With the child arriving last summer,
the disruption was immense (as beautiful a disruption as it were) and if
training was given the ok to continue, spending hours blogging would have been
a bit of a piss-take with a baby requiring parental attention at every waking
moment. Ever the gentleman and now model father, I let go of the blogging-leash
and devoted my time to caring for my daughter…and training…and the odd race. I
mean come on, they were already booked and paid for!
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| Beachy Head - Finishing 2015 with a smile |
2015 ended with another PB at Beachy
Head, my first and most frequently entered race. I finished
36th within a half hour of the winner. A nice end to the year. It wasn’t the first
race my daughter attended, that was IM Wales at just ten weeks old. Boy, how a
baby affects logistics! Driving to Wales for Ironman took ten hours rather than
the standard kid-free five, and for Beachy Head we arrived two hours before kick-off
in respect of feed times. The year ended with solid training, including
post-Christmas buggy-runs with our ‘parental-gift-to-ourselves’ BOB Ironman
stroller. A new reality.
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| Poor child |
2016 is the year of the sub-3. I said this last year I believe, but what I didn't do last year was enter a road marathon which is pretty critical. This month I'm running 'The' marathon so my stage is set. To gauge whether I've got the legs for a 2:XX marathon I've been testing my pace with shorter faster runs, particularly at ParkRun (my local being Mile End - a hilly one). In 2014 I ran a comfortable 3:14 at London at a time when my 5k PB was 19:45, I've since knocked that down to 18:26 in recent weeks so everything is pointing in the right direction. Running 26.2 miles at 6:52 pace seems tough though. For all the ultras and Ironman events I’ve ran and will run in the future, I think I’d regret looking back at days gone by if a sub-3 was never achieved. It’s a milestone achievement that I’m set on banking sooner rather than later.
Aside from pace I came through another
year of RUYD - refer 2015 edition here - without injury nor terrible
discomfort, despite an additional leap-year 29 miler. With London seven
weeks after the end of RUYD, I had agreed with myself that I wouldn’t drag
myself into injury just to finish the 435 mile challenge, thus jeopardising my
sub-3 attempt. Fortunately I came through unscathed. Fortunate, as I would have indeed dragged myself into injury to finish it!
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| Reunited with my duties after 435 miles |
The schedule, subject to further
bookings I’m sure, includes two Ironman events (Wales once more and also UK –
of which the thought of its two separate transitions is boring the hell out of
me) in a year where I may say bye-bye to the bank-balance-busting event, should
I fail to knock off substantial time across the 140.6 miles. Maybe I’ll buy
another Rolex instead (or privately educate my child…for a term at least), such
are the costs of competing. Be warned future Ironmen and women. Marathon-wise
I’ve got Three Forts in May and The Picnic in June, both utterly brilliant
courses. Beachy Head is a given, I could put that one on a direct debit. Just
the one ultra in the diary, that being the London to Brighton 100k for the
fourth time. Weaved in between all that are open water swims and aquathlons put
on by the wonderful guys at Capital Tri. And that’s it, should leave some time
for holidays and family time.
Right I’m off to change a nappy…that,
I am very fast at.
