The next step

I don't do things by halves. Except marathons, it seems. Although Birmingham, whilst the biggest physical challenge I've ever taken, was only ever meant to be a key stepping stone to the real prize: completing my first full marathon.

When I started running seriously in April a full marathon seemed a million miles off. Then, after some thought, I realised it was actually 26.2 miles away. As I covered more distance in my runs, this figure tumbled and now I feel I'm closer than ever. In some ways, the hard work is done; I've broken the important early thresholds and am now able to sustain a decent pace for around 90-120 minutes. I think if I relaxed my pace slightly, say to 8 minutes per mile, I could survive a slightly longer distance than a half-marathon; probably around 15-16 miles. However, making the jumps up to the 20-22 mile mark, which is where one should peak in their training, will take months of hard work. This is very much unchartered territory and despite my progress, I'm far from ready. I feel my legs need to be much stronger to survive such distances. I've made great leaps in the last few months and perhaps the greatest reward is that I now have the belief that I am bigger than the marathon. I'm well aware that there is much suffering to come. But much joy too, of course.

So I'll take some time off to give the knees a rest and will start seeing a physio regularly. I'll do some gentle 10k runs but most of my training over the next few weeks will be in the swimming pool and on the exercise bike. I will also step up gym sessions and focus much more on building the calf muscles.

So all that's left is to choose a suitable marathon to enter. London seems too epic as a starter, and is very hard to get into. So I've chosen the next best thing; Paris.

April 11th; almost 6 months from now. The clock is ticking. More on this soon.