My rehab marathon: Southampton

I didn't feel nervous or anxious before or at the start, I slept really well the night prior to the race, and I credit the training for creating this feeling of calm.  I was ready, and took it slow even at the start (though that was the fastest part for me).

As it turns out, every minute counted because I came in only just under 10 minutes less than my absolute backstop time of 6 hours (my race time on the chip was 5:51).

But Southampton was what made this run so fun.  That's just what it was, really, a fun run and a tour of this small port city.  It is a beautiful place, with lovely breezes and a variety of unique features including the impressive Itchen Bridge, which I crossed four times in the course of the race. (I'm told by a Runnymede Runner that in previous years they just crossed the bridge and came right back over, but luckily this year there was a nice 'little' 5k-ish scenic loop on the other side).

Because it is a lovely city, there were people streaming along the sidewalks, pavements, and at the edge of the route.  In residential areas they had pulled up chairs to the curb and balcony AND stayed there throughout the race.

The city was blooming, it had frequent cooling breezes (and subtle hotspots), and a whole bunch of friendly people feeling like instant friends to offer small treats, water, or a quick mist spray to keep us pushing on through a pretty hot day.

The runners were a pretty chatty bunch too, and I found a bit of a crew especially through the last stages.  We were just kind of mixed in with the general population in the part through the park, a few of us with our race numbers limping along among the dogs, prams, and families.

Parts of the end were a walk in the park, but what was I thinking?  I had to keep up the pace, that was for sure.  I calculated frequently in my head or out loud to myself, realized I'd be OK, took water when I needed it and when I could (OK it was HOT!).

The final 1/2 km comes and I'm still having a range of new experiences: saw a racer (again) who'd been in the same race as me three weeks ago (Magna Carta) now doing her 2nd marathon; realized my eyes were (joyfully) tearing up to be finishing my own first 26.2miles, coming down that last few metres; being met by a concerned motivator to ask if I was OK, and me saying yes through blurring eyes on wobbly legs; realizing just that this was the case; then seeing my wife Diane as the finish line finally loomed (a good 1/3 to 1/2 mile past where it should have been in my opinion), and pushing on past that final photo-op (saying Happy Birthday to her to as it was her actual birthday) to stand on my feet on the other side.

What a long and incredible journey.

(Postscript: I went for a 5km run two days later and was pain-free, running at 10min/mile pace, so I think the marathon was literally some kind of rehab run)

On 'maranoia'

I've never been there, but I hear the bridge has a good 'camber', and is the biggest hill of the course.

Three days to go.  The stretches seem to be working, but I won't test my legs again until tomorrow, and will run only three miles between now and the marathon.

But the legs feel good.  Still, I'm feeling a bit 'maranoid'.  I'm psyching myself into feeling phantom pains, that is when I'm not feeling good.

So it's a bit of a mixed bag in terms of confidence.  This will be my first marathon after all.

Other symptoms of maranoia.  Everything is related to the race, to my wife's chagrin.  Doing stretches in front of the television, always bringing things back to running and marathon strategies.

Maranoia symptom #3.  Sitting in my office chair is going to give me an injury.  But my stretches are making me feel so good, I'm back in the chair.  Anyway, working full time from bed was getting a bit creepy.

#4. I must be gaining weight due to all this tapering.  However, I have lost at least 30 pounds since I started running, am now doing strength training, and actually think about what I eat, so the fact that I've run a bit less this week shouldn't be a problem.

5. Running less is making me less fit.  NO: actually running less is giving you a needed break, during which time your fitness will actually increase due to lesser chance of injury.  If that makes sense.

There are so many other interrelated maranoid thoughts racing through my head that I'll just call that number 6: racing thoughts.  I'm thinking about getting a good time, and maybe even pushing myself, but I know I need to be very very careful here.

7. It's going to be hot.  I've not done a run in any temperature over 12 degrees C for months.  So I need to account for that: it'll be 20C on the day (perhaps).  Drink lots and adjust speed.

