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Jools - good to hear from you.
Badbark - I've never run Chester, but it has a good reputation as reported above.
PMJ - shocking.
8 miles including 6 x 30s "hill" sprints and 8 x 100m strides. A tad windy out there - fortunately it was more or less heading up the hill too!
PMJ sign of the times now
Gul enjoy the holiday , I ran in 30+ temps in Lanzarote one year and loved it but it can be quite breezy which helps , had to buy sunglasses though to actually see where I was going it was so bright !
2 mile morn and evening walked mon and tues and 3m this morn back on night shift tonight so may delay my start back a while yet and give my leg more time to settle. The mara doesn't seem to have made it any worse so it's more nerve related than muscle damage I think. The pain has been there for several months and flares up every so often although before recovery days kept it in check , has been quite painful to sit down for more than a few minutes in the past .
V wise to keep it easy, Gerard and save those legs for your hilly HM.
Saw your Strava note about what lurks beneath your cast, OO. Keep a lid on it won't you!
Glad your hip and leg have settled down, Gul.
Bonkers as ever, BB. Are you still on a pescatarian diet? Wondering what protein replenishes those muscle fibres of yours.
Sorry to hear of your DNF, Birch. Do you ever go for sports massages or chiropractic adjustments? Acupuncture? I know to many some of these seem like voodoo but I have found all to be incredibly effective at the right time and having them in my arsenal of Things To Throw At Injuries stops me from feeling pessimistic.
Hi Jools! Stories from Sri Lanka when you can please.
Lit - you are not only fast but modest to mention only that you ran Chester when you won it!
PMJ - I hear your pain on the public response to sirens. There but for the grace of God go I....
Took the boot off and started driving on Monday and all is well so far. Each day gives me more strength and mobility in the foot and ankle. I tried a little bit of yoga in my daily pilates today and it was wonderful! Loving how each day heralds new activities I can achieve.
Onwards and upwards, friends. Especially after tomorrow (crosses fingers).
Welcome back Jools & Literin, you were missed.
Good news Leslie that the race has not set you back. Nice and steady there.
I'm mixing walks and short runs, dodging in and out of the changing weather.
Evening all, just had a read back after a few days of not having much spare time.
Birch – Sorry to hear about your injury but it was the correct decision and no shame at all. I hope it settles soon. Well done to your son, that’s a cracking time. Does he have any desire to run a marathon, if he hasn’t already? Sorry for the tardy response to your question re my half on Sunday. I’ve felt a bit up and down in recent weeks and my last 3 races haven’t been that good maybe bar the 10k in April so I’m not feeling as confident as I did say a month ago when I seemed to be moving well but you never know until the day. It’s very weather dependant too as when I have ran it in the past it has been horribly windy in the last 3.5 miles along the south coast to the finish, that’s a deal breaker in terms of a very strong fast finish but I’ll have to manage the conditions as best as I can.
OO – Glad the Op was a success. You’ll be back to racing soon no doubt.
Gul – Enjoy your trip to the states and I hope you get to run, even if it is hot maybe you can just go easy, wear a hat and keep well hydrated? I love running in other destinations than the usual ones. There was a bit of a storm here on Monday night and it was super windy yesterday too.
Badbark – Good luck for Saturday!
Jools – Welcome back.
Lit – Ditto, and congrats on the win at Chester.
Leslie – You’d be wise not to rush back given your injury. I’ve not run Dublin but I don’t think it’s a particularly easy course either and the weather can be quite tricky too. I believe Badbark has done it a few times.
MsE – Onwards and upwards indeed. When do you think you will be able to run again?
4 easy miles on Monday with a few hills and the same yesterday but a couple of tempo miles thrown in for the downhill bits. 9.5 easy miles tonight with a pal and that’s it now running wise for me until Sunday. I wouldn’t usually rest for 3 days before a race but I don’t seem to race well unless I have very fresh legs so we’ll see if it makes a difference or not. The weather forecast for Sunday keeps changing daily, e.g. 23c and no wind forecast yesterday and 18c with 12mph wind today. As long as it’s not an easterly wind I don’t mind but I’m sure it will change before Sunday. A few runners I know were worried it was going to be scorching but I’ll be surprised if it changes to that extreme now, he says.......
Gul - yes, the Ultra is this Saturday. Weather is looking a bit mixed although the rain that was being forecasted now seems to have been replaced by simply overcast, rather humid weather.
Lit - great to hear from you. How's your running these days?
Jools - saw some of your pictures from Sri Lanka on Bookface. Looks stunning - glad you had a good time. Did you get any running in while you were out there?
