February Update

Hey everyone.  So month 2 of training is over and I've managed to amass 16 runs and a total of 113 miles in that time -that's the same as running from my house in Bristol to the centre of London!

Pleased also to report no sign of injury yet, other than the slight knee tweak the morning after a long run, again largely thanks to stretching exercises and lunges around the office at work(!).  Within the month I've been running on the Bristol to Bath cycle path (flat and fast but pretty dull to look at so far), out to Pill/Avonmouth (mostly track with some nice views) and out to Long Ashton (a bit of countryside but a little dull).  Running to Pill is probably my favourite route at the moment as its a slight change of terrain and has some challenging ups and downs.

Nice sunset by SS Great Britain

I'm now a little over halfway towards Prague and am starting to feel a little better about the prospects of getting through it in one piece!  My knee is holding up OK with the help of lots of ice and physio (you may remember that my cruciate is partially torn!).  It's still a worry that one wrong step and this could all be over and i'll have to go under the knife to stand any chance of getting the challenge done.  The most I can do is to keep stengthening the muscles around it and concentrate on where I'm planting my leg.

Weather-wise its been pretty cold and wet but I've made it out each time and really enjoyed the battle against the elements.  I'm hoping that March is much warmer and more useful for how I expect it to be in Prague (17/18C).  I know I've got a lot to work on before the big day including finalising drink-taking tactics, perfecting my race day routine (eating/stretching) and breathing rhythms.  I'm going to need some new trainers too around 3 weeks before Prague so I'll be heading off to Easy Runner, this time maybe looking a bit more like a runner!

Frosty morning run in Greville Smyth Park, Southville

I've read recently about being 'In Flow' -this is where a runner's brain and body reach a state of perfect harmony and you feel completely pain-free and almost on auto-pilot.  I have experienced this at around the 8/9 mile mark and it's great while it lasts!  You can honestly find that you're ticking off the miles without thinking about it and your mind seems to wander all over the place.  I've been getting used to using energy gels on any 9+ mile runs, not sure given the length of the runs that I've done yet as to how useful they've been but I'm sure that come the end of March I'll be able to see an effect and work out how best to use them.

Disgusting box of tricks

I've got myself a much cleaner looking website over at www.mikeseumarathons.com which explains the challenge more clearly and I'll be using to try and get some corporate sponsorship to help with next years flights and hotels.  I'm about halfway through compiling a spreadsheet of all of the marathons in Europe next year, it's a long job but its definitely reassured me that it is possible to get 5 done, despite the complications over where to fly from/to and how to get there the other end etc.

This will change I'm sure but 2016 could look like this:

Belgium (Genk) - February
Cyprus (Limassol) - March/April
Luxembourg (Luxembourg) or Austria (Salzburg) - May
Poland (Gdansk) - August
France (Toulouse) or Slovenia (Ljubljana) - October

Half Marathons

My usual soap-box bit of the update to talk about why I'm not a big fan of doing Half Marathons as part of Marathon training.  Whilst I appreciate that experiencing a race-day, the logistics of registering, having folk around you when you're running etc is good as an adjustment as to what to expect, I think comparing the two disciplines is like expecting someone to be equally as good at tennis as they are at badminton.

The danger of half marathons are that if you're at a good marathon-running level then you'll do nothing more than try and power your way round chasing a PB time.  That just isn't useful or realistic when the bar gets raised to 26.2 miles and can give you false confidence, you need to respect the miles.  In my view, an approach to half marathons should be to try to run at your marathon base pace -this takes a lot of self-discipline and I think the occasion and competitive element to half's will inevitably take over.

Running races can be useful preparation for a marathon but I don't feel that you learn as much about your ability and self as you do going out for a huge run on your own or with one other person.  Those who disagree will point towards the benefit of practicing penalties in training for football matches.  I'm afraid though I'm going to counter and say it's impossible to recreate the conditions you'll experience on a marathon race-day -technique and courage is essential but how can anyone know how you'll feel when the moment of truth arises!

Ok am done, would love to hear your views -particularly if you've done a few of both disciplines.  Obviously not disrespecting anyone who has taken on a Half Marathon, that's a huge achievement in my book, especially if you've done it for charity.  But it does baffle me a little bit to use it so often as an integral part of a full marathon training plan.

Quick thanks to everyone who has sponsored the challenge so far, as I write we've got £400 already for Invest In ME which is fantastic.  Once again if you'd like to help them to continue to find the very promising Rituxmab trial then please head over to https://www.justgiving.com/mikeseumarathons/

Cheap shameless plug for our previous project '92 Football Grounds in 92 hours' for Invest In ME completed last April.  Here's our tour diary of the event for anyone who hasn't seen it; 92 for ME

Cheers everyone, catch up next month!

