Skip to main content

23rd July 2017

Another dragon was slain.

This time to dragon was called The Outlaw Triathlon and back in 2013 I started this event. I just managed the swim and then got stopped on the bike. On Sunday I did the run.

It started the week before when a pirate team posted that they needed a runner. Foolishly and somewhat jokingly I said I'd do it. I added that I'd take 7-8 hours and was confident of being ignored.

I wasn't! So  I checked .... did they really want me? and the answer came back YES!

My last marathon was 2010 when I did London as part of the Lucozade Super Six. I'd trained well then it all went to pot on race day. This was followed by teacher training and a massive drop in exercise.

In 2013 whilst watching a channel 4 program on the Outlaw son had said I couldn't do it ... so I entered and proved him right. So since July 2013 I've sulked and struggled to do anything apart from get fatter and more unfit.

Anyway back to last week and still convinced I wasn't needed I "tapered" by swimming. I had run 6m 2 weeks before and 11m 2 months before so felt a taper was needed - don't want to over train!

I've always said that long distance events are all in the head.


Sunday was a prime example of this. I knew I could do a marathon - I've done 4 running and 2 walking before so why couldn't I? No reason.

In fact on that sunny/wet/hot/cool Sunday afternoon/evening I never once stopped believing and I always knew I would do it. The only questions were
  • What time - would I let the team down and miss the cut off? and
  • What injuries would I get?!
The answers turn out to be 7 hours 31 and no injuries!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Sensible Head

The choice was getting wet or getting wet. I opted for the wet but warm option rather than the wet, cold and wind swept option! So 1m done at the pool including 2 goals being achieved and some board work. I said a while ago I wanted to be able to do 20 lengths non stop DONE and 10 lengths of front crawl non stop DONE!! So happy pixie. Used a different pool today as I wanted to see about lessons for Gnome. It was a nightmare to locate the car park and once I found it, it was full to the brim with cars circling for spaces so I drove the 200m down the road to the free parking and nabbed the last space there instead! The pool is old so not pretty or ponced up but it is clean and in good repair and they do Saturday lessons and Gnome can start this week! OK so he then has 2 weeks off but how good is that! My other option was the pool near work and a possible start mid February! So just need to get the OK from Gnome and a commitment to get out of bed for a 9:30 lesson every week until March (...
7 comments
Read more

Remember this?

Yes I'm back on the bench :-( That sore foot thing on Wednesday... well it's still here. In typical bruised fashion it hurts more after a period of sitting down/sleep and I've been popping the brufen. There is a slight swelling too. Don't think it is laces ... on closer inspection the pain is (looks at google ... gives up and picks up "how to run injury free" instead) on the sesamoids area of the err middle phalanger (??? impressed hey!) In the same location where you would get morton's neuroma but the description is wrong so I don't think it's that!! (oh the perils of a little knowledge from a book or the web hey!) Anyways this means I'm on the bench. No running. I have 4 or 5 weeks until the Suicide Sixish so no panic, I will take 1 whole week off regardless and see what happens next weekend. Also think I will get some new shoes with more cushioning. Now all I need to do is locate my bike and/or exercise bike from the depths of the garage un...
Post a Comment
Read more

Time Trial Time!

I’m very poor at pushing myself and doing speed work but recently I’ve started doing a virtual mile “race” each month and 5k too. Last weekend I got a season best on my mile at 10:50 which isn’t fast but the fastest I’ve run for way over 10 years! Today I did a speedier 5k. My last couple have been on the same “course” at home but today I was having my car MOTd so ran were I was. This meant a lot of corners and looping so I wasn’t expecting any improvement but I managed to take 5s off my time!  Ok so again not fast at 36:42 but I’m slow and fat! and I’ve been running for distance and endurance for the last few months.  My “A” race is next weekend after that I’m going to try and work on my speed. I’ll be doing a 5m race series over the winter which will hopefully help.  So I’ll using Ami’s teachings and focusing on imagining working hard to keep going when it hurts.  I won’t get to PB shape yet (well possibly not!) but I hope to take minutes off the best tim...
Post a Comment
Read more