GM - very wise to take it easy. Will be interesting to see what the impact of not running for a few days beforehand is.
Have been taking it relatively easy this week so far: 7 miles worth of commute on Monday (including a bit of a dash through the rain on the return leg in order to get to Waterloo in time and avoid an hour wait for the next train!), 6.7 miles easy on Tuesday and a very enjoyable 6.8 miles through the woods with younger Lorenzito this evening. Fortunately he decided to keep it nice and easy for Slow Dad.
MsE - great news and great positive attitude.
OO - shocking disregard for medical advice
GM - hope the weather is kind for you on Sunday.
Lorenzo - ticking over nicely - reasonable forecast for Satruday.
9 miles including a mini-Zatopek session (16 x 400m @ LT / 200m easy). Timed nicely to finish just before 6am to open up for the polling station crew.
Gerard - no, my son hasn't expressed any desire to go for the marathon - although he was musing after Derby that sub 1:15 would yield a Championship entry at VMLM . .
enjoy your 3 day "mini-taper", hope the legs prove refreshed and speedy on Sunday . . .
Lorenzo - good to run with our offspring - a pleasure and a privilege . . . .
Gul - good early 400's there; polling - exercised my democratic right just after opening time - the station is at the church next door, so the boiling water goes on the teabag, I nip to vote, and return to an optimum brew !!!
still resting the glute/h'string here - went for a walk with my friend yesterday - her running's been curtailed recently, though not through injury - we were discussing that maybe "fitness jogging" was the way to go . . . . but we then looked at each other and the unspoken though was "naaahhhh" . . .
Gerard - no idea when I will be able to run again. I have markers for strength in that leg that will let me know when the time has come. This includes 60 single leg calf raises, 50 single leg raises (bent knee, on forefoot/toes) and 40 eccentric heel drops. I guess I build up slowly but the yoga will definitely help. Hope the weather isn't as hot as predicted this weekend.
Lorenzo - I hope you have me on speed dial for my updates this Saturday! Should I look out for Mrs Lorenzo at the finish line too? Fingers crossed the weather is good for you.
Birch - we all know where musing gets you ... Only a matter of time then. Hope you recover soon and are back out there.
OO - happy healing. I guess the walks and runs gradually become more run and less walk over time?
Polling day folks. Make sure you get down there to cast your vote. Never before has so much seemed to rest on the outcome today...
MsE - don't apologise - pleased things are progressing well.
Re polling - had a message from Mrs GD to say that when she and Miss GD the elder went to vote at about 9:30 this morning, the polling station staff told her that they had already had as many votes as they usually get all day! (Are they supposed to share that sort of information?!)
With hindsight I should have done some things differently - setting off slower (again), starting walk/run earlier and better nutrition, but these are things to work on - all I need to sort out now is whether I want to try again.
Anyhow, very briefly. Headed off to the start at about 4:30am, going past a night club still in full flow and also the first braai of the day. Start easy to navigate around, if very crowded; definitely the best starting songs, hearing everyone put everything into Nkosi sikelel and then Shosholoza brings a lump to the throat. I was in Pen B which meant it didn't take too long to get to the start line and also that I had a fair bit of space as soon as we got onto the course. Kept on repeating to myself to not go too fast, but as it was still dark it wasn't easy to check my pace on my Garmin (and I've a really lousy internal pace clock), but checking records afterwards, I was doing about 9min/mile which is a bit faster than I'd hoped, but not catastrophically so. Even at 5:30am there's still plenty of people out cheering and getting onto a 5-lane highway means there's plenty of room fairly soon.
After that, I'm sure that there's of loads of things that I should be remembering/writing, but large parts seem to have become a blur. Met up with some local to home runners (Stockport Harriers) which was good, and also ran with some local runners (Midlands AC) because their club vest was similar to mine, and they were really friendly and helpful.
As the sun came up, it gradually got hotter, although it wasn't until 11ish that it really started to hurt - I'm guessing road temperatures would have been around 25-30C? Deliberately tried to catch a little bit of water at each station, which later on became take two - one for me, one for my head.
Kept up an even running pace until the start of Botha's Hill (~21mile) where I started run/walking (should possibly have been earlier), and got to the half way (ish) point (~27mile) at the bottom of Inchanga at around 4:12. After that, things (i.e. me) started to go a bit more downhill and everything got a lot harder - though I know that the second half itself is generally considered easier. The run parts got shorter and the walks longer (though I was still keeping to about 100/100). Also started to feel nauseous which meant I didn't possibly eat as much as I should have (though I did manage to try the famous salted oranges, boiled potatoes and flat coke).