Feb stats

Runs completed: 16
Miles: 113
Average temp: 4C
Ciders: 8
Injuries: 0 :-)

January Update

First month of training now over!

77 miles done across 15 runs including one 10+ mile long run.  Nice steady start and I'm feeling like I'm in a decent rhythm.  Pleased to report no injuries so far, thanks largely to the stretches in the book below which has also given me some really interesting ideas of how to manage the mental endurance side of the challenge.

The Non-Runner's Marathon Trainer by D. Whitsett, F. Dolgener & T.Kole - essential reading for new runners like me.

Put simply it suggests that when training for a marathon you could assume the mantra 'I am a marathoner'.  Would I like a beer?  No thanks, I'm a marathoner.  What do you do for a living?  'I'm a marathoner' etc etc.  Cheesy for sure, but I like it.  To ensure that I don't feel tempted to skip training sessions or deviate whatsoever from the training plan, I am trying to consider myself (however daft it sounds) as a professional runner.  Running is my second job and I'm going to work just as hard in it as I do in my paid job (prob more so, just kidding boss).

Long Run Sunday with Henry.  He's aiming to do London in under 4hrs so his pace is a little fierce for me but I'm hanging in there.

It's been a horrible month for weather, I've had almost everything thrown at me so far including -5C, torrential rain, sleet, thunder & lightning and ice-rink pavements.  I've started to run home from work which is working out well (I'd be walking 2m to get home anyway) although dodging traffic and plotting a route with the least amount of traffic lights has been important.  If anything I've felt greater satisfaction from getting those nasty runs done especially as its hard to change up the routes to avoid boredom.

Nice views of the bridge (not at all warm despite the rare sighting of the ball in the sky)

Nearly all of the runs have been on pavement so I'll be looking to be a bit more creative as the weather (hopefully) improves and get out onto some grass.  I've been running under the Suspension Bridge a few times and up to the Downs as well as my fave route along the river past SS Great Britain (it's flat afterall!).

I've decided to keep this site running as a blog and create a new more corporate friendly website which looks a bit cleaner.  I'll be needing company sponsorship for the 2016 runs to cover travel so working with a good mate and designer from work on that as well as a flyer (after some great suggestions from Mike Shepherd -I mentioned before he's running the North Pole Marathon in April http://www.shepherdfitness.co.uk/).  There's no rush on getting them done for this year but I'll be hoping to show them all to you over the next few weeks as I'm keen to get some more booked in.

Standard post run drying out

As I type, the facebook page https://www.facebook.com/mikeseumarathons is up to 82 likes and Twitter @mikesEUmaras is up to 205.  Had some really useful tips from some endurance runners on Twitter in particular and some of the challenges that are being attempted are completely insane.  Trying to stay focused on my own challenge of course.  I think I'd be open to ramping up from the end of this year to 5 or 6 maras a year if I can get the help with expenses, that way getting the challenge done by a target of 2020 perhaps.  We'll see.

I'm finding it a little tough to know what to do on short recovery runs (3 miles), its become such a short distance in my mind that I struggle to get the approach right.  They're usually immediately before or after a long run so am trying my best to take them as jogs and mix up tempo rather than feeding the Garmin.  Very useful having a smartwatch but its easy to fall into a trap of obsessing over your times. More important to focus on maintaining a steady, comfortable pace to finish the race than a potential mid-race panic/downer when falling behind an ideal finish time.

Superstition

Before I close for another month just a quick word on some pretty odd running rituals that seem to have developed quite accidentally.

• All weekend long runs must be run in the national football shirt of one of the marathons I will be running this year.
• All runs begin with Pearl Jam's 'Alive'
• A Man Utd sweatband must be turned inside out and placed over the Glastonbury Festival wristbands on my right arm.
• I lightly tap the 4th lamp-post along Coronation Road (from the direction of Temple Meads) each time I pass it.
• Chewing gum gets tossed on mile 5 of every run.

There you have it OCD at its finest.  Maybe more out of comfort than anything but it works for me!

Quick reminder that all of this is in aid of Invest In ME (www.investinme.org) to help to fund biomedical research into ME.  I'm not aggressively hounding folk for sponsorship (just yet) but if you'd like to support us then please visit:

https://www.justgiving.com/mikeseumarathons

The guys are doing a fantastic job and are keen to make contact firstly with the Czech ME Association for the Prague challenge -would be great to meet them over there.  Also I'll be getting a flag done which I hope to have with me when crossing the finish line.

