THE GOOD BUCK

I had a few days off training after the marathon then got back to it on Thursday. A 1k swim, followed by 30 minutes rowing, straight into an hour on the treadmill (7.3 miles). That is made really tough because you are already sweating from the rowing, then you have to run, in a barely cool gym, with no fan. Great heat conditioning, I suppose. But awful.

The next day I just did an hour on the bike trainer, the day after I did an easy paced 8 mile run. Yesterday I did an hour on the bike then straight out for an 8 mile run. I was just trying to train my legs to the misery of running off the bike, but after a 3 miles aiming at sub 8.30 I was feeling fine so I upped the pace to 7.40s to bring it home under sub 8 average pace. I was surprised and happy with that.

Last night I was thinking I need to do some long rides to get myself bike fit for the half tri and work towards LEJOG. I tried the Garmin feature where you ask for a distance and it plots you a safe bike course. It lead me along Cromwell Ave (busy main road) and over the motorway roundabout (a Highways Agency declared accident blackspot). That’s a no.

I got a free place for winning my age group at Blackpool marathon with a 3.08:11 last year. Then I lost my mojo. And got lazy. And missed so much training I thought I was giving up on running. Then I got a nasty dose of covid and I physically couldn’t run for a month or two after the bug. Which was actually a good thing because as soon as I was well enough I was dying to run again. I got back on the horse, got some good training done, overdid it, got a sports injury and had to take weeks off of running just a few weeks before the race. I did a 20 mile test run last week and I was so battered I decided I wasn’t fit enough to start the race this year. But then I was rabbit-holing triathlons and saw a full distance one, relatively cheap, in 18 weeks. I mentioned it to Wendy and she said “But you’re not even doing marathons right now.” (Or words to that effect.) I realised I was being slack and defeatist. So I did the marathon today.

Being on the sea front the wind was pretty stiff, right in your face one way, at your back coming back, then in your face for the 3 miles back to the start finish line, you do two laps of that. There were some some of roadworks today so they’d re-routed the course a little, but not re-measured it. It was consistently .3 of mile too long. My watch was saying 10 miles, then I’d pass the 10 mile marker at 10.3 miles. It wasn’t just my watch, I asked two other runners and their watches agreed with mine. That was a tough mental challenge on the last 3 miles into the wind. I was absolutely smashed, I wasn’t really marathon fit, I had nothing left, and they were sticking an extra third of a mile on. I ground it out, clicking my watch at 26.2 so I’d have a real marathon distance time, then at the finish line. By that point I’d done nearly another half mile (.44 of a mile).

I’ve just looked, the official chip time is 3.42:36, but 3.55 of that was the .44 miles extra. 6th in my age group, 154th out of 596.

Things were all going badly. I’d totally lost interest in my motorbikes and I couldn’t sell them. Work looked like they were messing me about on purpose so I was looking for another job. And my achilles was limiting me, and I was quitting in advance, not even attempting the Blackpool marathon.

The agency have been creeping my start times earlier and earlier. Last week they gave me an 05.20 start. I decided to draw the line before they had me on 02.00 starts. I declined the shift. This week they only gave me two shifts, both of them 05.00 – 06.00. I was sure it was on purpose. Either do it, or get no work. I declined them. I thought they wouldn’t give me any work for the whole week. I was looking at other jobs, which made me sad because this is the best one. You know your shifts a week in advance and get a finish time. The money is good and I get a lot of downtime, which is also nice, but mainly knowing your home time. Anyway, they gave in first and gave me three shifts, two 09.00 starts and a sucky one that starts at 13.10, but I’ll let that slide. I don’t need to get another job! A different, full time, driving job would suck in many ways. Virtually every other driving job wants 12 hours out of you each day, and you just never know when you are going home. My training would go out the window. So, happy to be staying here.

I was looking at maybe doing an brand name Ironman next year after LEJOG, when I should have legs of steel. Quick glance said it’s £700! Bloody hell! I was rabbit-holing then, so I looked for cheap ones. There’s one at the end of August for £250. I mentioned it to Wendy, and she casually remarked that I’m not doing marathons at the moment. For some reason that was all it took. I had planned on skipping Blackpool marathon on Sunday, and I was worried as my BPD is getting less with age, so is my willingness to suffer and persevere. When she said that my brain switched on again. I’m doing it. It’s going to hurt and it’s not going to be a great time, but I’m not quitting before I start.

I treated myself to a head unit (a small, bike GPS computer thing). When it arrived I took it for a test ride. The idea is (for me) that you can import GPX routes to it and it will guide you, turn by turn on a map, like a normal satnav. It also picks up your other sensors so it can monitor pedal cadence, speed, distance, time, etc, but the main thing for me is the satnav feature. If I’m doing LEJOG I am going to need a lot of guidance. Especially if it’s along trails and small country roads. The reason I bought the unit instead of just using my ‘phone satnav is battery. The head unit will run for 15 hours on gps, I doubt I’d get an 8 hour ride out of my ‘phone. The ‘phone screen is a lot better quality and burns through battery.

As I had the cycle path route for LEJOG I needed to test it out on a cycle path. I chose the Transpenine Trail. I got the GPX, loaded it onto the head unit and set off. It’s a bit of a learning curve, working out how it does things. On the way out I took a few wrong turns and lost the course a bunch of times. I eventually made it to Stockport but was too discouraged to go any further. I worked out how to reverse the GPX and came home. I think I only made two slight errors. I’m getting the hang of the unit. It was all but 25 miles each way, but because of the condition of the paths and tracks it took me 2 hours riding out, 1.50 back. And it was hard work. It was a very nasty wake up call. The course is nearly 1,200 miles. I wanted to do 120 miles a day to get it done in 10 days. That just isn’t going to happen. 100 miles is 12 days, but over that terrain that is still a big, big ask.

I looked around and there was a cheap (£4.00) ‘book’ (really just a bit of a route description, it’s mainly a way to sell you the link to the gpx files) of some guy who’s done LEJOG 3 times, the first as short as possible along all the main roads, the second an attempt to plot a safe route, and the third ironing out the kinks from the second attempt. It contains cycle path sections but the main idea is to use the shortest safe route. So it shadows the main roads, but on smaller roads to the side, wherever possible. And it’s 945 miles, instead of 1,200!

As is ever my way, once I’d started looking at Dawes Galaxy touring bicycles I got fixated. I did a few searches, but I was frustrated by the fact that I needed the 48cm frame model, most of them were 53cm and above. I tried to trick my brain into letting me be patient by buying a rear rack. I could fit that to my road bike and do my training on it while I waited for a perfect bike to appear. Nah. I was obsessing and making myself frantic.

I quickly cracked. I went to see a 48cm Super Galaxy (supposedly slightly more sporty riding position, combined shifters/ brakes). It was up in the North Pennines. (Junction 38 of the M6, then across to the east for an hour and 20 minutes). I didn’t know there was that much back-of-beyond in England! Stupid big hills, twisty little roads, it was a focusing drive.

I got there and the bike was fine. A bit scratched, with some baked on oil and dirt, but everything worked. It was blue, not the racing green I wanted, but I couldn’t wait so I got it. Relief! I think it’s a 2000s bike, and the seller said his mate (who’s bike it was) had got parkinsons so hadn’t ridden it for 10 years. So it shouldn’t be too worn out.