How (not) to Train for a Marathon (Part Seven)

Previously on How (not) to Train for a Marathon: We went to some very, very dark places on the longest training run I have ever done, enjoyed some French Cul-De-Sacs, and got high-fived by Henry VIII.


Things Fall Apart

It's the end of the first week of March, and there are just 5 weeks to go until the big day. It's at this point that things start to go off track - I've largely done what I needed to up to this point, but then everything starts coming at once - injury, illness, travel, like I'm delving into life's bag of Revels and pulling out all the coffee ones. It's a catalogue of disasters seemingly designed from stopping me getting to that finish line, and it's during these dark weeks that I decide that if I do make it through, I'm going to share my stories so that anyone else in the same situation can be reassured at just how miserable things can get without it stopping you making it through the big day. (Oops, spoiler!)

This is amazing - a guy at the hilarious Epicurean's Answer blog actually did research on the breakdown of the Revels across several bags, and it turns out coffee is the least frequent, we just perceive that there's more of them if we don't like them.
How very like life.

9th March (The Surrey Half Marathon)

What I am supposed to do:  18 miles
What I actually do: 1.83 miles jog, 13.44 miles run and a whole load of walking about
How Does it go?

I really shouldn't be here. I've already done one Half Marathon race, and today is supposed to be 18 mile training day. But I've paid for this, and I'm looking forward to it, so I'm going to make it work, dammit.

The race starts in Guildford, so I get off the train there and decide to be the smug one who jogs past everyone on the way to the start line just to get some more miles in. After last week's despair, it feels goood, but it doesn't quite make up for the fact that the race I'm doing today isn't really what I'm supposed to be doing.

Still, it's a lovely run on a sunny spring day, the roads are shut between Guildford and Woking so we can run there and back again through the countryside and not get run over, and there's a dodgy Oasis covers band playing outside in Woking when we get there, which is reward enough for anyone. There are a couple of fairly challenging hills that I manage to power through after my experience in France last week, and as I finish back in Guildford with a half-lap of the running track at the Athletics Stadium, I start to feel much more confident again. It's the last time for a very long time.

Finish line selfies are always popular, right?

Final stats: 13.44 miles in 2:18:44


15th March


What I am Supposed to do: 20 miles
What I actually do: 12 miles

How does it go?

I can't be bothered to make up a completely new route this time, so I amalgamate some others by deciding to get the train all the way from Surbiton in London's Zone 6 to Vauxhall in Zone 1, and run all the way home along the river. It's 20 miles - I tell people on Facebook that I'm going to do it, and I don't think they believe me, but that's probably because I don't believe it either. I've felt the pain of 16, and since then I've not gone any further than that, so what makes me think I can do this?

More Thames-porn.

I turn out to be right - as it happens, everything starts ok apart from nearly getting lost through Battersea Park, but the pace is ridiculously slow (12-13 minutes per mile), and I can feel that my body is completely spent and nowhere near recovered enough for this.

A brief diversion occurs in Mortlake, where I find the Thames Path completely flooded and have to double back on myself through the streets, but it's not enough to take my mind off the undeniable muscle pain, and from Mile 11 onwards every step becomes a struggle. When my knee starts twinging again at the 12 mile marker, I decide there's just no sense in pushing this, and stop by Kew Gardens, go and find a bus home, and eat a recovery breakfast once again cooked by the lovely Karin.

Sometimes, you just have to listen to your body.

22nd March

What I am supposed to do: 22 miles
What I actually do: Nothing

How does it go?

It really doesn't... the day after the aborted 20 miler, I'm off to Athens for a week's meeting with my new job. I drink too much ouzo and Mythos, and hang out with a couple of people with heavy colds.

On Wednesday the 18th, I wake up with a sore throat and a serious cough, and it looks like running might be off for the entire week. Sunday is supposed to be my longest run, and I completely miss it, which doesn't improve my mood. Things are starting to look a bit dodgy for the big day, as from here on out the training plan is all about "tapering" (easing up and starting to conserve energy stores for the main event). I'm meant to be slowing up, but not stopping completely. And I'm not even meant to be slowing up until I've done a proper, PROPER long run. (16 miles is clearly nothing...)

