Sponsorship update

Against a background of credit crunch, global armageddon, financial insecurity and Comic Relief nicking possible donations the fund-raising is progressing as well as I can expect. There is over £700 donated on the JustGiving site (http://www.justgiving.com/pauls-flm2009), I am hoping for a decent pledge from one of my suppliers at work, my mate Ed Walters is running and raising funds on my behalf (currently around £300), a recent MUFTI day at work was on behalf of BabyLifeline that should raise around £200 , The Princess Vic has pledged £150 (though I haven't seen this yet and I have dissappeared from their website) and quite a few friends and colleagues have pledged to donate when they pull their fingers out / remember / await pay day. Please spread the word - I'm doing this for the babies!

Nailed it or Blood, sweat and screams

It's the morning of the big one - 22 miles. Friday night I organised all my gear and the plan was for Claudia to wake me up with one of her sky-ripping cries that mean "I'm awake, time to feed" sometime between 5:45 and 6:00am as is her way. Saturday morning and I hear a little whimper at 4:30am but it passes and I drift back off into my dream (something about an old friends wedding, Tina, and me punching an even older friend, Trevor Brown, because he pushed my donkey over and laughed). Then there it is Claudia is awake and she wants her milk, aka Sharon's breasts. I look at the clock and it is 6:25. You can't rely on anyone these days. Five minutes later I have my shorts on and I'm downstairs preparing my breakfast, Cheerios, skimmed milk, a banana and an isotonic drink. Next it's vest on, this is my new race-day vest I'm trying out, feet gelled, socks and trainers on and 15 minutes of stretching as per my physio-terrorists orders. I now have 10-15 minutes to let my cheerios and banana settle and watch Sky Sports News in which time the rest of the clan have decided to get up. My rest then consists of getting Sharon a cup of tea and having to explain every piece of equipment and give it a human name to George. Howard the mp3 player, Barry the belt, Lucy the carbo-gel and so on. At about 7:10am I am kitted out and out the door for the second longest run I have ever done.
The plan is run from Shepherds Bush through Holland Park and Notting Hill into Hyde Park then 4 laps then home - sounds easy. The weather is fairly perfect for running, overcast and there is a wet mist hanging in the air although this does make it a little cold to start with as I am running only in vest and shorts for the first time this year. As I cruise up Notting Hill I have now warmed up and am feeling good. After around 25 minutes running I enter Hyde Park. At this time in the morning there are very few people, mainly runners and a few walkers. It's a lovely feeling to have such a large park practically to myself. As I pass the Albert Memorial and head toward the Household Cavalry barracks a group of 6 horses canter past. As I reach about 5 miles I am aware that this is where my calf tightened last week, paranoia sets in immediately and for the rest of the first lap I am waiting for something to go wrong - fortunately nothing does. I head into the 2nd lap at a good pace and feeling good I am already saying to myself "after this lap I'm half way". The weather is still good, warming up slightly and the mist is clearing. the park is still relatively empty, no cafes open, Speakers Corner speechless and tourists still tucking into their full English at the hotel. I have 3 carbo-gels on me and 2 small bottle of isotonice lucozade. On the second lap I allow my my first gel at 8 miles. Unfortunately I was squeezing the sachet slightly too hard as I ripped the top off and about a third of the gel shot up into the air and landed partly on my leg partly on the ground. I quickly drink down the remaining elixir and carry on. After 5 minutes I do feel a boost, the only down side is the spilt gel has now dried and there are streaks down my leg that look very much like I have "done a Paula" and pee'd myself. As I finish the second lapmy garmin shows just over 10 miles covered, that means I'll need to add a little to the route to clock 22 miles. On the third lap the park is getting busier and there looks like an organised race has started though we do not clash routes. At around 13 miles my calfs do feel slightly tighter but this is to be expected I tell myself and the occasional twinge in the knee/hip/ankle I ignore. I hit 14 miles and take another gel this time completely orally. These gels are really good and the make I've settled on are fairly watery so you don't need to wash them down and waste water, they taste a bit like unset strawberry jelly. I start the last and still feel good overall though have started fantasising about pints of shandy, marmite sandwiches and KFC's. As I complete the final lap I decide to add the extra mileage necessary in the park so start another part lap. By now it's around 10:00am and the park is getting busy, the sun has come out and so have the tourists all of whom seem fascinated by blossom! I run passed the Albert Memorial for a final time then up passed the Diana memorial then head toward the exit as the garmin gets up to 19 miles. As I leave the park a helicopter thunders over head and lands in the gardens of Kensington Palace, don't really know why I've mentioned this just thought I would. I finish my last gel and have one sip of drink left. I am really feeling my legs now but just tiredness not injury as I stumble-run down through Notting Hill. This down-hill stretch is probably a god-send but I don't really notice it! As I get to Shepherds Bush Green I know there is only a mile to go which spurs me on. Uxbridge Road has come to life now with most shops open quite a few people milling about. Finally I reach the Princess Vic and turn right into my road for the last few hundred yard or in metric the last few hundred metres. Just under 3 and a half hours after setting off I reach my front door. I ring the bell and hear George charge like a small bull elephant to look out of the letter flap and shout "Daddy's back, come in garden with me". Sharon opens the door, looks at me then says "Urrr, oh my god, are you okay, oo my legs are going". Just then the neighbours come out, Ed says "Is that what I think it is" and Marielle just screams. It is now I follow there stares to my chest covered in my rather snazzy Ron Hill running vest, white with orange detail. However a third colour had been added - red, in 2 patches where my nipples have been rubbed raw. It looks like a couple of gun shot wounds.
The neighbours disperse, Sharon and the kids go off to the farmers market and leave me to tend to my wounds and shower. After 20 mins I have showered and dressed and feel amazingly good. Calfs are a little stiff as expected but everything else is fine, not even my nipples hurt - miles of training have toughened them up. So after putting my vest in a bowl of vanish I hobble off to the market to meet the family. That's it, that's the biggy done and it's the longest I have ever run continuously as during the marathon last year I had to walk a couple of times from 19 miles. Now the taper starts, same intensity when training but reduced mileage. All in all a good start to the weekend.

