The Only One

Everybodies training seems to be going really well. I look across at Graeme as he's skipping and he seems to do it totally effortlessly... and he does that proper "boxer skipping" too... totally irritating to one who falls over the rope every few seconds.

Everywhere I look, people are churning out 18 - 20 mile runs and doing a marvellous job. Fetch mileages are going through the roof and everyone is out there "doing the do".

I'm a bit envious... OK, I lied... I'm jealous. Whilst I 100% believe my new training is going to push me to levels I have never experienced before, I don't believe it's going to happen as quickly as I need it to. Doing 2 marathons 3 weeks apart on the back of a 10 mile long run scares the shit out of me. Even Graeme said last night to be prepared to totally hate both marathons and be in a certain amount of pain completing them on a run/walk basis. I do hate it when he's right, but I think he is!

I suppose I will just have to look forward to Florence. I have deliberately booked this race for two reasons... A). I want to go there, it looks lovely B). I will have been on this training programme for 6 months by then, and I have total confidence that I will be ready to run a decent marathon by then. (Hopefully without walking).

I got an email yesterday saying that it was the first in a series of emails with little tweaks and changes to my training, now that I'm in the swing of it. My first change is to split the squats and deadlifts and only do one of them on a Wednesday and the other on the Sunday. The aim being to start lifting much more than I currently am. I have decided next month to buy an Olympic bar and the relevant weights so I can deadlift at home and don't need to go back to the spa on a Sunday afternoon.... plus... I'm already nearly at the top weight with the free weights at the spa, so I'm going to need something extra soon anyway. Apparently the gym at the spa is going to be refurbished at some point, so that will be good, as they are planning on getting squat stands and the like!

So, I'm the only one not running a long way in training at the moment (I only do around 25 miles a week at the moment) but as from now, I'm going to stop worrying about it. Rome wasn't built in a day, and actually, writing this all down has put it all in perspective for me.