8. My shoes.  I've only had one new set of trainers since my Windsor Half back in September, and have now convinced myself that it is my shoes that are partly to blame for any (probably imaginary) injuries that might be coming.  But at the same time I don't want to run in new shoes.

9. Eating. I'm going to 'carb up' starting today because I know that finishing is all about somehow getting enough calories to get around 26.2.  I don't want GI problems at 15 or 20, but still plan to eat a couple of energy bars on the way.  Hope it's ok.

10. Am I getting injured?  I already mentioned that.

Running Smarter

After a talk with Paul Hobrough and John Brewer at the Bloomsbury Institute in London on Thursday night, I'm working on my IT Band with special focus on the Tensor Fascia Latae.  I've got a couple of special stretches that I keep repping throughout the day just to stay healthy for the big race this coming Sunday.

So I'm reading both of these books, and I met and spoke (briefly) with both authors.  They are both very experienced and convey a combination of common sense and knowledgeable research.  Paul demonstrated two stretches in front of the smallish (20 or so in attendance) audience that had gathered that evening at Bedford Square, in a room with a fancy chandelier and book-lined walls.

He showed us how to stretch the Tensor Fascia Latae, which, with the gluteus maximus, controls the Iliotibial band that travels from the lateral hip down to the knee (and which for me has been aching a bit, but has not stopped me from running up to 20 miles at a time).

The other exercise I'm doing constantly now is the single leg squat, in reps of 3 x 15 throughout the day.  

Only two in the crowd claimed to currently have an injury (I also did not raise my hand), which surprised Paul.  But he showed us these two stretches specifically and after having done them for a couple of days I think I'm feeling bit better already.  Paul mentioned that only around 30% or so actually do the stretches assigned to them by their physiotherapist.

He's not even my physiotherapist, but I'm doing mine!  These are great stretches, offered for free!  So I bought his book, and I can highly recommend it.  Running Free lets you jump right to what ails you.  You don't need to read the whole book to start.

John's book is also excellent (he's the right of the three in the middle of the photo above), and you read it in sequence, start to finish.  As a beginning marathon runner, by around page 72 it was getting a bit advanced (i.e. advice for those who've done more than one marathon), but the training schedule is there, and both books have useful indexes.

Paul's book (Running Free) also has a training schedule, and he recommended a really reduced level of running in your last taper week.  So this week I'm only running 5 miles over Monday, Friday, and Saturday (total), before the big day.  He said to get out at the time you'll need to be up to start the race to get into the daily rhythm.  He also said, 'you need to feel like a runner' so just run a bit to keep that feeling.  

I'm not sure what else these two wizards could tell, just by looking at us. A lot I'm sure.  Do they have that 26.2 mile stare?  How do these people walk?  I could almost read their minds through the looks in their eyes for a second there...

Magna Carta Half Marathon training run

Yesterday felt like the first day of spring (or even summer).  I gathered with a few other Runnymede Runners at Wraysbury Skiff and Punting Club, just a small group of us but a good enough turnout to represent the group well (all wearing RR jerseys) amongst the larger (but not large) group of chilled out bunch of half- and full-marathon runners. 

It was a bit on the warm side at ~12C, but with a thin layer of high cloud and a stiff breeze, not too hot.  I wore long sleeves, the right decision in the end) because I knew I'd be on my long, slow, distance-run training pace, and because there was still the distant (or distinct?) chance of rain. 

As it turns out, the weather just got better, with some sunny spells, just enough to get a really good turnout of dog-walkers and tourists up from the Runnymede pleasure grounds and Egham itself.  I had words of encouragement further upstream from Old Windsor residents walking along the trail/towpath/pavement we followed, back and forth, over a couple of hours.