I eventually go to the doctor on March 25th and he tells me to rest a bit more, as for some reason he doesn't think me running 20 miles will actually improve my cough. I ask for a second opinion on Twitter and the consensus is that my doctor isn't an idiot, so I continue to rest, twiddling my thumbs and ruminating over and over again as to whether I will actually manage to do this, or have to pull out.

I obsessively Google "running injuries", "run marathon after 16 miles training", and "am I totally screwed?", reading everything I can find to see whether I'm going to be able to do this, or end up face down in a dock somewhere near Canary Wharf.

Still, at least Athens was pretty, eh?

On Saturday the 29th of March, I say bollocks to sitting worrying on the sofa, and decide to do something about this. If I lose all my running fitness, what's going to happen? I'll have to walk the whole distance, won't I? So I put on my walking shoes, and off I go on my normal 10k route, trying to walk it as fast as I comfortably can, just to see what my pace would be like. I average 16 minutes a mile, calculate that it would take nearly 7 hours to do the Marathon at this speed, decide I'd accept that, and move on with my life.


30th March

What I am Supposed to do: 13 miles
What I actually do: 11 miles (of which, 9 are running)

How Does it go?

Spurred on by being able to walk, I decide to give running a go -it's my first for over 2 weeks and it turns out to be the last one I do before the Marathon.

I manage 6 miles before having to stop and walk for a bit, then I do intervals of 2 miles run / 1 mile walk to see how that goes as a possible strategy for the main event. The running miles feel ok, until the very last one - when a familiar twinge in my knee signals that today's training is over.

With two weeks to go, I decide that it might be time to seek professional advice but before that, I turn to my trusty Twitter buddies who tell me to buy a foam roller and roll out those Illotibial bands. I go to Sports Direct and get one, bring it home on the bus to some odd looks, and start using it on the floor in the living room - into which Karin appears fairly shortly to ask me why I am torturing warthogs. Yes, it's a painful old thing which results in me groaning and grunting in a most unbecoming way, but it really does help, so I carry on with it anyway.

At least I: a) Keep my shirt on and b) don't look like Simon Cowell.

Physio Killed the Radio Star

On April the 2nd, I finally go and see the Physio at my gym, to explain my dodgy knee symptoms.

"Ok, so when did you first feel this, was it when you were running at the weekend?", she says.

"Um, no, it was about 6 weeks ago.", I admit, sheepishly.

"Wow, ok, so have you been resting since then?" 

"Noooot exactly, no...."

She gives me a deep tissue massage, which is probably the most uncomfortable thing I've ever experienced, as part of it involves pinching the offending tendons between her thumb and forefinger, running down the length of them to try and work out the knots (or something - I don't know what she's doing really, she could be trying to see how much it takes me to start crying, for all I know...)

"Everything is very tight - you should really have come in weeks ago!" - Yeah, no kidding. "Oh well, we'll get you to start doing these exercises and then you should be ok to carry on running again in a few weeks' time."

When I explain that I'm doing the London Marathon in 11 days' time, she first looks confused, then amused, and then realises that I'm serious about this, and puts on a brave face and starts trying to help me. I get exercises to do, she tells me my glutes are pathetic so I need to squeeze my butt cheeks together with every step as I run, and she tells me to keep on with the foam roller, but not to do any more running until the actual race.

That's right, none at all. Her logic is that at this point, I can't gain any more fitness, as that time is past, and all we can do now is damage limitation. It's incredibly unlikely that I'll be able to run the entire way, we both agree, so I tell her about my plan to run a certain number of miles, walk a certain number of miles and she agrees that it's probably the best result we can hope for. She also suggests that I take pain killers with me and take them every few hours in the hope of keeping the inflammation down.

"Good luck!", she says, sounding like I might be the client of hers that's needed it the most.


5th April

What I am Supposed to do: 8 miles
What I actually do: Help my sister move house

How is it?

It's quite a good day, actually - thanks for asking. I don't do any running, but I do drive across London to Deptford / Greenwich, and find cones out all over the place, signs up warning people of delays, and pubs advertising "Marathon Breakfast".

Shit just got real.

Mmmmm....

Eeeeek!

Ewwwww....

The Final Countdown...

