London Marathon 2014 - Here I come (again!)

Running was always a big part of my life when I was growing up.  As the daughter of a club runner, when running was seen as the sport of oddballs, we spent many a family weekend cheering my dad on as he competed in races around the welsh countryside. I also have vivid memories of him running in some of the early London Marathons.  In 1996, at the age of 27, I ran my first London Marathon completing it in 4 hours and 55 minutes (these were the days before chip timing so it was never a precise time but definitely sub 5).

A few weeks after that first London Marathon my husband and I found out we were expecting our first child, Theo.  My running dwindled and our family grew.  I am now mum to four, Theo (16), Xanthe (14), Jules (11) and Daisy (9 in December).  I always intended to get back into running, but sometimes life has a habit of throwing the unexpected in your direction.  Daisy, our youngest, was born prematurely and not long afterwards was found to have a very rare genetic condition called Costello Syndrome, since then she has also developed intestinal failure and now requires all her nutrition to be given intravenously via a drip which we are trained to set up every day.  Needless to say a lot of my time is spent in hospitals or managing her complex medical care.

So I found myself two years ago, practically a full time nurse to my youngest daughter, not overweight but definitely not having shifted the baby weight I had put on during my last pregnancy, on the wrong side of forty and feeling stressed and unfit.  I had been procrastinating for too long, I needed to get out and feel the wind in my hair and get out on the trails again.  So in January 2012, on a one of the coldest mornings of the year, I put my running shoes on once more, dropped the children off to school and ran.  I ran 5k and I felt great.  And having run on one of the coldest days of the year I knew I could do it again, so I discovered our local Park Run on Wimbledon Common and I ran 5Ks against the clock every Saturday.  Then I re-joined the running club I had been a member of in the days BC, before children.  Through the Wimbledon Windmilers I rediscovered the joys of cross country and trail running, I found that I actually quite liked going for long runs with other runners, I ditched my headphones and entered races.  The more I ran the better I ran, I started to learn about speed training, tempo sessions, fartlek, hill training, I went to the running track and I invested in a satellite watch and started to monitor my pace and speed.

Daisy is life limited and we have been supported by our local Children's Hospice, ShootingStar-Chase since she was only a few months old.  The hospice offered me a Gold Bond place to run for them in the 2013 London Marathon and I jumped at the chance not only to give the marathon another shot, post children but also to raise some much needed funds for a cause so close to my heart.

Based on my running performance and recent race times I predicted I could complete the marathon in under 4 hours (and secretly I hoped for 3hours 50 in order to get a good for age place for the following year).  But the best laid plans can often go wrong - as we all know, the sun shone on the day of the this year's marathon, great for spectators, not so great when you have spent one of the toughest winters on record training.  My strategies unravelled (along with my shoelaces - schoolboy error!) as I panicked about hydration, got caught up in bottlenecks and let my pacing strategy go completely up the spout. I finished in a very credible 4 hours and 19 seconds but as all runners know, we are never happy.  We play our race over and over in our heads wondering where we could have saved valuable time.

So I am delighted to have been given a second chance to get that elusive sub 4 marathon time.  I know the theory, I know I can run a marathon, but can I run it fast enough to get the time I know I am capable of?

I have no problem motivating myself to get out and put in the training and the miles - running is my stress release and with a goal like the marathon and a target time in mind I need no other motivation.  My problem will be the unpredictability of my life, even since last year Daisy's condition has deteriorated and to cap it all this year she developed epilepsy.  So from my training point of view there is no room for procrastination or putting a run off until later in the day or the next day, I really do have to seize the moment because I never know what each week will bring with Daisy's care and health needs.

I have scoped out my training schedule and have planned a few spring races.  I run between 3- 4 times a week, I try to attend one of the club speed training sessions as I find it easier to do speed work as part of a group - speed work can consist of intervals or fartlek and I know this, together with some quality tempo runs is what will help give me that edge and endurance in the marathon.  I enjoy hill training (it must be the welsh blood!) and always make sure one of my runs is a hill session or at least incorporates a few hills.  This has paid dividends in recent races where I have found myself overtaking runners on hills.

Long runs are probably my favourite bit of marathon training, often I will join other members of my club for a run along the Thames Towpath and into Richmond Park on a Sunday morning, but sometimes the demands of family life mean that I have to fit a long run in on a school day, this is more convenient but I find running on my own boring.

My biggest marathon challenge will be to get my pacing right.  This year I made the common error of setting off too fast which meant that my legs were like lead at 20 miles, so over the next few months a lot of my training focus will be on pacing and on improving my speed.  I am looking forward to sharing my London Marathon training journey with you, for me it is not about starting from scratch, I know I can run a marathon, but I want to use my training to fine tune so that I run a marathon that I know I am capable of - hopefully 2014 will be my sub 4 year!