I felt for those running the full marathon, but this was such a supportive and even intimate-feeling event that I was a bit jealous too, that they were getting such a chilled-yet-accomplished day out of it.  I did too, in the end, and have the awesome medal shown above to show for it: a really unique object among my ever-growing pile of medals.

I kept pretty consistently to my chosen LSD-marathon pace and in the process built up my confidence even more towards my own upcoming Southampton marathon.  It now feels a question of 13mi --> 20mi --> 26.2, all of which seems doable -- even quite comfortable. 

Final 20 thoughts

Easter Sunday saw me do my last long training run for my first marathon.  I've said all I can say about this already, I think, and actually have enough confidence now to be able to say I don't think it's going to be much of a problem getting around 26.2.  Still, one must'n't get over-confident.  I'm still going to have to take care.

Some more useful advice has been rolling in from my running club.  Sometimes it's about little things you wouldn't think of, like bin liners, having a couple of those handy on the run; or eating carbs (pasta) for three dinners before the race.  These are really useful bits of information.  I'm writing them down in a list, alongside the obvious ones, like bringing a gel or two, a snack, and band-aids/plasters.

I don't think I'll be all that tempted to stop and walk, but you never know.  We'll see how things are going at 20 on the race day.  My current training pace will give me a good couple of hours to get around that final 10km.  Which is a good margin to work with for a first marathon, I think.

After all, it will be a PB distance no matter what!

But if I do walk a bit, at the end or whenever, it should be ok, because at the end of this last 20-miler I wasn't limping or really all that sore, just stiff. 

I think this is exactly where all the training, stretching, and resting have really paid off.  Yes, I'm sore, but I don't have to run until tonight (after a day's break, all stretching and strength), and I'm tapering down to three weeks from now, a process I think I'm really going to enjoy!

And I get to run again tonight: just a really nice 7-miler in Savill Garden. 

Posture & pacing

Today's run took me to Windsor Castle and back.  A funny thing about how I'm running now -- reaching out towards marathon distance -- is that my pace is gradually approaching that at which I used to run during C-2-5k days.  I'm slowing down drastically -- today it was around 12:30 min/mile -- in order to keep my form, with lots of steps (literally picking up the pace even as I slow down), straight back, chest out, and head up.  It's also the only way to ward off the pain of running so far, for so long.  Concentrating on pace & posture keeps the pain at bay.

Now, today was lovely, the fields and river were bright again on the way back, and I started to really get into it once I'd reached Windsor itself (i.e. past old Windsor) and turned the corner to the castle.  Here it became properly social with all ages participating in the spectacle: little kids on bikes just ecstatic to be alive, alongside sporty/sprightly seniors with hiking sticks and smiles on their faces.  This is the spectacle of the long walk, it's that stretch across space that links a vast stretch of landscape, and pulls together so many bodies in a visual performance.

I reached the gate again and stopped, checked my watch.  I'd hit 11km, by a bit of route engineering, at just under 1.5 hours.  I was on track.  My goal in all this training is simply to finish a marathon at the future specified date (22 April 2018) -- but you also need to come in under around 6 hours I think or there will be no-one there when you finish (I'm sure I'm exaggerating here).

I got some great advice from a fellow runner who said, "you just need to get to the start line."  I honestly hadn't been thinking about it that way.  We're basically ready, the rest is just mental, and avoidance of injury.

Today's run was about psyching myself up.  Since running my first 18.6 km I've had this niggle of doubt about being able to do it -- any long 15+ mile run really.

But my wife keeps coming through for me too.  She's showed me some stretches to work on my tendon (the hip-knee connection that hurts quite variably, but much more in the knee right after I stop), and last night she talked me through getting back out there to train through the pain -- by helping me formulate the strategy of pacing to minimise the pain.  Go as slow as you need to, to keep it comfortable, and then just push through at pace.

So, the thing is, I pushed along up to almost 14 miles and I can now visualise myself doing Windsor and back twice at that slow (sub-6 hour marathon) pace.  But will my body agree?  I seized up after waiting for a train, but was ok after some stretching.  Now, at home resting, there's no pain and not a hint of swelling (there never has been).  All is well, right?

