Latest posts by Minks

Nessie, my mum had her gallbladder removed just before Christmas. She had gallstones which caused an attack of pancreatitis, and she was in agony. Hospitalised for 10 days while they cleared the infection, then booked in for gallbladder removal 3 weeks later. Two days before op pancreatitis flared up again, readmitted to hospital for another 10 days but this time they decided to keep her in until infection had cleared and then operate straight away. Had op done laparoscopically so good recovery and she's fine now. She said it was so painful - round her back and right side; she had a couple of occurrences of what she thought was bad indigestion before the first attack and some nausea.

My tight right calf was soon joined by my left, and the rest of the race was really a battle to keep focused and to try to stretch them out as best I could between strides. When I hit 20 miles I started to focus on the end of the race, and I knew I only had 4 miles to go until I would see my family. Those were 4 tough miles, though, and when I emerged from the Blackfriars underpass and my supporters were nowhere in sight I felt really low and demoralised. They'd had to view from further along the course, so around 24.5 miles instead of 24, but when I finally got that cheer my spirits were instantly lifted and I knew I only had a couple of miles to go. The Embankment is always one of the highlights and as I passed some of the familiar sights of London - the Eye, Big Ben - it felt incredible to be a part of this amazing display of human endeavour and camaraderie. Events like this really do bring out the best in people and the crowd support was unbelievable. As I turned into The Mall and saw 600m to go I started to pick it up, and when I finally saw the line I knew if I gave it everything I could finish in my second-fastest marathon time, so I caned it to the line.

I didn't get the time I'd hoped for, but maybe I was unrealistic to think that 5 years after setting my PB in London I could set another on Sunday. I am 5 years older after all, although I do wonder whether if I hadn't switched off the autolap on my watch, and was getting proper feedback, I'd have been able to dig just a little bit deeper and go that little bit faster. I'm really pleased with my time, but more so at having held it together even when I realised I wasn't going to run the time I'd hoped for, and to be honest at just having kept going from 16 miles when my legs wanted to seize up on me!

I still haven't figured out the new thing (or even if it will let me in from this PC!) so thought I would post my VLM post-mortem here in the meantime. After all, it IS actually about running!

Firstly, I just want to say a huge thank you to all of you who have sponsored me, supported me and encouraged me (here and on FB) throughout this mad campaign. I am incredibly proud to be doing this for Breast Cancer Care and even more so to have raised over 50% more than my initial target through JustGiving. At the start the focus was on the marathon itself, but in recent weeks the fundraising has become really important to me and I'm delighted to have raised so much.

Marathon day dawned damp and drizzly but not the torrential rain that had been forecast all week. Leaving the house became somewhat stressful when, having woken hubby to drive me to the friend's house I was travelling in with, he was still fast asleep 15 minutes later - 10 minutes before we needed to leave the house! He then decided to get in the shower (WTF??!) and we finally left 5 minutes later than planned. The rest of the journey was uneventful and my friend and I arrived at the start with a good hour to spare. My friend was on the blue start and mine was red, so we said our farewells and I had a wander round to make sure I knew which was my baggage bus, where the starting pens were and so on. I decided to delay putting my kit bag on the bus as late as I could so I could keep my warm clothes on for as long as possible. It was really chilly and I had decided to run in shorts and t-shirt - it never crossed my mind that anything warmer might be required given the recent temperatures.

About 10 minutes before the start I entered the pen and immediately wished I'd done so sooner as the sheer volume of people made it feel considerably warmer than where I'd been waiting. There was the usual faffing and speeches, then a huge cheer as the race was officially started and we were off! I crossed the line 2 minutes from the gun so tried to remember to factor this in to my calculations round the course. I settled in to my planned pace - around 7:35 per mile - within the first mile and pressed the 'lap' button on my watch bang on mile 1. I was to regret turning off its autolap function (which I'd done because of signal loss round the course) as I seemed to run further than a mile each time between markers, probably due to the need to weave in and out of other runners so much. I was disappointed to go through the second mile at 7:47 pace - which it actually wasn't, it was the time taken to run from the mile 1 marker to the mile 2 marker, which showed as 1.04 miles on my watch. By mile 10-12 I had no clue of my actual pace and thought I had fallen seriously off. I figured at that point that a PB wasn't going to happen but just to keep running as hard as I could.