In the last week, you're supposed to do as little as possible, rest as much as possible, and eat as many carbs as possible. I manage the last one, but 1 and 2 are a bit buggered by virtue of having to travel to Roskilde in Denmark with a very excitable colleague, who insists that we try and do something every evening, is obsessed with walking everywhere instead of getting cabs, and is somehow charming enough with her annoying persuasion that I go along with it. Even when she insists on calling me "Henry" for reasons too complicated to go into.

Hence, there's not much rest, but it's ok, the short walks we take get the muscles going again, and I've brought all my gear with me - the running shoes and clothes, the foam roller and my exercise mat, and I spend any free time I do have doing my exercises from the physio and trying not to panic about what's now less than a week away.

There's even genuinely healthy food to help me stock up my body, and I'm able to use the excuse of running a marathon at the weekend to avoid putting my feet in one of those fish-nibbly tanks that my colleague is desperate for me to try.

"Oh Henry, you're so boooooring!"  - ah, but you know, Marathon comes first! "Huh, alright then...". Win.

Unfortunately, I neglect to tell British Airways that Marathon comes first, and after bumping us off our return flight from Copenhagen in exchange for a 200 Euro gift voucher which actually doesn't materialise, we then end up two flights later in the evening, and without our suitcases.

Suitcases. Which contain literally everything I need for the marathon - shoes, clothes, foam roller, headphones, the lot. It's 11pm on Friday night, in the morning I need to go to the Marathon Expo to register, and in less than 24 hours' time I need to be tucked up in bed with all my gear laid out ready for me to grab and go.

See, even the last Revel in the bag usually turns out to be coffee.


Next time: It's the day before the big day (the small day?)

How (not) to Train for a Marathon (Part Six)

Previously on How (Not) to Train for a Marathon: We discovered why you can't run in the pitch black, what Mo thinks about my 10k time, and examined just how much fun you can have running 14 miles.


Practice Races

"Week 11: Run a Half Marathon (See p58)" reads Sunday the 2nd of March's instruction in the Marathon training plan - the idea being that doing a 'test race' gets you used to what it's like on race day.

What's on page 58? Oh, of course, it's a "feature" (advert) about the Silverstone half marathon race which, completely coincidentally, is organised and sponsored by all the same people as the London Marathon. "Register now, as this popular event is filling up fast!"

I laugh in the face of your pathetic attempts to manipulate me, Marathon training plan, I shall find my own Half Marathon race, from which you will obtain zero money, and I will have a much better time because I won't have to drive to sodding Silverstone. Of course, I now have a dilemma, because when someone gives me a plan for what to do when, you can bet your life I'm sticking to it to the letter, otherwise the whole thing is going to crumble and fall by the wayside like my diet plans after one Malteser.

I just spent a very long time Googling pictures of Maltesers.
There's some seriously good stuff out there if you know where to look. I can hook you up.

I try to find a Half Marathon that's a bit more local to me (yes, a Local Half Marathon for Local People), and find one that looks good, but it's not on the same day. Still, I decide to swap weeks 11 and 12 around in my training plan. It annoys the schedule nerd in me to my very core, but decide it probably won't make that much difference in the end.

And then... I'm halfway through week 10 and having palpitations just thinking about doing that 14-mile run from last week again PLUS another 2 miles, when I spot something on Twitter - there's a Hampton Court Half Marathon! And it's this weekend! Of course it's sold out, but someone on my feed has a spare place which he can't use, and it'll just go to waste... of course it's too late to transfer it officially, so tonight, Matthew, for one night only, I am going to be "Charles Hedges". I can still do 16 miles, can't I? I'll just finish the race, cross the line and then carry on past everyone else and run home. It'll be just like that time my friend Rob crossed the touchline playing rugby, and carried on running right off the pitch, thereby losing our team a certain try.


23rd February (Hampton Court Half Marathon)

What I am supposed to do: 16 miles
What I actually do: 13.01 miles, and then another 1.27 miles, and then give up
How Does it Go?

Here I am, at my first ever Half Marathon race, and I have a curious mixture of excitement and terror in various parts of my body. Will I be able to do this? Will I come last? Will I have to stop and adjust my pants halfway round and get arrested for indecent exposure?

Of course, I know I can do this- I've gone further than this in training already, so what I'll do is pretend it's just another training run, I'll go at my normal pace (11 minutes a mile or slightly more), not care about my time, ignore all the other people around me and just run my own race. I line up behind the 2:30 pace setter and decide to stick with them as an insurance plan. Lights out, and away we go, and before I know it I've done my first mile in 10:15 - slow down, boy!