Differentiating time

Windsor Castle, Moat Garden, March 2018, photo by Gwilym Eades

Here is the notebook entry alluded to in the last post:

From my notebook, the day my father died, written just after a run, but before I got the news:

"When we de-prioritise time, it unfolds differently.  Differently from when it is prioritised, but also differently in the sense of in-difference, and productive of difference.  

Does it just mean running slower? (To some extent, but not necessarily, yes)."

Then, on March 20th, 2018, ten days after I received the news of my father's death:

"Dialectics are concerned with time, which is of the body; and with space, or extension outside the body.  Body and mind are one, both are extended through time and space, and in relation to other bodies.  

Now think about a route.  We tend to see it as a fixed thing, but it is always changing.  There are miniscule, incremental changes in a material sense: a new curb or re-surfaced road section, some trees removed.  Others are more catastrophic: that roundabout gets taken out by construction or flooding for a few months or weeks causing a full-scale shift in the route.  And conditions change daily: the weather especially can alter our sense of the shape and length of a route, especially on very hot or cold days.  These are the external movements of space we deal with daily, and in the longer term as well.

Time is of the body: it has a rhythm, it dilates, extends, and shrinks.  Most of all we tend to think of it as a line, an object outside, on our wrist, on Strava, Garmin, or Suunto.

'While you are sleeping your body heals.'  My wife just told me this and she's right.  I'm training for my first marathon, tweaking my runs, my diet, my recoveries.  But after one particular (10k trail) run, and the whole next day, I felt sore and tired.  It focused in my right leg from the knee up.  Two days later I got a good night's sleep and it started to clear up and that is when I made the connection: I wasn't getting enough sleep.  It is now time to do so, consistently, so the body has time to heal.  I've decided to gift my body this time.  It/myself.

This is the other side of the dialectic: the ideal one, the thinking side, the one that psyches you up (or out).

The observation about differences in time was made 10 days ago after a long (30k) run where I'd adjusted my pace to endure its length by slowing down to 11 min/mile.  This was my psyching up procedure to outsmart time by slowing it down.  The result: farther in space, and more ground covered in relative comfort.  The difference this made was that it gave me space to think, to breathe differently, to let others overtake as I moderated my pace and really took in the scenery.  At Windsor Castle gate I took a few seconds' break (11km in) to take my first sip of home-made Gatorade: 3/4 water & 1/4 o.j. with a good dash of salt.  That moment to throw my gaze down the Long Walk, to where the moving mist washed across the Copper Horse: that would be my half-way point.

The Long Walk from Windsor Castle, 2013, photo by Gwilym Eades

So in the indifference to time, in the determination to let it take what it takes, you give yourself over to your body -- you listen to it -- and it comes to embody the differences in space produced by that giving.  You are no longer indifferent in this new sense: there is a thrill in seeing things go by, phenomenally.  Blue-panelled escarpments rise and slide by in jagged layers, echoing and fading across the valley.  You turn your head and a field seems bright despite the greyness of the day -- even the mud shines -- you are lucky there is no pain, because one day you may be running through it.

That same day, ten days ago, I received news that my father had died.  As I always do on run days I took a short nap, but I rarely dream.  Today, exceptionally, I was in my bedroom (usually I'm on the couch), and I dreamed, of the birds flapping in the field next to the Long Walk near the Copper Horse.  The dream was vivid and short, the birds all sorts: geese, crows, and kites, some flapping on the ground, some taking flight."

I've since begun to recuperate my leg and have identified a second problem.  After running hard for two years I have 'no more ass', i.e. less cushion than I used to, and sitting on an office chair is painful.  It causes pain from my hip to my knee.  I now work standing or stretched out across two soft chairs.  My stretching and rolling regime has also been extended.  I'm on the mend!