I crossed halfway about a minute adrift of my planned target, despite having reached 8 miles in an hour as planned. I think lack of focus thinking I was off PB pace was to blame. I was really enjoying the race at this point though - crossing Tower Bridge was emotional as always and the crowds were almost deafening. I think I got to about 16 miles before I finally truly accepted that a PB wasn't going to happen. This was my low point as my right calf started to tighten and I realised that the toes on my right foot were hurting a lot. I'd noticed in training that my right middle toe felt a bit bruised a few times but hadn't given it too much thought. Now the constant impact was having a major effect on that toe and the one next to it. I think I subconsciously adjusted my running style as a result of the painful toes and this led to the tight calf.

JG how many days do you work now, and how many extra would the extra hours give you? If your in-laws already do two days for you in the school holidays, you might only need to find cover for one extra day - or if spread over more than one day you might be able to compress the extra hours into one day in the holidays and then just use a day's leave each week to cover if needed and you can't find an alternative arrangement? I have to be quite creative about my hours sometimes but the bottom line is as long as the work gets done, my department is very accommodating. It's always worth asking even if your request is a bit unusual.

Thanks for reposting Lotte's long run advice for the ultra, Vixo. I had been wondering myself how to approach mine as it's only 9 weeks after London. I will need a week off to recover from the marathon before I even attempt to build back up for the ultra, and really not sure how much to do for it. In that time I'll probably only have opportunity to do maybe one or two 20+ runs (May half term is also in that block of 9 weeks and we might go away, so not sure how much running will happen that week either). I'm not too worried as I've done a lot of long runs for the marathon (4x16, 4x18 and 4x20) so those plus the race itself must count towards anything that comes afterwards! It's 50K so "only" five miles more than marathon distance, and should be flat as mostly on canal towpath. As it's the end of June it could be scorchio, which would possibly be a problem especially as the section I've chosen to do starts at 12 noon. The 100K distance is split into two 50K sections, and 50K runners can do either. I chose the second section as I think it'll be nicer scenery - the first 50K starts in central London and I know some of the early sections of the towpath (through King's Cross and Camden) and they are a bit grim. Plus logistically a 7am start from central London would mean leaving home around 5am which is just a tad too early. Pace-wise I have absolutely no idea - I'm thinking of somewhere around 8-8:15 miling but it depends on how London goes and what I can manage there as to what pace I think will be appropriate for the ultra.

Sounds like your training's gone really well, Vixo - trashed legs are just a sign of having worked hard! I would do maybe one more long run and then taper - I think your race is the bank holiday weekend, isn't it? So the week after London? I know there's a reason I didn't choose it - think it was just too soon after the marathon.

Everyone seems to have had a good Easter break - weather caught us out too Caro; who'd have thought that WALES would be hot and sunny over Easter?? (It never usually is - I even did my final 20 miler on Friday before we left, remembering all the times I've had to do it in a gale force wind in the Welsh hills - and then the weather was far better in Wales than at home, and my long run was done in the pouring rain. Sigh!)

Now tapering - funny how niggles start to appear once the hard training stops! I've had this happen before so know not to be worried about it but it is a bit disconcerting. Hamstrings ached like hell after a fairly steady 7-miler last night and all I've done since last Friday is that and two easy 5s. Massively overate on Tuesday (ate a lot over Easter generally, but really overdid it that evening) and felt completely stuffed to the point of discomfort. Wasn't remotely hungry all the following morning and didn't even really want lunch. It wasn't a pleasant feeling and I won't be doing it again in a hurry - and it's too early to be carb-loading so can't even use that as an excuse!

Many, many thanks to those of you who've sponsored me. Look away now as I'm about to shamelessly repost the link for anyone who hasn't yet and would like to - every penny helps and I'm really proud to be doing this for Caro and other women in her position: https://www.justgiving.com/debsh/

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