Luckily, the previously documented 'first few miles' syndrome kicks in pretty quickly, and there are a lot of people on the route, so I drop right back to 11:30 for a couple of miles, to catch my breath, and then as we reach Hampton Court itself, I get high-fived by Henry VIII as I pass and something in me clicks as I speed off down the towpath towards Kingston (this time, being able to see.)

DEFINITELY the real one.

Miles fly by, and I keep my mind on enjoying the scenery, humming along to my banging tunes, and high-fiving random kids who've come out to watch (this is surprisingly motivating, actually). It's a really nice race with a good, flat course, and lots of excited spectators. And a Henry VIII.

With one mile to go, I'm starting to flag - somehow knowing exactly how far there still is to go is actually demotivating (it's the reason why I groan audibly at every race when I start seeing the "500 metres to go" / "100 metres to go" / "No honest you're really really nearly there now" signs) - but it's not as demotivating as seeing all the people who've already finished, sauntering back to their cars with their goody bags and eating their bananas provocatively.

But all that pales into insignificance compared to those who, as they're strolling, medal around neck, start calling out "Well done! You're doing really well! You're soooo nearly there!", in the world's most condescending tone which probably only exists in my head, but is nonetheless one of the most irritating things known to man aside from Piers Morgan. "I WILL DECIDE WHEN I'M NEARLY THERE, AND IF I CAN'T SEE THE PISSING FINISH LINE, I AM DEFINITELY NOT NEARLY THERE, THANKS!", I (don't) shout back, with veins popping from my head in apoplectic rage.

Still, the facts in the cold light of day are that I actually am pretty close to the finish, which I duly arrive at in what is a great time for me at this stage in my training, and as I cross, feeling damn good about myself, I slow down to wander over to the table where the goody bags are kept. There's a small queue, but I probably only wait about 30 seconds before grabbing my bounty, turning round to get going again, and...

"AAAAAAHHHHHH..."

Remember that knee pain I mentioned at the end of the 14-mile run? Yeah, I've failed to get that checked out, and somehow the act of stopping for 30 seconds has rendered me completely incapable of moving again. I hobble away from the finish line and find a quiet spot out on the road - thoughts of now running another 3 miles completely gone. I manage to do a bit of stretching and eat my banana, and I'm just pondering what on earth to do when my sister Helen arrives on her bike, hoping to catch me finishing, but now finding herself in the unenviable position of having to help me get home.

Still, at least she can take this "sort of victory" photo for me, although she somehow makes me look about 2 feet tall in the process. (Or maybe that's just my awesome attire.)

I do some more stretches and hobble around a bit, and then suddenly I feel ok. "I feel ok", I say.

"I'm going to try to run home, you can cycle alongside me..."

I don't know if you've ever run a really long way, cooled down properly and stretched, and THEN started trying to run again, but I hope not, for your sake. This is the worst idea ever. I manage one-and-a-bit miles, Helen cycling alongside when possible, but bicycles aren't actually designed to go as slowly as an ant trying to roll a can of baked beans up a hill with its face, so she heads off into the distance every so often to spare my embarrassment.

I give up halfway home and hobble the rest of the way. Upon arrival, I check my Endomondo to find that it's only tracked 13.01 miles for the actual race, which is odd since it will nearly always track more than the advertised distance due to me weaving in and out of even slower people like a Subaru driver on the M3. Checking on Twitter, there's an apology from the organisers of the race along the lines of "Yeah, sorry, there was a marshalling error - someone sent you the wrong way before you'd really even got going, so the race was only 12 and a bit miles. Sorry about that!".

I would say I'm at the lowest point I will reach on this journey - but there's still one more rung on the despair ladder to fall down onto...


Final stats: 13.02 miles in 2:20:43 and 1.27 miles in 14:50. Ugh. 



Really, really, really long runs

Ok, now it's time for the big boys' stuff. We've skirted around the Half Marathon distance for a few weeks like, well, teenage me at the edge of a school disco dancefloor, but now it's time to grow a pair of balls, and go out there and do The Robot. Or something...