Pleasure or Pain?

Quick update on my physio session. For anyone who read last years blog they will recall that I use a German physiotherapist called Romy. She is excellent and last year diagnosed my stress fracture, recommended a great consultant and worked on my legs enough to get me through the marathon, that is why I turn to her when I get aches and pains. Unfortunately there is a price to pay with this physio, I am convinced she works on the rule "No pain, No gain". Romy has the strongest thumbs known to mankind and she's not scared to use them. So yesterday I braved the hippies, crusties, anarchists, soap-dodgers, real protesters and police and made my way along the Central Line and DLR to Westferry. Within minutes of arriving I was in my shorts lying face down on the table waiting for a gentle comforting massage on my calf. How foolishly optimistic was I!
For the first 4 to 5 minutes I managed to maintain some level of conversation, though I was starting to sweat as Romy's thumbs dug further into my muscles. After 5 minutes I lapsed into silence as I was either gritting my teeth or letting out small, high pitched whimpers. For the next 2 minutes this so-called health professional tortured me while telling me about her plans to set up home with her boyfriend, go travelling and have kids. Finally the agony ended, Romy wheeled over the infra-red ultra-sound heat torch thingy-me-wotsit, slapped some gel on my calf and for 5 minutes I had a gentle massage - now this is what I came for.
So I left the physio in ten times as much pain as I had been 45 minutes previous. As I made the 30 second walk to Westferry I heard over the tannoy that all the hippies, crusties, anarchists, soap-dodgers, pot heads and real protesters were leaving Docklands so the police diverted my DLR to Tower Gateway. Eventually after many changes of tube and bus I made it home.
As Sharon and the small people were out I headed up to the shed to do 30 mins on the bike to stretch out the leg. The sun was out and the shed like a greenhouse. 30 minutes and 3 pints of sweat later I staggered to the house dehydrated mumbling about bloody germans, need for drink, leg pain and hippies.

Long time no post!

Apologies readers, well Sticky at least. I'v e failed to update the blog for nearly 2 weeks. Now I could put this down to my ultra-busy work, play and training schedule or a niggling injury but truth is I've just forgotten to. Right since my last post I have done my normal training routine - a couple of runs during the week and a bike session.
On Saturday 26th I set off at 7am for a 20 miler, unfortunately after about 7 miles around Hyde Park I felt my left calf muscle tighten up so for once in my life I did the sensible thing and cut the run short. I completed 10 miles and headed for home. Now normally I would be devastated by this and think it a set back, but thats not how the new Paul thinks! I ran that 10 miles ahead of marathon pace and felt exceptionally good, a 10 miler is nothing to me now which is great. My pace was good and consistent, I felt good from the word go and fell straight into a rhythm. I knew the calf wasn't an injury but simply a reaction to the amount of mileage I had put in over the last few weeks/months. Here's the biology bit - all the impact of every step of my runs causes the muscle fibres in the leg muscles particularly the calfs shorten and tighten. Eventually parts of the muscle effectively ball-up into hard knots. Now if I had been a model trainer all the way through this may not of happened, but I must admit I don't do enough pre or post run stretching to pull the muscles back into shape and on Saturday they told me so! When I got home I dd the requisite stretching (horse / gate / bolted - I know) then showered.
On the Sunday the calf was slightly stiff but nothing major. On the Tuesday I did 50 minutes on the bike and that helped stretch it out, yesterday was a quick 6 miles with no adverse reaction. Today I have booked a sports massage with my physiotherapist just to stretch out and loosen my legs up and then I'll go for a short run tonight. After which I promise to stretch for the full 20 minutes. This Saturday is my last "big" run, a 22 miler after this I will be tapering down my mileage, storing up that energy for race day!