27th December 2010 has been a great day, my birthday, anniversary (Mrs Kelly never too happy about me running on this day!) the Hot Toddy road race last and 2nd least... the start of my 16 week programme for the London Marathon 2011.
The day started well as rain instead of snow started to fall, the choice of road shoes and the trails took a short debate. Clare decided to stay at home (freezing conditions are not fun especially with our 3 boys running amok!) so I trundled off to Todmorden to join the start of the Hot Toddy 2010 organised by the Todmorden harriers by myself.
It was great to see so many Royton Road Runners taking part and I started my warm up with John Sweeney, whom I will be coaching in the new year (should the great thaw ever happen). Andy O'Sullivan was in fine form on the loud hailer and race organiser Ben Crowther got the race under way at 11:00am.
The hot toddy features one of the longest steep hills around, honestly it just seems to keep going on and on. Colin Green caught up with me after a mile or so and we ran together for the rest of the race. Now technically I was supposed to be using this as a training run, but the race bug always gets me and kept Colin in sight for the last couple of miles (I am rubbish at running downhill and Colin got 30m in front).
Happily I still had loads of energy left at the end and managed to overtake a few runners and finish 5 seconds behind Colin in 36:47 which was a PB of some minutes on the Hot Toddy for me!
There is a photo of me at the finish (I am wearing the attractive hat!)
http://www.todharriers.co.uk/hot_toddy/toddy2010_pics/imgpages/image045.html
I finished 45 out of some 248 runners so am very happy with the race result indeed.
I quick dash home, shower and back out to my sisters for a meal which was great fun.
So now the task of shedding a couple of Kilo's begins as I have done around 19 miles running in the last 3 weeks! , my next race will be Joe Salts new year awakener in Whitworth on... new years day.
I just need to do 6.4 miles this week and I will have recorded 1000 miles running in 2010
Monday 27 December 2010
Saturday 18 December 2010
Snow days!
What a week I have had with nothing but a cold and the return of the snow!
I had a great night out on Thursday, with some members of my "Run in England" group at the best Curry house in Royton!
I spent all night building a temporary laptop for Heaton parkrun (www.parkrun.org.uk/heaton) as their usual laptop is out of action, the expectation was to have Clare deliver it Saturday morning... As I cleared the snow of her car, I decided to run the engine to begin the demisting process. The car started OK and then emitted a skidding sound from the fan belt, followed by smoke from the engine! Needless to say a new fan belt is required and the laptop never made it to Heaton park.
So we all trundled off to Oldham parkrun and had a great time with the 5 runners that made it through the snow to the park (Results, news and photos at www.parkrun.org.uk/oldham)
So as another week comes to an end I can only reflect that my running has been minimal and hope to get some training in before the "Hot Toddy" on the 27th December.
Till next time
Mark
I had a great night out on Thursday, with some members of my "Run in England" group at the best Curry house in Royton!
I spent all night building a temporary laptop for Heaton parkrun (www.parkrun.org.uk/heaton) as their usual laptop is out of action, the expectation was to have Clare deliver it Saturday morning... As I cleared the snow of her car, I decided to run the engine to begin the demisting process. The car started OK and then emitted a skidding sound from the fan belt, followed by smoke from the engine! Needless to say a new fan belt is required and the laptop never made it to Heaton park.
So we all trundled off to Oldham parkrun and had a great time with the 5 runners that made it through the snow to the park (Results, news and photos at www.parkrun.org.uk/oldham)
So as another week comes to an end I can only reflect that my running has been minimal and hope to get some training in before the "Hot Toddy" on the 27th December.
Till next time
Mark
Tuesday 14 December 2010
London Marathon here I come
Every day I get more excited about my fortunate prize at the Royton Road Runners (RRR) presentation night!
see http://www.roytonroadrunners.co.uk/ for the news item and photos from the night.
I gained our last club ticket to the Virgin London Marathon 2011
So I have amended my training plan for 2011 to start my marathon training on the 27th December 2010, which will be 16 weeks!
The 27th is my birthday and I will also be taking part in the "Hot Toddy" race http://www.todharriers.co.uk/hot_toddy.htm
So this will hopefully be a momentous day to kick off my London Marathon adventure...
Last night was the official end to the Run In England group that I have been coaching over the last 10 weeks.
They have been a great bunch, so much so that I have decided to create a bridging programme of 10 weeks to build them up to the 6 miles/12 minute pace group that is the foundation group at RRR. I will then start a new RIE group to coincide with the Race for Life event in Alexandra Park, Oldham.
Right now I am harbouring a cold and it has moved onto my chest so no training at the track for me tonight :(
see http://www.roytonroadrunners.co.uk/ for the news item and photos from the night.
I gained our last club ticket to the Virgin London Marathon 2011
So I have amended my training plan for 2011 to start my marathon training on the 27th December 2010, which will be 16 weeks!
The 27th is my birthday and I will also be taking part in the "Hot Toddy" race http://www.todharriers.co.uk/hot_toddy.htm
So this will hopefully be a momentous day to kick off my London Marathon adventure...
Last night was the official end to the Run In England group that I have been coaching over the last 10 weeks.
They have been a great bunch, so much so that I have decided to create a bridging programme of 10 weeks to build them up to the 6 miles/12 minute pace group that is the foundation group at RRR. I will then start a new RIE group to coincide with the Race for Life event in Alexandra Park, Oldham.
Right now I am harbouring a cold and it has moved onto my chest so no training at the track for me tonight :(
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