Because I messed things up last week by doing a Half Marathon the week before, it's now time for my 16-miler.


Monday 3rd of March

What I am supposed to do: 13.1 miles
What I decide to do: 18 miles (for a reason I can't quite work out now)
What I actually do: 16 miles
How much I actually cry: A little bit

Taking my "find a new route every time" theory to its limits, I have relocated for a couple of weeks to my parents' house in the French countryside, where I am trying to recover from a stressful few years' work ahead of starting a new job. For some reason, the stress levels actually seem to increase while I am there - and it's only with the benefit of hindsight that I can see that the Marathon training is a massive contributor to this. The amount you put your body through week in, week out, the worry about whether you're doing enough, the pressure of your sponsors and charity counting on you, the constant feelings of not being good enough and that you're going to fail...

(So that's now the "cheap form of exercise", the "helps you lose weight", and the "relieves stress" myths that we've debunked over the last 6 blogs...)

This therefore marks the first lengthy run that I've done away from my beloved River Thames, and I have carte blanche to go wherever I like - but, wait, it's not that easy. It needs to be somewhere that I can run off the actual road, which counts out the immediate surroundings since for miles around there are only country roads and farmers on tractors -who, to be fair, do at least seem to enjoy the unusual spectacle of grown men in luminous lycra chasing sheep down the lanes.

It also needs to be somewhere where I don't keep having to stop to cross roads, and somewhere that if I have to stop for a pee, or to heave up my breakfast at the foot of a tree, nobody is really going to mind. Step forward the Forêt domaniale de Châteauroux, which is a large forest just South of the city of Châteauroux, with paths, and small forest tracks, which lend themselves perfectly to just such an occasion. I plan out my route using a run planning website, for some reason marking out an 18-mile route even though I actually only need to do 16. (As of now, I cannot remember why, and am calling myself an idiot for making my life harder, but let's ignore that for the moment.)

The numbers here are in Kilometres, just to confuse you.

There's obviously no way I'm going to manage to remember this route, so I print the map out - unfortunately it covers such a large area that it has to go on 6 sheets of A4 to have anything like the right amount of detail. So I assemble all the pages, tape them together, fold them into something that sort of fits in my hand (about as well as my stomach fits in my trousers right now), and get into the car, in which my parents will drive me the 45 minutes to my designated starting point.

If I've been nervous before, it's nothing compared to now. I sit in the back of the car, yawning and fidgeting, in scenes reminiscent of my Dad driving me to my first music exam, or to my first residential course away from home, or to university halls. All I want to do is sleep, to go back inside in the warm, for the car to turn round and my parents to say comfortingly "It's ok, you don't have to do this, let's just go home, shall we?"

But of course, I really, really want this at the same time, so as the car pulls into the layby where I'm about to begin this ordeal, the adrenalin starts pumping, I get in the zone and bid them a brusque farewell (probably just like when they left me at uni), and make arrangements to rendez-vous at the checkpoint marked 16 on the map above, to provide energy drinks and moral support.

The road ahead of me. It's awfully straight, isn't it?

A quick stretch and a warm up march with knees up around my ears (another reason why I want to be away from civilisation), and off I go.

The folly of my route choice immediately becomes clear: as you will have noticed from the map above, there are an awful lot of very straight roads in this forest, and as I realise gradually, there's nothing more demotivating than running mile after mile on the same straight road with nothing in your sights but the horizon, and identical trees as far as the eye can see. A bend would be nice, or a clearing, but the first few miles pass without such luxuries. Still, it's a nice sunny day, I've got some good tunes in my ears (it's today that I discover how surprisingly many of the lyrics to "My Name is Prince" I can remember), and the act of  trying to hold my water and the map at the same time whilst simultaneously unfolding sections of it and seeing where I need to go at the next intersection without losing the whole thing in the wind, keeps me occupied quite nicely.

I take a 90 degree left turn just before the 3 mile mark, and start heading inwards on the second side of my very irregular pentagon - things are feeling good, I'm running at a good pace nicely under 11 minutes a mile, and I'm reminded again just why I love this so much. I even take my headphones out for a bit and listen to some French birds singing in their French accents. At the 5 mile mark, there's a path I mustn't miss, as it turns me back into the forest instead of letting me exit into civilisation, but I can't see it. I keep going, desperately looking into the undergrowth for where this elusive trail might be, but before I can find it, the trees end, I'm suddenly running down a very suburban street, and into the town of Le Poinçonnet.