Cheers for your continued support everyone, makes a huge difference.

Jan stats

Runs completed: 15
Miles: 77
Average temp: 2C
Ciders: 10(ish)
Injuries: 0 :-)

December Update

Happy New Year folks!

A final update before I begin training on Jan 5th.  December has been a really good month of practice runs and experimenting before I start the real hard work next week.  I've been out 7 times in December which sounds a lot until I look at the training plan and see that for the next 11 months I'll be out running 16 times per month!

There's been a good bit of variety in there too with runs in Bristol, Fuerteventura and Haywards Heath and a real spread of temperatures from -3 to 23C!  Fuerteventura was a real reminder of what I could be expecting in the future with some of the hotter ones (Greece, Spain, Malta, Cyprus, Portugal) and obviously I'm likely to be more at home with the colder ones (Estonia, Finland, Denmark).  Given the choice I would definitely take -3 over 23!

Corralejo, Fuerteventura (sunny and sapping!)

Victoria Park, Haywards Heath (crunchy and cold!)

Anyway I'm good to go now and on my recovery days will be doing light stretching, maybe even some basic yoga to keep my usual knee and back niggles away.  I'm going to have to get really good at identifying and managing my own injuries as we tick these mara's off that's for sure.  The one thing that I know I can't do anything about is the English weather and the frustration of not being able to run with a heavy cold -anyone knows any tips on this I'd be very very grateful!

I've set up a twitter account: @mikesEUmaras and have around 50 followers so far which is a decent start.  I'm trying to follow a variety of people including ME groups, sufferers, running mags and shops, famous athletes and ultra-marathon specialists as well as a few local businesses which I hope to soon approach for corporate sponsorship.

With some great advice from Mike Shepherd (http://www.shepherdfitness.co.uk/), I'm working on a flyer to go out appealing for long term sponsorship to help cover some of the flights/race costs for 2016 races and also working on a more professional website.  Should have this done by the end of January and be in a good position to ramp up the requests for help and subsequently raise awareness.

I reckon if I go after small amounts per year then I'll get more joy (£100/£200 per yr per company) for the next 5-6 years rather than the bigger amounts.  I'm pretty sure that sounds like a more attractive business proposition and actually the more sponsors I can get the more exposure for ME research and Invest in ME.

Training Plan

So week 1 begins soon and this is the plan I'll be following on the first one:

My training plan -courtesy of Runner's World

I'm aiming to get Prague done inside 4 hrs 30 - 5hrs if I can, then I can improve upon it at Helsinki a couple of months later.  With it being such a long time since I've tackled that distance I think its a fair assessment of where I'll be come late April.

As mentioned before I'll be running Prague in my Czech Rep footie shirt.  I'm on the hunt for a Finland shirt for later in the year to add to the current collection for future races,

(Spain, Italy, Germany, Bulgaria, Greece, France, Czech Rep, Ireland, Portugal, loads more to get!)

Just as important will be diet and I'll be cutting back pretty significantly on booze and cake for the forseeable and taking advice on healthy meals and snacks.  As Mike told me when we met up 'Don't carry anything on a run that isn't useful' -top advice that.

I'm also learning from the likes of Amy Hughes (53 Marathons in 53 days : 53 marathons) and Simon Buckden (100 marathons for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder : 100 for PTSD) who are both incredibly inspiring.  Check them out if you get time, makes my challenge look a doddle.

Boredom?

Quick thought on what goes through your head when running.  When you're in a breathing rhythm and effectively on auto-pilot then it is actually possible to tune out completely on what you're doing.  On some runs I've found myself coming up with new inventions, ideas for books I probably will never write and a retirement end-game should I win the lottery.  I'm listening to my Ipod for the most part (which I think is causing me to run too fast!) but there are times like when driving on a motorway where you can completely lose track of what's going on.  I've heard recently that it's seemingly possible to empty your head of all thoughts on long runs and achieve some sort of Zen-like state -this sounds very interesting and I'll come back to it once I've investigated.  Will have to make sure it doesn't get me run over though, it's busy in Bristol, drivers hate runners and I've had a few near misses already!

Time to get on with it all, again a quick link to the sponsorship account: JustGiving -thanks to everyone who has sponsored and followed/shared so far.

January targets!

This time next month I hope to have made contact with the Czech ME Association, got together a better website, flyer, some more kit and be injury free with 100 miles under my belt.  Much to do!

