On the road again

And here we go. Entered into the 2007 Paris Marathon this week. Bib number: 32266

The date is April next year, giving me a full 30 weeks to get properly ready and avoid injury - the traditional trip-up in Quinlan running plans. Both last year and this, I didn't give myself enough time, over-trained early in an attempt to get on some sort of track to a good time - and promptly end up injured and unable to run at all. Last year it was the Achilles, this year I managed to re-trigger the hip problem that stopped me in my tracks back in 1998.

At least this time, the hip problem won't result in six years of doctors' saying "Get used to it, you'll never run again". This time I knew what stretches worked and I'm working them into my daily routine - and the pain dissipates by the day. (Non-hessian office chairs help too - which tells you a lot about exactly where the pain is...)

So. A new, slow, long-term running programme was required. And all the training programmes out there are for 18 weeks or less. They talk about longer being better, but do they actually have longer training programmes out there? No.

But I've eventually found something - a little programme called RunCoach32. And after downloading the trial version from RunCoach :: Your personal trainer I've fired it up and planned a lovely long gentle run in to next April.

I'm a bit concerned that it describes my programme as "UNREALISTIC" - because it doesn't seem to think I'll be able to improve my mile time significantly in the next six months from my current state of plodding-slowly-round-in-unfit mode. Personally, while I don't think I'll quite reach the heights of svelte-athlete-devouring-the-miles-with-smile-on-face, I do think that I'll see a significant improvement. I did last year and I did this year in shorter timeframes. Only the injuries got in the way, caused by ramping too much.

So a nice slow build here we come...

And, in a six month period, a full 1079 miles to run. I could change the name of this blog as a consequence, but let's be honest...

So. First run yesterday - and not bad. Not exactly fit, not exactly easy, but a great start.

2.5 miles run - 1076.5 miles to go.

Posted by Tony Quinlan