I had this conversation with my nephew about winning the London Marathon and despite all my good points of not even having the slightest chance of “winning” he left a comment on my fundraising page: “Come on Roy you are going to win.” This boy has a sense of humour. But then my flatmate (he is one of the brainy ones and should know better) also went on about winning and today at the ExCel Exhibition Centre, where I registered…
On my way to register for the marathon and receive my running number. It is 44540 by the way and with this number you are able to track me live on race day via the official London Marathon website.
I got the vest for the Marathon quite a while ago, but was puzzled how my name would appear on it. Today I was going again through the fundraising material that was sent by the NSPCC and suddenly three black letter fell out of the envelope, R, O and Y, together with a step by step instruction how to iron this on my vest. I did it, it worked and it feels great! Traditionally NSPCC’s running vests are NSPCC green, but…
With 11 days to go I am entering the final spurt. And the fantastic news is, today you cracked two-thirds of the fundraising target! Yeah and a big thank you! I don’t really know how to express my gratitude, so expect a bit more thank you posts over the coming days. I still can’t quite believe how generous you guys have been. On the training front it is getting harder and harder to train less and less. I know, this whole tapering…
With only three weeks to go until the London Marathon it is time for tapering. That means all the hard work should be done by now, you don’t add more miles, but run less. So I left the house with the idea it’s gonna be easy. Big mistake. It must be that mind thing that makes or breaks it. My knees were again very tender, but now after 2.5 hours rather than 3. Anyway, I passed the Olympic Stadium. There…
I did see the foot doctor in the end. It is good sometimes to get check out by an expert. First and major thing: The pain in my foot is nothing to worry about and I can to my marathon. Yeah! But the doctor wasn’t to impressed by my barefoot running ideas (“hippie ideas” to quote him). His main point: My feet are perfectly fine, why do I bother to improve something that works. Hmm… He did not give me the…
Today in four weeks is the London Marathon. All running advice that grabbed my attention seemed to stress one thing: Do you last long run today. Very important, very, very important. Not easy when, you have pain in your foot, not really knowing what it is and whether the last long run before the marathon might push you over the edge and becomes your last long run for months or even a year. Have been there, that’s why I am…
Got up this morning, went down the stairs and suddenly felt this piercing pain in the ball of my left foot again. It first appeared on Tuesday during my very light and easy lunch time run. The same day when the strange pain on the top of the same foot appeared during a very light and easy bicycle ride to work. WHAT IS GOING ON? I tried to be good this time, stopped running, made an appointment with a foot…
I can’t quite remember at which point I thought running the London Marathon is a good idea. Now with the event coming closer and closer I’m getting equally more and more terrified. Today is the 22th of March, which means there are only 30 days to go. I got an appointment with a foot specialist for tomorrow. It’s not bad, but when I move, walk, run it gets slightly worse, which is worrying. But luckily the cause is bigger than…
I finally found a cure for my chronically hurting Achilles tendons (or my Achilles Tendinitis, as I learned from several running websites). After 10 months of soreness it finally seems to be over. The cause? My inflexible calve muscles. Only a week of serious stretching and massaging (deep into the knotted calve tissue) has done the trick. Just in time to experience completely new pain: some kind of burning pain on top op my left foot and rather bizarre some…
Got a new mattress for the single bed room. But what to do with the old one? It was still in good condition, but it was a bit to hard and springy and not really my idea of a good night’s sleep. Before calling the council to get it collected, I gave Gumtree a shot, mentioning my fundraising in the ad and that the money would go to the NSPCC. Two days later it was sold and gone. Smooth and simple. Win-win! Let’s…
I always thought of Snaresbrook as a strange name, a bit menacing and the perfect setting for some ugly stories you don’t want to know about. Well, it happened that I googled this place to get the spelling right when posting this atmospheric picture of Snaresbrook Crown Court of my long-run the other day. Coincident or not, but apart from the right spelling I did stumble upon a story that I could have done without: Contaminated (urine) food at the court canteen. Not quite sure…
Finding a free shower after my bi-weekly lunch time run is usually not a problem. But today I had to climb up to the 8th to find one. And I got rewarded with this view. Well, it doesn’t look that great from this angle, but I also wanted to get shower sign on the picture 🙂
Lunch break run. My training buddy tries to take a picture using my phone, complaining the trigger is not working properly. Well, the phone was not in picture but video mode. Here the result: Your browser does not support the video tag Ultra short and it reminds a bit of the moving newspaper photos from Harry Potter, right?
Today I put into practice all the new running ideas to tackle my knee pain. All at once. 250 ml Hornet Juice before the run, tried the 9/1 run/walk strategy and kept in mind to pull my lower leg always up, actively using my hamstrings. I was carrying an other 500 ml bottle Hornet Juice mixed with some Energy-super-something and felt more prepared than ever. I didn’t expect it to be easy, but I hoped it hadn’t been as hard as…