There's a nice church, at least.

I've run right off the map and have no idea where I actually am, so on goes the data roaming and in comes Google Maps, (all without stopping, by the way) and it's at this point that I realise I'm 2 miles or so off course. My heart sinking, I try to figure out which way to go, do a brief unintentional tour of French Cul-De-Sacs, manage to find my way back to the main road and head straight down it, back towards the forest and the hope of regaining my route and meeting my parents at some point today.

Around 9 miles into my run, I finally make it back to something approaching the planned route, and start again on the long, straight slogs, running on and on with seemingly no progress being made, but at the 10 mile mark, I turn a slight corner and find something different to cheer me up - half a mile of very steep hill leading down into a valley, and then half a mile of very steep hill leading up to my checkpoint, for the majority of which the path is made entirely of sodden grass and calf-deep mud. I've always said I didn't fancy doing a Tough Mudder, and this proves it, as I squelch slowly and painfully, actually losing my sodden wet trainer at one point, up the incline towards the spot where I know my parents are waiting with supplies.

Finally, about half an hour late, I arrive at the designated meeting spot, and there they are, the first human beings I've seen in hours - My mum is first, holding out a banana and an energy drink, both of which I eagerly grab, and then a few steps further on, there's my Dad, with a replacement bottle water, which I greet like a pint of Kingfisher at the end of an economy flight to Banagalore. I'm elated to see them nearly as much as the items they're holding, and my spirits suddenly take a massive upswing.

It looked a bit like this spot, but to be fair, so did the entire run. (With the obvious subtraction of leaves from the trees.)

It seems rude to just run right past them, so I jog on the spot a little, determined not to stop completely for fear of a repeat of last week's knee incident, and we shoot the breeze a little, chatting about how things are going and why the heck I'm so late. Obviously I now can't do the full route I'd planned because of my exploratory survey of suburban French architecture, so they suggest that if I turn left at this very checkpoint, there's a straight road which goes right across the diameter of this forest, so I can run right down there with no danger of getting lost, and not have to worry about the map any more. They'll meet me at the other road (around 16.5 miles) and we can decide then whether I'll carry on to the full 18 or not. (I think you can sense where this is going.)

It seems eminently sensible, so I leave the map with them, and with a renewed spring in my step, head off on the last section, with 5 miles to go until the next opportunity to get back in the car. What follows is probably the darkest and most difficult hour of my entire life. There aren't actually that many trees by the road at some points, so from side to side I get to enjoy a bit of a grassy bank and some bracken;  but in the distance the road stretches endlessly ahead, upwards into the distance, towards the main D990 which bisects the forest like a knife through a Florina. (It's a type of French apple, what do you mean you've never heard of it?)

I climb 200 feet over the next 2 miles, trudging wearily along this minor road, all alone, looking out every so often for cars (since this is one of the few forest roads that actually allows traffic) - and eventually I reach the roundabout that signifies that I'm halfway down this final, gruelling stretch. I'm at the 14 mile mark as I (thankfully) select the correct exit from the roundabout and cross back into the forest, and I can't see how I am going to make it to 16, let alone 18. All my leg muscles are burning like I've never felt before, my lungs feel like they're about to be expelled through my mouth, my head is pounding with intense pain, and I start moaning out loud with every breath...

"WUUUURRRRGGGHHHHHH", I go, again and again. "YEEEEUUUUCCCCCHHHH". The road continues to stretch endlessly on into the distance, I focus on my feet, or the tarmac 10 metres ahead, anything to avoid looking at that damn road and the finish point that I can't even see. The music is still going, but I can barely hear it any more, all I can hear is the pounding of my heart, and a voice in my head. "You knew you wouldn't be able to do this. You knew you couldn't run a marathon. Why did you even try? 