Cheers!

Mike

#3 Helsinki Marathon - Aug 15th 2015

After some good advice from running guru Mike Shepherd, I've gone and booked another one for 2015.  I'll be ticking Finland off the list by doing Helsinki!

Never been to Finland before and this is a great excuse to go!  Was very easy to enter the race and the course looks very pretty, running over bridges and through parks Helsinki Marathon Route 2015

The average temperture over there in August is around 17C which makes it pretty manageable and it will mean that besides a week off for Glastonbury and a few days after I do Prague (May 3rd) I will be training for pretty much 10 months of the year!

Makes sense on reflection to try and get this challenge done a bit quicker so will be doing 3 next year and hopefully 4 or 5 in 2016 when I should find it easier to get to and maintain my fitness.  Who knows maybe I can try and get them all done before I hit 40! (2022)

Again I'll be getting in touch with Invest In ME to see if we can get some attention whilst we're over in Finland, if you'd like to sponsor me (your donation covers all 28 that I'll be doing) then do visit my Justgiving page

November Update

November has certainly been a month of two halves for my training.

I went to down to see some friends back in Cornwall and went for a fantastic run on the Saturday morning in West Looe.  Was about 7am and the sun was up with nobody around, just another reason I love running so much, you do pick up some incredible views.

The view from West Looe

Then I woke up the following day with a really bad pain in my ankle which made it really difficult to walk.  It felt like my foot was on fire and although I couldn't see any obvious swelling there was definitely no way I could run on it.  I made an appointment to see a podiatrist and had google-diagnosed myself with what seemed consistent with Peroneal Tendonitis and most people I talked to suggested I might be laid up for 4-6 weeks.

Peroneal Tendonitis is an over-use injury that can be pretty frustrating as its hard to track down what aspect of your training is doing the damage to avoid it happening again.  Also in some cases it could lead to your tendon snapping and surgery being the only solution -this would seriously impact my plan to run 28 marathons!

In any case with a lot of ice treatment and bus trips to work and back I felt better mid-month and started easing back into training.  I decided to buy a GPS running watch and after some great advice from fellow runners I went for the Garmin 220 -check out the reviews/how it works here: Garmin 220 explained

Here it is then, all £175 of it!

It's pretty cool, bleeps when my pace slows down, records personal bests, split times and then syncs it to my pc where I can keep track of the training, distances etc etc.  

As I mentioned on a previous post I have now signed up for Dublin next year as well!  Not quite as nervous about that one, it's an English-speaking race which makes it easier re the logisitcs on the day and I've been to the city before.  Really like Dublin, it should be a really picturesque race and the thought of a well earned pint of Guinness in Temple Bar afterwards will get me through it.  It looks like up to 12000 can enter and it wasn't ballotted which was good as I knew I was definitely in from the start.

Definite bonus is the prospect of having good mate Ben Scott running the race with me, really great to see a familiar face and to share in our training journey even though I expect him to leave me behind at some point early on!

Comrade Ben Scott looking unusually normal

In other news, Invest In ME (my chosen charity - www.investinme.org) contacted me to say that Runners World and Men's Runner have both been in touch looking to do a feature on my challenge.  More great exposure for the charity and I'm looking forward to talking to them over the next few weeks.

Had a relatively quick 4 miler up in York on the final weekend of the month which was really good fun, if not totally freezing!  Ran along the city's medieval walls and then down the riverfront for a little bit in my new Czech Republic shirt which was its first outing of many before the big day.  York is a fantastic city to visit, especially The Shambles area where I had some great mulled cider and some top Yokshire Pudding filled roasts -a good run and a load of walking definitely needed.

York city walls, treacherous but with amazing views of York Minster

A quick note of thanks too to some very excellent people for sponsoring me so early on in the challenge.  First up thanks to Sally Burch, the legend that is Paul Kayes and to some family folk; Lindy & Howard Springett (who've always been super-sponsors of all my crazy challenges).  If you'd like to drop some coins in the pot for ME research here's the link again: Just Giving.

I'm due to be meeting a real inspiration this Sunday to compare notes over marathon training; Mike Shepherd.  Mike is doing the North Pole Marathon in April for the same charity which has definitely inspired my challenge.  Way too hard for me that one.  Check out his event; http://www.shepherdfitness.co.uk/ -hoping to get some top tips from him re training schedule, diet etc and hopefully can help him raise more sponsorship by looking at Twitter and increasing work on the socials.

