Today, I realised on my morning run, is exactly one month away from the Virgin London Marathon. I received my race pack and number in the post yesterday and it's all dawned on me that this is really happening. I will be running 26 miles.
I'm feeling pretty good about it, but am obviously nervous. I tend to not sleep very well before a race and get psychosomatic leg cramps and as a result my race times are rarely as good as my training times. Luckily, I'm not the competitive type and my main aim in any race is normally to finish it rather than smash some PB (although that would be nice).
I ran my mile repeats at a time of about 8.30 m/m with 400 minutes of recovery today and 2 miles of warming up and cooling down either side. The one remarkable thing about all this marathon training is that I can now run 9 or 10 miles without a second thought - it's simply not a distance that scares me anymore, just an everyday run, a fact I find pretty bonkers and reminds me how far I have come since I started running 3 years ago.
Regardless of what happens on the day I can say that whilst this training has been exhausting and time consuming, it's really been great to do something that makes me proud of myself - achieving small milestones from a PB distance to getting that little bit faster. So rarely in our day to day lives do we take the time to set ourselves goals or push ourselves, and I'm really glad I've got the chance to do so. Unlike 5k, 10k or half marathon races, you can't really 'wing' a marathon, so you have to stick to your schedule and force yourself outside come rain or shine, and my discipline has also really surprised me. I always thought those people running after work, early in the morning or through the pouring rain were mad, but now I'm one of those people too.
I wonder if I'll feel like this after the marathon? Or if I'll curse the day I decided to enter?
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