Dear all,

Its been a month now since I started my official marathon training for Paris 2010. All is looking well so far even though it wasn’t always easy to run. Like most of England we had snow lately. Maybe not so much in the “big smoke” thanks to the smog, but enough to cover the streets with an icy patch of snow. So finding a road to run on was not always easy and running on the streets of London isn’t always the best thing to do if you want minimise the chances of getting run over by a bus.

So in order not to have too many excuses for running and being stuck on a boring treadmill, I bought myself some amazing trail running shoes by Innov-8. I am usually quite brand loyal when it comes to a running shoe, but since ASICS trail shoes are not too fantastic, I have gone with this British brand with is popular with mountain runners and trail geeks.

I must say it is one of the most comfortable shoes I have worn for running on the rough and the grip and “feel” I get from the shoe is tremendous. I remember I smiled for about an hour because it felt so good. Jumping over the snowy ice patches, roots, rocks etc was like being a child again.

The other thing I did in order to make my runs more interesting is to enroll in a coastal trail half marathon  series once a month prior to the Marathon in Paris. The company called endurancelife provides some excellent races along the coast of England. Very well organised and lots of fun. The superhardcores can run the marathon distance or like us “softies” run only half or 10km. The organisers take pride in making the course scenic and enjoyable but also challenging at the same time with steep inclines of 500m ascents, jumping across rocks, running along pebbled beaches, etc.

My next challenge will be in South Devon. Its going to be a beauty!

Until then train hard, have fun and keep going,

Sebastian

Ps. To sponsor me for my charity Noreen’s kids please follow the link. Your support is very much appreciated. Any donations will go directly to the children in need. Thanks.

This blog is an addition to my training programme for the Paris Marathon next year.

Throughout my life I’ve hated long distances. I was awful in school at anything over a 1000m. I was designed to run quick, short burst and did well in sports such as football, basketball or sprinting.

Then in 2006 I landed in New Zealand and things changed. Being new to a country you often get asked the same question: “Where are you from? What do you do or what do you earn?” well in NZ you get asked “where are you from and what sports do you do? “. The answer wasn’t satisfactory if you just mentioned one sport interest, here you had to do them all! Everybody was doing 2 hour runs, paddle for 2hours, cycle 1.5 hours, go diving and surf morning and evenings.  Sometime all on the same day or weekend!!!! It was mad, but to my surprise and initial scepticism terribly addictive.

And so a year into my NZ sporting adventure I signed up to do my first marathon.

I recall it as it was yesterday. It was a beautiful flat course, tucked around the famous bays of Wellington, New Zealand.  The crowd gathered at 6.30 am. It was fresh with the usual strong gust of wind coming from the north. Around 250 runner s were lined up to running the full distance of this coastal marathon, 3500 were stopping at 21km. Everybody was geared up with short shorts, tank tops and the latest shoes and energy bottle belts. The energy was great and people where itching to get going.

To my surprise, I felt that the initial first 21^st km went by pretty fast and I clocked in at 1.50 min (“this is going to be a walk in the park”). When I go the middle stage my running pattern became more rhythmic and I felt I was in “the Zone” then. This part was encouraging and fun (“keep going you’re not far now”). The last third with its ups and downs, its random joint pains was not so good (“my legs are full of led, this is hard”) and then the worst part of all, the WALL at 38KM (“I feel awful, I should rest now”) was what I dreaded most.

My mind was clouded over, my joints all in pain, my legs felt like tree trunks, my breathing heavy and my heart rate through the roof. But I persisted, defeated my inner daemons and jogged my last 4 km in an almost drunken state of mind to the finish line. (“I want to lie down on this lovely patch of grass and go to sleep”). I finished the race in an average 4.17H.

I was shattered! Walking like an old man hunched over and shaking. My eyes were unable to focus and I was constantly falling asleep whilst taking my timing chip off my shoes. I was badly hypoglycaemic and needed food and drink fast! Thankfully my lovely wife was there to help.

I swore that I will never do another event again, but two years later I am back at it. This time however, I am more determined to run a well prepared race and correct the numerous mistakes I made on my first attempt.

KEY MISTAKES FIRST TIME RUNNERS MAKE (that I made too!):

1, Non-specific training plan: I had downloaded a training plan online and tweaked it a bit to my needs.  This was certainly not detailed enough and I was naive in thinking that one size fits all.  I underestimated the distance and thought I could approach the race without any major planning. I was wrong and I paid for it!

2, Poor nutrition: I experimented with nutrition too late and became nauseous with some last minute thick and indigestible energy gels during the race.

3, Not enough  long runs and no race prior to the marathon: I ran 30km once 3 weeks prior to the race and in-between probably ran 21 to 26km 3-4 times.  Again I am lacking structure to my plan and carelessness.

4, I trained alone: I often lacked motivation to do bigger runs and often didn’t bother going if it was raining outside and too windy.  What a fair-weathered little girl I was back then.

5, Poor goal setting: I had no idea what times I should work towards and how I was going to get there.

6, Not listening to your body when it need rest: I was lucky not to get injured! I rarely cross-trained and continue to play regular football.

7, Good shoes: I ran in an off the shelf pair of Nike Pegasus (1 year old) with a hole around the little toe from playing indoor football J. I could have run in Crocks…same thing!