All the while, this voice fights with thoughts of the people who love me, people who've sponsored me and want to see me succeed and above all, thoughts of my Grandfather who I'm doing this in memory of. As I start thinking about him, my brain makes the twistedly ironic connection between the vision of him, shuffling along slowly, unable to pick up his feet as the Parkinson's got worse and worse, and the sight of my own feet, barely leaving the tarmac now, with each step getting shorter and shorter, and the rest of my body just being dragged along for the ride like a sack of potatoes,

It starts to rain. There's still a mile to go, and the fact that at least I'm dry (the one last good thing left to me) is gone. Onwards I still go though, slowing right down to nearly 12 minutes a mile but not stopping, never stopping. If I stop, I will fail - and I'm not going to fail.

My actual route. It's not quite the same, is it?

"16 miles in 2 hours, 55 minutes...", says the computerised Endomondo lady in my headphones. The rain is still falling. It's getting colder and darker. I'm running down a hill, quite unlike Kate Bush, and at the bottom I can just make out a car sitting there with its lights on... Is it? Please, let it be... IT IS! My parents get out and start coming towards me, and I just start bawling my eyes out as I try to force the last few steps out of my legs, which by this point are locked into a position they're probably never coming out of.

"WAHHHAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHAAAAAAA", I say to my mum, "I DON'T WANT TO... I DON'T KNOW WHY... I just can't...."  - she grabs my arm as I come to a stop and lean against her for support, as my dad runs back to the car to bring it as close as possible. The rain is still falling, and I know there are still 2 miles left to my ultimate target, but I don't care. There will be an 18 mile run one day, but that day isn't today. I try to do some stretches against the car, but my knee is in agony, and my parents have to hold me by both arms to help me so much as get into the car. I look down at my shirt and it's smeared with blood which has run in the rain, my trainers are caked in mud and my socks are soaked through with brown water.

Yes, I went there. It was time.

We go back to theirs and I have the most wonderful bath and cup of tea that I've ever experienced, and spend the rest of the day hobbling back and forth between the drinks fridge and the sofa.

Two days later, I post this on Twitter. Perhaps I will be able to do this Marathon thing, after all....

Next time: Things start to unravel in the final weeks, as I make my last preparations for the big day...

How (not) to Train for a Marathon (Part Two)

Previously on "How (not) to Train for a Marathon": We established that you should probably have started basic training, like, yesterday; that people in running shops have seen much more hideous toenails than yours; that Rocky didn't know jack about what to put on your feet; and that the MC Hammer look is definitely in this year.

Oh, and we established that this whole thing is not meant to be a serious training suggestion, more an encouragement to anyone that might feel that they're not prepared enough for an upcoming race. Lord knows, I could have done with something like this.

The Marathon Training Plan

"You're In!", screamed the letter which popped onto my doormat in October, kindly leaving out the "(deep doo-doo)" part, which probably wouldn't have helped, if we're honest. The letter and its accompanying magazine sat accusingly on the dining table for the rest of the year, quietly tutting every time I put off another jog, and sniggering at me squeezing into my man tights, trying desperately to get back to 10k fitness by New Year's Day. (Which I did do, so up yours, magazine.)

Marathon News: This just in - you're much less fit than these people.

Upon finally plucking up the courage to open up the magazine on New Year's Day, I discovered that it was mostly comprised of advertisements (for charities and running gear), interspersed with more advertisements masquerading as training advice.

"DOCTOR'S ORDERS: Lucozade Sport will be available during the Marathon in April so make sure you try it in training to see if you like it. It tastes quite different after 20 miles."

So - go and spend your money on this drink, so that you can see if you will like the free samples we will give you during the race. And even if you don't like it, don't worry, because you sure will when we force feed it to you in the dying stages of a race when you'd happily suck on a yak's armpit if you thought it contained a microgram of glucose.

The London Marathon - sponsored by... oh, I see.

But I digress. There it was, on page 31: The Training Programme. Actually, there are always 3 - Beginner (aka just trying to get you round without you breaking down and weeping on a poor St John's Ambulance man), Intermediate (aka the smug gits who've done this before and are going to whup your arse and patronisingly call out "well done, you're nearly there" as they jog home past you at mile 20), and Advanced (I am assuming this is exactly what Mo followed.)

I thought about this for no seconds, before settling on 'Beginner' and starting to draw out my training plan. Yep, it really helped to visualise just how screwed I was in diagrammatic form, by scribbling months' worth of my life into neat little boxes and marking out which painful and humiliating task I would subject myself to on each date.