Quick note to say for any runners following this blog, I've added a section on the right hand menu listing some pretty good tunes to listen to when running -pretty eclectic, sorry, no X-Factor nonsense.

Catch up next month, when I hope to have survived party season and picked up some miles in Fuerteventura and erm, Haywards Heath! - have great Xmases everyone!

November Stats:

Miles covered: 38
Cross trainer & weights: 7 hrs
Injuries: 1 
Run over near misses: 2

#4 Dublin Marathon - Oct 26th - 2015!

I've booked another one for 2015 and it's going to be Dublin in October!

There's a few reasons why I've gone for this one next including the fact that its going to be cheap to get there and it falls at the end of October (26th) which means I can have a month off training (around the time I'm at Glastonbury Fest) after Prague (May) and then start up afresh with enough time to get ready again.

Dublin looks like a really friendly race and having been there a couple of times before I know that it will get great support from the locals.  I haven't done much research so far on the course but I've read some good reviews and it looks like it should be well-organised and great craic (Dublin race reviews).

It was pretty easy to enter online and not too expensive (70 EUR) and I hope to be joined by my good mate and Portadown resident Ben Scott who has caught the running bug too (more on him to follow!) Would be great to run a with a familiar face, not sure how long he'll want to stay with me at the back though!

Once again this one will be for Invest In ME (www.investinme.org) who are entirely run by volunteers aimed to raise awareness and funds for ME sufferers.  They're doing an amazing job at the moment and funding research that is breaking exciting new ground to find a treatment for the illness.  I'll be setting up a Justgiving account for this event towards the end of next summer.

For now it's all focus on getting ready for January's training, good to get two booked in for 2015 though and looking forward to picking the two for the following year (Luxembourg and Greece my current favourites for that!)

Mike

October Update

So I'm training for my training as it stands and starting to get into a good rhythm.

Down to 12 stone which is a good start and I think my optimum weight is going to be somewhere between 11-11.5 stone for when training starts in mid-late January.

Here are my new trainers bought from Easy Runner in Bristol (http://www.easyrunner.co.uk/).

Asics (my usual running brand of choice), £85 proper comfy.

They're really great at Easy Runner as they can record you running on a treadmill ('gait analysis') and play it back to see what sort of trainers will work best.  Fortunately, despite the issue with my knee, it seems like I've got no real problems with my running technique, phew!

I'm now up to just over 4 miles per run, three times a week.  Two nights of the week are dedicated to weights and cross-trainer work to try and get myself in shape to lengthen the running distance soon.

I'm trying to run on Sunday afternoons at the moment rather than just in the dark on weekday evenings to try to replicate race conditions.  Also its just much nicer running when there's people about!

Doing some background reading tonight I found some interesting info about the 28 marathons that I'm attempting!

Below are the races, next year's dates and how many entrants they had last time out.

Austria	12th April	9000
Belgium	4th Oct	1279
Bulgaria	12th Oct	174
Croatia	12th Oct	448
Cyprus	8th Mar	500
Czech Rep	3rd May	9000
Denmark	24th May	10000
Estonia	13th Sept	1800
Finland	15th Aug	3865
France	12th April	40000
Germany	27th Sept	22000
Greece	9th Nov	8499
Hungary	11th Oct	4400
Ireland	27th Oct	12000
Italy	22nd Mar	15000
Latvia	17th May	1300
Lithuania	13th Sept	752
Luxembourg	30th May	8000
Malta	22nd Feb	508
Netherlands	19th Oct	12000
Poland	26th April	6675
Portugal	11th Oct	1000
Romania	5th Oct	705
Slovakia	29th Mar	739
Slovenia	27th Oct	1100
Spain	26th Apr	11000
Sweden	30th May	12000
UK	Done!	35000

Some of the lower attended races look pretty scary (except Malta), can't say I'm looking forward to Bulgaria or Romania to be honest.  Read some reviews and a few of the lower races don't tend to give out water or have any toilets!  Also its really hard to find where to register/get your race number the day before, eek! Luxembourg is a night marathon and looks kind of fun though.

Next update in November when I will have upped the training and hopefully done a decent run on my hols in Cornwall and York!

With Prague booked in for May I'm now starting to think about booking one for next October, makes sense whilst I'm feeling up for it and keen to keep up the training/complete lifestyle overhaul. Eenie meanie......

Cheers for your support, drop a few quid into my Justgiving on the right hand side if you feel generous.  Invest In ME is an incredible charity which is entirely run by volunteers, they're really on the cusp of a breakthrough with the illness and anything you can spare would be massively appreciated.

Thanks for reading

Mike