2019 turned out to be a very strange year for my running. I’ve done far less regular training than I would normally which has led to some pretty poor finish times. On the other hand, I’ve been surprised at being able to turn up to some ultra distance events and actually complete them despite being so unprepared.
January to June
We had another addition to the family in December with the arrival of our second daughter Astrid, and I completely checked out of running in favour of being at home with the little ones as much as possible. Marathon training started as usual in January, and I managed to stick to (at least some of) my training plan and get through a very hungover Oakley 20, MK marathon and Ridgeway 40, all around half an hour slower than my usual efforts. I found the MK marathon very difficult but the Ridgeway was really good fun as always, and much more comfortable to run. I don’t know why, but I always find the longer distances easier than marathons.
My plan was always to try and get back into some more structured training but it just didn’t happen as I always found other distractions and excuses for avoiding running. I still had a few events booked throughout the calendar which forced me to get off my backside and get out there. Without this I’d have probably fallen out of touch with it all together.
July to December
The second half of the year didn’t improve much, and I ran just 16 miles throughout the whole of July (to put that in perspective, I managed 239 last July). By now I was becoming quite overweight and finding it even harder to get going. I had a 50k ultra coming up which gave me the motivation to try and sort myself out but I wasn’t expecting much. In the end, the ‘Pub by 4’ ultra turned out to be pretty surprising – My running wasn’t great but I was able to survive to the finish, still feeling pretty good. It was a really nice event to take part in and I’d like to give it a proper go next year.
In September I entered the Tolkein run on a spur of the moment, and surprised myself again when I’d planned to run a marathon but ended up with another 50k ultra under my belt, again with hardly any training whatsoever. Things quietened down a bit from there, and I ran a pretty pedestrian Dirt Half in November (again, feeling very hungover). My wife also ran the Watford 10k (her first in a long time) with a very comfortable finish and a great time. At least one of us is getting a good result! It was a nice change to look after the kids and cheer her on too.
I did a few runs over December but nothing special. In fact I was starting to feel a bit fed up of not running and wanted to challenge myself to start getting back in shape for the new year. On Boxing Day I noticed I had run 944 miles so far this year (another surprise for me) so I decided to round this total up to 1000. I’d need to run 11.2 miles for each of the five days until the end of the year. It was quite a punishing challenge with a lot of walk-running with very tired legs but it felt really good counting down the numbers, finally reaching my arbitrary goal on the 31st. It’s given me a lot of motivation and I feel as though I’ve ended the year on a high.
I don’t normally go in for new years resolutions, but for 2020 I want to make a much bigger effort in taking some pride in my running, sticking to training plans and finding ways to change my routine to fit in regular training sessions. No more excuses!
