immediate goal is to keep pace with the runners in my Running Club at the Third Space Gym, Soho.  I coach them so I now have to put my money where my mouth is!

And must remember not to fall over 🙂