The last few weeks have seen the intensity of my training head up an notch and my long runs have now headed in to double figures - a milestone I was more than happy to have made it to!
I've also been lucky enough to be able to go to a couple of marathon related events, the first of which was an evening hosted by the Iain Rennie Hospice at Home for all those running for the charity. On Thursday I headed up to Tring to meet the 18 others who have undertaken this ridiculous challenge. It was really lovely to meet everyone else and hearing their reasons for running for this amazing charity only serves as reminder as to why we are all putting ourselves through this; although there may be 19 emotional wrecks running that course in 11 weeks time!
And yesterday I went to 'Meet the Experts' - a day of talks put on by the London Marathon organisers to give first time charity marathon runners all the information we need on the course, where our spectators can hang out, injuries, nutrition and hydration and then got a presentation from Liz Yelling, a UK Olympic Marathon runner, whose pace is about double the speed I manage to plod along at!! By the end of the day my brain was fairly numb with all the information and the realisation that I've only got 76 days to go!
Today saw me join the Gade Valley Harriers to complete my first run in public and with other people. And by other people, that would be those who actually spend a frosty Sunday morning running around hilly Hemel Hempstead for fun! To say I was nervous would be an understatement and hanging around at the back of the pack listening to people talking about their pace times only served to make me paranoid that I would be about a week behind everyone and keep all the volunteer marshalls standing in the freezing cold for way longer than they are used to! For those that went to Hemel School, it was pretty much the (not so) fun run route with an added 2 miles so it felt most strange not to have a very homemade note excusing myself because I had a sore toe or something equally serious!
Thankfully I made it all the way round and was lucky enough to be able to head straight back to Mum's for a HUGE plate of Sunday roast and a snooze on the sofa - the best after race wind down!
I'd like to say a massive thank you to everyone who has sponsored me so far, it really is amazing how generous you all are. And now on to the begging part ...
http://uk.virginmoneygiving.com/AliceHarveylondonmarathon
xxx
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