Polly Shortts was everything I had read about and just about finished me off but by that point it's only 8km to go, and I would have crawled that if necessary.
Getting into the racecourse finish I felt like Dorando Pietri in the 1908 Olympic marathon, I was convinced that they had moved the finish line, and seeing dancing people in green morph suits on the home strait didn't help with the hallucinations. Crossed the line in 9:26:33 and immediately burst into tears and was given a big hug and a shoulder to cry on by a lovely marshal.
Must have taken me 20 minutes to walk the 200m to the internationals tent, where I went and sat in a toilet for ~45 minutes trying to get stomach under control. Spent a couple of hours there before I felt I could navigate to the buses to get back to family in hotel in Durban (not sure if carrying a mobile would have been a good idea?).
There's probably lots of things I should write about, but highlights on the course were the number of people shouting out encouragement by name, the braai smoke drifting across the road, the kids at Ethembeni School, 'Chariots of Fire' on the bagpipes (twice) and being told "You look fantastic Sir, keep going" by a very polite schoolgirl at 70km (biggest lie of the day, but very courteous!).
I don't think I've ever left so much on the road in a race, but it was still fantastic experience. I was hoping for sub 9, but that was with little knowledge of what the race actually entailed, so I'm happy with my time. Just to to decide whether to go for a back to back......
ps Club track 5000m championship race yesterday evening as a recovery run - 1 minute off my pb - need to try harder ;-)
MsE - your number is in the phone. Just hope I don't run out of batteries. Unfortunately MrsL won't be there as younger Lorenzito is running in the Surrey Schools County Champs in Kingston on Saturday so she'll be providing the parental support. I'm hoping that there will be celebrations all round by the evening.
Great that you're back up and exercising again.
Gruelling session from you there Gul, especially so early.
Birch - agree with you 100%. Fantastic to be able to run with the young 'un, have a natter for 99% of the distance and then just watch as he burnt me up coming down the road to our house!
Have cast my vote as I'm working from home today - it always mystifies me how one can vote without any form of ID. What's stopping people just going into a random polling station and pretending to be someone else? Will probably stay up until about 1.00 tonight to see how the results are looking.
Birch you are not a " fun runner"
MSE great you are getting back at it again.
ANDYLID great report really shows how tough it is ,I couldn't cope with that sort of heat for very long so well toughed out .So much to learn and so many mistakes to make over such a long distance so always a learning curve but you made it !!!
Lorenzo I can't believe you can vote without Id we certainly cannot over 'ere probably because even the dead used to vote in the past such was voting abuse ...
3 mile walked , post mara blues here and a little bit of can't be arsed settling in !
Not in bed here. Can't sleep. Each time I consider it, the thought of waiting for another declaration pops into my head!
Club session last night with 4x400, 4x200 and 4x400. Rest day today and early night tonight before hitting the trails for 6 or 7 hours in Saturday.
Lorenzo - you should have been getting a good kip, not staying up till 2am! All the best for tomorrow.
Did some sleep deprivation training last night. Didn't get out for a run till 4:53am as I was too busy watching the election coverage. 5 recovery miles. Should sleep well tonight!
Well done Andy. Solid work, Sir.
Great to see you're active again, MSE.
Track session for me last night. Got there early so ran around the block for a 2 mile warm/up. Both miles were 7.03.
On the track the session was 8 x 800 with 2 min recs. Coach set me a target of doing them all around 2.55 which I managed to do. Did the last one in 2.50.
It dawned on me that this was almost like a Yasso session. I know I could have done another two reps at the same pace, so it seems to bode well going into my next campaign. Was quite pleased at the end.
Andy: sounds amazing, and what a lovely report. Comrades is on my to-do list. Just need to crack 2.45 first!
Great report Andy really enjoyed, although no interest in this race or anything above Marathon.
Come on Lorenzo...!
I've take a 3 day rest but might venture to parkrun today.
GUL nice early 5
Jools a little bit of focus and luck and you will be there !
PMJ might take a little longer for that ,at least as long as it takes to grow 2 extra legs so you are safe enough.
The reports of ultra's on here and the tremendous suffering involved I just couldn't imagine a comrades ,makes us mere mara runners sound like light weights !!!
another 3m walked starting back running on night shift just doesn't make sense ...
Given Jools and PMJ's wishlist put me down for a 2:59 sometime in the future ,not wearing a costume though unless absolutely necessary ...
AndyL - That's a very respectable first Comrades, well done and great reporting!
MsE - You're making good progress and I expect you'll be strong when you are able to run again, which I hope will be soon.