I was somewhat astounded to discover that, because I'd been ignoring the smug little bundle of pages for so long, it was already too late (on January 1st) for me to complete the entire training programme. Mistake Number 1. I instead figured that since I could already run for an hour without stopping, I would be fine to jump right into week 3. Probably not the worst call I made along the way, but it did mean that the training plan now ran right up to Marathon day without any leeway. Mistake Number 2. 

My feelings about February 16th are somewhat unclear...

You might notice, if you enlarge my training plan above, that there are a number of mysterious codes and numbers, a pleasing number of ticks, a few crosses, some smiley faces, one, I dunno, constipated face(?) and even a "YES!!!" (3 exclamation marks, eh?) - so you can probably gather that training was something of a mixed bag. You'll see, though, that most of January and February have been largely completed, and that's where the vast majority of the work and fitness-building went in. It may or may not help you to know that I was working exclusively from home during this period, and so I never had to do any of my short runs in the rain or the dark, I just popped out on my lunchbreak and made up the time later. No, you're right, that didn't help you at all.

Anyway, things fell a little off the rails in the last month, but by (mostly) doing what I was told for 10 weeks up to mid-March, I built a moderate level of fitness which enabled me not to have to crawl on my hands and knees at any point on the big day.

Training largely falls into 3 categories:

A. Long runs - These take place at the weekends. These are the most important part of training for any race, and we'll come to them next time - have a guess as to what they might entail.

B. Short runs - These happen during the week, only twice if you're a n00b like me, and have all kinds of scary names like 'Threshold', 'Fartlek' and 'Kerrang' (ok, maybe not 'Kerrang'). Short runs mostly involve running a bit slower than your intended marathon pace, alternating with bursts of much faster running, and even sometimes sprinting, preferably with your arms flailing all over the place and a look of gay abandon on your face. Well, that's how I did it anyway.

This might explain why I was absolutely rubbish at all the short runs, except for the reassuringly named 'Easy Run', which in my case meant jogging as slowly as I could without going backwards - these are pretty much just designed to get you moving again after the long runs destroy every fibre of your muscle tissue. Enjoy!

Yes, I completely sucked at the short runs, with nearly every short run turning into an 'Easy', or if I was feeling adventurous, a 'Steady' run. If I had to pinpoint one reason why I didn't manage a faster time on the day, this is it - I never conditioned my body to run any faster than my long-run-plod, and every time I tried it just shredded my calves and/or shins - sometimes both, just for good measure.

It's extremely important, before you start, to think about what your target marathon pace is going to be. And I say this because I really didn't give it enough thought. After completing my first unbroken 10k on New Year's Eve in a bit over an hour, in retrospect I don't see why I didn't decide that was my marathon pace and just keep building up from there little by little. At that pace, I could have finished in about 4.5 hours, and I would have been extremely happy with that - as it was, I just looked at the impossible task in front of me, decided that 6 hours was the slowest finishing time I would tolerate, and sort of worked out all my training paces based on that, but mostly also sort of didn't work them out at all. Mistake Number 3, although I have since read that most first time marathoners are far too conservative with their expected finish time, so we're all morons and not just me. 

I was also kind of rubbish at:

C. Core exercises - You know, planks, press-ups, squats, all that excruciating stuff. This is supposed to be done at least once a week, to build up your core stability and prevent yourself from getting injured. I started out doing it twice a week, and then somewhere along the line decided that the time when I wasn't running could be much better used watching 'Storage Wars' and eating pizza.

So this fell by the wayside somewhat, but I did at least keep stretching every couple of days. Yeah, I stretched all those muscles and tendons good and proper, with exercises I'd been given by a physiotherapist two years ago to combat a specific calf problem - and to be fair at least that problem didn't reoccur at all. It might have been an idea to remember that I also had hamstrings and glutes, though. Mistake Number 4.

So, what have we learned here? Apart from that there's no run called "Kerrang"?

I suppose the main point of this whole section is to say that I managed to complete the marathon on the day, with a minimum of walking, by pretty much only ever running at marathon pace during training, and completely neglecting to work on my core. So if you're in your last few weeks of training for a race and you're panicking because your fartleks are all out of whack, and you think abs is just a member of 5ive, take heart - you're determined enough to do it, and you will probably make it around. Just don't expect to spot Mo along the way.

Next time: Pain and Charity (these aren't related - honest.)