I Guess I’m Back…At Square One!

Posted on April 28, 2014 by James Clay

Missed me?

Is it really February since I last had something interesting to say?

No, but I’ve never been very good at those self-pitying posts full of pathos about not being able to run, so I thought I’d save you the pain of having to pretend to read them.

You see I’ve been injured. Really injured. “Don’t do anything fun” physio advice injured.

Back at the end of January I had an amazing weekend on a residential bootcamp and was looking forward to the sharp end of marathon training as the countdown to Brighton started…and then before I’d even had a chance to write up my weekend something went pop. It was during a circuits session, I was skipping around a sports hall and I felt it ping in my left ankle. Saw the physio a few days later and his advice was to stop all impact activity. That’s no running, no mountain biking, no pogo dancing, trampolining or base jumping…basically a cease and desist order on anything fun!

Needless to say I was devastated, remained devastated for a long time and was not in a good mood when it came to discussing running and exercise.

But now I’m fixed, kind of.

So I’m back, taking it very easy and with a horrific level of fitness and terrifying amount of weight to lose (inactivity during mini egg season is a recipe for disaster), but I’m moving again. The race diary is filling up again, the first 10k is less than a fortnight away, and the summer holds some big challenges so, if you’ll allow me, I’m looking forward to sharing this new phase of my running story with you.

It’s good to be back!

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Brighton, Write Off

Posted on February 2, 2014 by James Clay

Now the decision is made, I can see that it was inevitable from the start.

In my last post I talked about how training for two marathons back to back was soul destroying and demotivating. Truth be told I haven’t really ever got to grips with this latest round of training. I haven’t derived a single moment of joy from any of the runs I’ve done, and having another plan dictate my every move sucked all the fun out of getting out there and exercising.

Then I got dragged along to circuit training by some friends…and boy was I weak! 7 months of constant running and very little else and my ability to bang out push ups and shoulder presses had diminished to embarrassing levels. A few weeks later and I received an invite to a residential bootcamp training weekend (more on that soon) which was incredibly hard work…but really, really fun.

Getting back from that weekend and looking at my plan for a joyless 40 mile running week, I knew something had to give.

And so, I’m backing out of the Brighton Marathon.

I’m taking back training as a source of pleasure, something to be enjoyed not endured. It’s not an easy decision, walking away from an event featuring 50 other runners from my club and which has been my focus since Christmas. But there is absolutely no benefit to me in struggling through the next 2 months and becoming even more disillusioned with exercise.

The training races are still all in my diary, I’m still planning to run them (although maybe not the Gloucester 20 miler) but now I can turn my attentions to doing some of the fun energetic things I miss. Looking forward to more circuit training, getting back out on the mountain bike and lots of lovely, short runs!

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The Marathon Advice You Never Hear.

Posted on January 21, 2014 by James Clay

The interweb is littered with advice on how to run marathons. There are countless pages telling you how to train, what to expect, when to do how many miles. You can find reviews of every piece of marathon kit you will ever need and several thousand more that you won’t. There are blogs, some even as good as this one, where people share their stories of marathon running. The race organisers will send you details of what to do on race day, your friendly physio or coach will keep on at you about stretching, foam rolling, ice baths.

But there is one vital piece of information that no one ever gives the amateur marathon enthusiast. Some simple words of wisdom that I have never heard uttered before. Advice so breathtakingly obvious it nearly goes without saying…but by not saying it we invite catastrophe.

Until now…

Because I am about to fire a truth bullet straight out my tr-uzi and blow your mind all over the room with the very best recommendation I can ever give to someone attempting a marathon.

Are you ready?

Here goes…

Never, ever, under any circumstances, have another big bastard marathon booked before you have finished your current one.

Never cross a finish line and be in a situation where moments later the evil little voice in your head says “now do it again in a few months”. Do not hang up your shiny new 26.2 medal then open the training plan for your next marathon.

Because here’s what will happen.

You will hate running. You will look at the words on the page and though they only say “3 mile gentle run” you won’t think of the joy of a slow jog around the park and back. You will instead think “I wanted to do 5 miles today” or “I don’t feel like running at all in this rain” or maybe even “is it mini egg season yet? stuff running, I’m off to the pub”.

Marathon running takes commitment. Not just 26.2 miles of it but hundreds and hundreds of miles of doing what your told, of long runs every week, painful massage and foam rolling, sacrificing fun for those four or five sessions a week you have to fit in to be at your best come race day. It is a commitment every runner should relish at least once, but when you’ve done it be absolutely sure that the next run you do, the one after that and the one after that, for a month or two at least, is for fun.

Leave behind the rigours of marathon training and just run. Because if you don’t you will forget why you started and resent what you’re doing. If you are lucky you will push on, hating every moment but somehow achieving greatness with your next endurance feat even if you can’t enjoy it. If you’re not so lucky, you may end up listening to the voice in your head and spending weeks eating mini eggs in the pub.

And then you’ll find yourself with race day looming, way behind on any training schedule, dreading what you have to achieve over the next 11 weeks when all you really want to do is run, for fun.

Wise words. The voice of experience. Don’t make my mistake, you will regret it.

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I Have Been Busy…

Posted on January 1, 2014 by James Clay

Since the Bournemouth marathon I have…

Memorised the telephone number and menu of every take away in a twenty mile radius, wrestled bears and chopped down trees, remodelled space to make it easier to navigate, designed furniture for royalty and built it using wood from trees long extinct, scaled the World’s highest mountains from the comfort of my sofa, mastered the art of seduction by practicing on houseplants; juggled citrus fruit and inadvertently come up with the best cocktail known to man in the process, lost the recipe for said cocktail and spent 8 days drunk trying to rediscover it; I’ve been swimming, swallowed by a whale and lived inside it for a month, we visited Iceland, Finland and Scotland but never set foot on land; I’ve read the complete works of Tolstoy, Shakespeare and Katie Price; done a feasibility study on the likelihood of Earth being attacked by giant goldfish (and discovered we are all doomed), won the lottery three times but lost my ticket four; I have mastered massage and become a ninja, but stopped practicing both when I got confused and relaxed a mugger and killed a lover; I have listened to the combined musical outputs of One Direction, Olly Murs and Justin Bieber and failed to find the point; I have reviewed every item on Amazon, I have lied but been honest about it.

I have been busy.

But the one thing I haven’t done is run.

And now I am destined to pay the price with hard work and pain as January begins and with it the unavoidable truth that I run my third marathon in 96 days.

Let’s get this done.

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As One Door Closes…

Posted on November 16, 2013 by James Clay

…well to be fair the other door was always open.

But now it’s been kicked wide, decorated with flashing lights, big pointy arrows pointing pointedly and an enticing view on the other side.

Open Doorway

The closed door? Well last night my dreams of running the London Marathon 2014 were finally put to bed when my name wasn’t drawn for one of the club places. Disappointment and annoyance were in equal measure as an unethical change to the club rules had slashed my chances from 50% down to 10%, but I shan’t dwell on it. I may not have won the ballot but we did win the quiz, much to the distaste and muted applause of the masses.

Instead I shall put that rejection dejection to one side and with it the idea that I could run two marathons on consecutive weekends. I now have only one target for spring 2014. Every time I lace my trainers from now until April 6th it will be with one thing in mind…

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