Halfway across Belgium to run a half

Sunday morning my alarm beeped chirpily at 6am and I begrudgingly opened my eyes into the darkness of a February morning. The night before had been a panic of packing food into my rucksack, making sure all my running clothes were clean, dry and ready to go. I slept strangely, constantly waking up every few hours, as if I didn’t quite trust my phone to annoy me to wake. At 6:15am I pulled on an outfit, which two years ago I would never have...

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The bad runs are sometimes the best

Foret de Soignes, Brussels The road felt like sludge, my legs hated every second of it. I stared into the faces of confused shoppers, they were judging me, I could tell. It had taken me almost five weeks to realize the start of my running route was a sneaky incline for almost a mile, and it hurt. My heart banged angrily in my chest, and my lungs tried to suck in as much oxygen as possible. It felt miserable. My watch mocked me, as my pace refused...

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STOP FREAKING OUT and read some books instead (Advice part two)

A side effect to constantly looking up advice on the Internet is an unrelenting sense of fear and anxiety, which is the opposite effect of what I wanted.You see along with all the friendly happy people telling you how to train, and that missing one long run isn’t such a big deal.You will read stuff that suggest things like: you haven’t trained enough, you’re really slow, marathons are hard, and you will get injured and your foot will fall off (ok...

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Advice addiction: stuff I collected on the internet that helped with my first marathon (Part one)

I am an advice addict. There I said it. I am addicted to reading advice on the internet. I spend too much time on the looking stuff up, to bank away in my memory disc (i.e. my mind) for later use. So as you would imagine, running a marathon put my advice addiction into overdrive and I spent long hours researching literally everything and anything I could about how to train, what to eat, strength exercises, why my hips hurt, how horrible hitting...

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I DID IT: I am a marathoner

In November last year I ran a 10k in 1 hour 9 minutes and decided to sign up for the Manchester, UK marathon. Yesterday (6th April) I ran the last 10k of the marathon in 1 hour 7 minutes. In five months, I managed to not only knock minutes off my 10k, but I managed to knock minutes off it after running 20 miles. Look they gave me a medal and everything. I always approached the marathon with a sense of caution, I didn’t want to aim for an amazing...

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The last leg of the journey

Here I am, sat in my pyjamas only a week away from my first marathon. I don’t know how to feel anymore, my mind jumps between all encompassing fear to giddy excitement. I have started dreaming about the marathon, and they are nearly always nightmares. I accidentally do the half, instead of the full and end up hours later than everyone else. I forget all my water and energy gels, and just have to hope that I can finish without collapsing. The...

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Run forest run

I have been awful at updating this blog recently, pretty much like the running itself once you stop its hard to keep going. So here’s what has been happening. Halfway to victory I ran a half marathon in 2 hours 15 minutes. When my friend told me that was the time we were aiming for, I laughed heartily for a bit and said: “No chance.” But due to stubbornness on my part, and refusing to get left behind I diligently followed at a pace of just...

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Cancer is bitch - why I am not giving up

Me and my parents at Salford Quays.  I woke up and I was hungover, not just hungover but completely sleep deprived. It was one of those nights that started, and didn't seem to end. Another bar, another drink, bleary eyes and stumbling out into the bright blinding morning sunshine. I slept for most of the day, a comatose state of drunken revelry. I stared at my phone, there were three missed calls, and messages from my parents. Ugh,...

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Bloody knees and the art of giving up

I destroyed my running tights today.  Now, I don’t believe that there is any kind of mystical power taking an interest in my daily affairs. If they were, they’d likely be quite bored and try to change the channel every few minutes – seriously, she’s watching Netflix AGAIN, it’s been like 5 hours… (my life can be dull). However, I am starting to feel that right now the universe really does not want me to finish this marathon. The last...

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Snow, dogs and other annoyances of running outside

When I first started to run I came across all number of things that filled my heart with pure runners’ anxiety. These days, I am much more aware of how to deal with it. So for those who want to strap on the shoes, but still fear running outside, here are my top annoyances while running (with tips on how to deal with them). The weather The weather is basically a runner's enemy, because truly the best running weather is no weather at all....

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