Twenty. Miles. Is. A. Long. Way. Indeed.

Days to go: 20
Current weight: 15 stone 0 pounds
Total lost so far: 16 pounds
... and the 'Big One' happened today, more of which below.

Well, you may have noticed that the counter has now dropped into days away from the London Marathon, rather than weeks. And you also may have noticed that I didn't post anything last week. Reason being: it's our Easter Holiday from uni and as such, we went away for a few days to Monkey World in Dorset (www.monkeyworld.org). Becca did threaten to leave me there, especially as she thinks I rather too closely resemble some of their rescued apes. But I made it back safe.

Just prior to going, I managed 21.1km last Saturday in a reasonable (by which you can read relatively slow) time of 2 hours 7 minutes. Not bad for the limited time actually running and only a few bike rides to keep the cardio work going. And this week, sleeping on an airbed had hardly made the recovery all that effective.

So it was with minimal preparation that today, I headed out for the advised maximum pre-Marathon run of up to 20 miles or 3 hours 30minutes. Which, in an odd twist, is exactly what I managed on both counts. Typical that in my previous blog I prayed for the good weather to return, so today it was obviously the hottest day of the year so far.

But I managed it. And suffice to say it definitely feels like I've run a full 7 miles further than I ever have before. However, couple of small blisters aside, I actually don't feel too bad. I reckon, all things considered, that I'll be able to run the London Marathon in 4 hours and 40 minutes. any quicker than that and I'll be over the moon!

Right, recovery sleep is definitely the order of the day. More updates oon.

And if the point of me doing all this writing has passed you by recently, THEN PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE PLEDGE WHATEVER YOU CAN MUSTER FOR LEONARD CHESHIRE DISABILITY AT www.justgiving.com/stuyeomans.

That's all for the time being. Happy pledging.

Back in the Game!

Weeks to go: 7
Current weight: 15 stone 1 pound (ooh, creeping down again, get in!)
Total lost so far: 15 pounds (techically back to halfway again)
...so let's get the running going again, shall we?

Well, not quite, but at least some kind of athletic adventure was undertaken at the weekend. Those of you paying attention (do keep up, please) will see that this past Sunday was the Kingswood Mountain Bike Duathlon run by the nice people at Ashford Triathlon Club. For the uninitiated, this involved 3km of trail running, 14km of mountain biking and then the same 3km trail run again. All in the brisk morning light of a March morning. And all done in 1 hour and 33 minutes. 72nd out of 122 - okay, so not world record breaking, but bear in mind that I haven't done much in the way of training over the last 3 weeks due to injury, so I'm happy enough.

Looking forward; my lack of half-marathon race in the build up to the big one at the London Marathon I'll be changing tack and doing the Paddock Wood Half Marathon on April 5th. And with that, I'll need something to distract me from the possibility of returning injuries and pain.

Something I've used for quite a while is music while I run. One of the most distracting things I used to hate when I ran without it was the sound of my own breathing. If I run at any pace at all, my big mouth makes a fair racket and as such, I always seemed to convince myself I was more tired than I really was. So the 'generic white MP3 player' is a great choice to mask the hurricane-like sounds of my gob and helps me concentrate on the run at hand; be it an easy jog or a fair paced aerobic threshold workout.

Research shows that the rhythm of the music you listen to as you run correlates closely with your footfall and therfore the pace at which you run. Obviously, my giant limbs rotate at a different pace to a tiny 7 stone woman, but you get the picture. Therefore, things like slower beats are better for the more leisurely plods and Hardcore Dutch Gabba is best saved for the lungbusting interval training sessions!

Me, I'm more a fan of the anthemic rock and indie, probably because of it's impression on me during my teenage years. Stand up those of you with any songs from the first Oasis album or Shed Seven on your running playlists! Unfortunately, most of that stuff is archived on tapes in the loft and not exactly transferable (for me anyway) onto the little white music box. But luckily, Kings of Leon are perfect, that and Bloc Party, The Fratellis, Feeder, Lostprophets, Pigeon Detectives. But to each their own.

On that musical interlude: Happy return-to-running! Same bat-time, same bat-channel next week, team.

In a tribute to President Obama - Change we need!

Weeks to go: 10
Current weight: 15 stone 3 pounds
Total lost so far: 13 pounds
... yes, that's an increase. And no, I'm not happy with it.

Good grief, and the plateau of performance appears to have taken hold. My weight has decided to leap upwards this week, although two pounds could be attributed to the steak and champagne on Valentines Day (aren't I romantic?). So I think we'll let that go.

The little niggles and aches have, however, became more persistent despite small adaptations to training and all of which have now flared up after today's, albeit impressive, training run of 1 hour 45 minutes and 18.7km. Well, it's impressive for me. Martin Lel is hardly quaking in his racing flats.

So, with an excruciatingly painful hip, shin and foot (not all on the same leg mind you, I believe in spreading the wealth around my whole body), it might be time to redress the balance in my training. Reason being: I'm not, by any stretch of the imagination, a runner (no sniggering at the back). So four sessions a week of running on concrete will take its toll. And it clearly has, so now I'm going to swap one of the shorter runs for a conditioning session where I work on the specific strength of my core and leg muscles to help support the weight when I run. Also, I'm planning to do a sprint and mobility session on the grass in exchange for interval training this week to lessen the impact on my already tired and aching joints.

The idea is that by next week I'll be exactly 15 stone and I can take the following 9 weeks before the marathon to whittle down my frame even further. Yep, I know this particular post is a bit dry, but it goes to show that pounding out the kilometres (226.8km so far) isn't all beer and skittles. Reassessment of both your own goals and how you achieve them need to be made if unexpected things crop up. Same is true anywhere, but at the moment, this only applies to my running as the Physiotherapy training seems to be going well!

Til next week, happy running-training-adaptation.