Sunday Morning Runs - how far is too far?

Regular readers should remember that I'm spending my Sunday mornings running and Soo's spending her Sunday mornings coming to pick me up from somewhere way out East. There runs started off well, but now I've got a problem.

I started off running between 10 and 17 miles, depending on how fit I was feeling. For the last few weeks, I've been running from home to Shoreham. This is a 21 mile route that takes me around three hours. The first time I ran this route, I had to stop before the end and walk most of the last mile as my legs had stopped working. All the muscles in both my legs were extremely sore. I'm hoping that this is the famously painful "wall" that marathon runners talk about - if it's not, then I don't think I can handle the real "wall" when it comes.

Anyway, the last couple of times I've run this route I've still been in pain and quite tired by the end, but I've managed to keep running for the whole distance and I know I can run further. And this is my problem - should I extend my training runs to 26 miles? All the training plans I can find say that I shouldn't - 21 miles is plenty. But I can't really see the logic behind this. My body has responded well to the 21 mile runs, so why shouldn't it respond in the same way to 26 miles? And, anyway, I'm not following a training plan. I'm just running a few times a week when I have time.

We'll see how well I'm feeling next week before I decide how far to go. Who knows? I might end up in Brighton again!

Brighton Half Marathon

So, my second half-marathon in a week - the Brighton Half Marathon. This couldn't be more different from the race I did in Dover last week - this time I ate plenty of pasta in advance, and I remembered to wear my running shoes. There were also considerably more runners - around 5,000.

Although I don't live far from Brighton, we still had to get up early as the race started early - 9:45am! We only got there just in time to stow our bags and find our starting point. While we waited for the starter's gun, there were still lots of other runners still arriving or queueing for toilets. I don't know why the race started so early - I can only assume that was the only way the organisers could get the council to agree to close so many roads in the city.

This was the second time I'd run this race - I did it in 2006 as a qualifier for the Snowdon Race. The course has changed a bit since my previous outing - it no longer goes so far East over the cliffs, but instead it has a longer city section in downtown Brighton. Once it's out the winding streets, the course goes along the seafront for a few miles, then turns round and comes back for even more miles. Then it goes up some hills.

I didn't enjoy this race as much as I had Dover, but I'm glad I did it. Even though there were "only" 5,000 runners, it was the biggest race I'd ever run. In London there will by closer to 40,000, so I need to make sure I get as close as possible to the front at the start.

My finishing time was slightly faster than Dover, but still just over 1hr 30mins, so I, thankfully, don't have to try to run the full marathon in under 3 hours.

Dover Half-Marathon

For some reason, I entered two half-marathons in a week. Next week is the Brighton Half-Marathon, but last Sunday was the Dover Half-Marathon.

Normally, my race preparations consist of lots of pasta the day before, lots of sleep the night before and lots of porridge on the morning of the race. Unfortunately, as we were staying in a hotel in Dover, I had none of those things for the Dover Half-Marathon. Also, due to a problem with my running shoes (they were in Chichester, not Dover), I had to run in my emergency squash shoes.

So, all in all, I was quite pleased to finish in 1 hour, 32 minutes. I felt quite tired even before the race and my feet were extremely sore for most of the second half of the race.

As Brighton's closer to home, I should be able to remember to take my running shoes so I'd like to run under 1 hour, 30 minutes. That would be nice, but then I might start to tell myself that I can run the London Marathon in under 3 hours....which I suspect might be a bit optimistic....

Long Sunday Runs

Something I keep reading about in other people's marathon training blogs is the concept of the "Long Sunday Run". Personally, I find it much easier to laze around on a Sunday than to go our for a 10+ mile run. Conversely, I enjoy running during the week in the evening after a day sitting still at a desk.

Unfortunately, the London Marathon and both of my upcoming half-marathons take place on Sunday mornings so I decided it would be a good idea to "train" myself to run on Sundays.

So, between us, Soo and I have devised a scheme to get me running. For the last few Sundays, Soo and I have driven to Soo's gym in Bognor Regis. While she spends an hour doing pilates, I run away down the seafront. When she's finished, she comes and picks me up from wherever I've got to. The first week we tried this, I got as far as Worthing (about 11 miles), but felt that I could have gone further. So this week, Soo went home after pilates and came to pick me up a bit later. By which time I was 17 miles away in Lancing!

I'm quite enjoying this approach to Sunday morning running and, provided Soo doesn't get bored of having to drive further and further to pick me up, I hope to continue doing it regularly.

Who wants to go running?

So it's the time of year when everyone else is eating a lot and drinking a lot and relaxing a lot. And the maximum temperature in my garden hasn't been above freezing for nearly a week.

But despite this, I went for another run tonight. The roads are that eerie light-grey colour they get after days of salting with no rain and they were shining up brightly in the moonlight, so I ran all the way to Yapton and out the other side - as far as I could run until the pavement ran out. Live Maps tells me it was 7.8 miles. Not bad for an evening run, but I need to go further.

Hill Running at Harting Down

All my recent running has been on the road on the flat. While I find this to be the most effective style of training, it's not as much fun as hill running. I love running fast downhill - especially when it's muddy and slippery.

So, this weekend, I went up to Harting Down and ran along the South Downs Way and up and down some of the steeper sections of the escarpment. It had finally stopped raining after three days of downpours, so the ground was nice and muddy. Unfortunately, it was also quite misty, so the usual fine views weren't there.

I ran seven miles with over 550 metres of ascent. Those of you who have followed my running for a while will know that a recurring feature is falling-off-toenails. I'm pleased to report that the nail on my right big toe was severely damaged by today's hill running at Harting Down, so it should fall off in the next few days. I'll be sure to post a video when it does...stay tuned!

Races

As Christmas is approaching and everyone else seems to be eating lots of chocolate, it's becoming increasingly difficult to go out training and eat healthily.

To provide extra motivation, I've entered some races in the new year: half-marathons in Dover and Brighton, and I'm thinking about an off-road half-marathon in the New Forest.

The Dover Half-Marathon is on Sunday 15th February, so Soo and I will be spending Valentine's night in Dover. Which should be romantic.

Brighton is only a week later on 22nd February. I did this race a few years ago - in fact it was my first half-marathon. That was in 2006 and it was very wet and cold and windy. The half-marathon starts and finishes in the same place as the Brighton 10k (on Madeira Drive), but to make up the extra seven miles, it goes up over the cliffs to the east of Brighton - not fun at all!