You know that question you were asked as a child…”What do you want to be when you grow up?”… well…at no time did I ever answer , “I want to run multiple marathons, and maybe someday get up in the morning, drive to Portumna and run 31 miles”.
Dublin 2014 must have fried my logic circuits. It was the toughest marathon I’ve run, and fittingly, it was number 13 for me. I did know enough not to say “Never again!”, but, soon afterwards, from what must have been a small dark corner of my brain, a tiny voice said, “What about a 50k?”. I’d always dismissed such ideas as nonsense for me. I know what I’m like after 26.2 miles - what would I be like after 31 miles?
As sometimes happens, that tiny voice grew and grew and before I knew it, it was coming out my own mouth… “I’m thinking of doing a 50K” I told people, then it became...”I’m doing the 50K in Portumna in June”.
My 2 running buddies, Siobhan and Emer, told me if I was running it, then they were too – couldn’t have me having a 50K medal in my collection and they wouldn’t.
Emer was the first to sign, a victim of boredom in Boston, then I signed, a victim of middle-age in Ennis, then Siobhan signed, a victim of a glass or two of a nice Rioja at Christmas…
We put together a training schedule. It’s a little daunting – we’re running the Limerick marathon in May…AS A TRAINING RUN! What have we let ourselves in for…
Anyway, we’ve decided to let you in on our training through this blog – the highs and lows, blood sweat and tears, the sublime and ridiculous…
Hasn’t been the most auspicious of starts for me. I won’t go into the vicissitudes of man-flu for you all (“Thank God!”, I hear you all say) but suffice it to say after 4 weeks I’m on the mend.
We already have 2 weeks of official training under our belts. The first week, supposed to be 8 miles, we did 9 miles in icy conditions and the joy of a couple of hail showers.
Last week we covered 9 miles. The new route planner is still in training and seems to have a fascination with hills…makes it a little challenging, but we’ll go with the flow…we’ll be thankful later
Looking forward to 10 miles this coming weekend…looks like more hills scheduled…
More to follow...
Ronan
Dublin 2014 must have fried my logic circuits. It was the toughest marathon I’ve run, and fittingly, it was number 13 for me. I did know enough not to say “Never again!”, but, soon afterwards, from what must have been a small dark corner of my brain, a tiny voice said, “What about a 50k?”. I’d always dismissed such ideas as nonsense for me. I know what I’m like after 26.2 miles - what would I be like after 31 miles?
As sometimes happens, that tiny voice grew and grew and before I knew it, it was coming out my own mouth… “I’m thinking of doing a 50K” I told people, then it became...”I’m doing the 50K in Portumna in June”.
My 2 running buddies, Siobhan and Emer, told me if I was running it, then they were too – couldn’t have me having a 50K medal in my collection and they wouldn’t.
Emer was the first to sign, a victim of boredom in Boston, then I signed, a victim of middle-age in Ennis, then Siobhan signed, a victim of a glass or two of a nice Rioja at Christmas…
We put together a training schedule. It’s a little daunting – we’re running the Limerick marathon in May…AS A TRAINING RUN! What have we let ourselves in for…
Anyway, we’ve decided to let you in on our training through this blog – the highs and lows, blood sweat and tears, the sublime and ridiculous…
Hasn’t been the most auspicious of starts for me. I won’t go into the vicissitudes of man-flu for you all (“Thank God!”, I hear you all say) but suffice it to say after 4 weeks I’m on the mend.
We already have 2 weeks of official training under our belts. The first week, supposed to be 8 miles, we did 9 miles in icy conditions and the joy of a couple of hail showers.
Last week we covered 9 miles. The new route planner is still in training and seems to have a fascination with hills…makes it a little challenging, but we’ll go with the flow…we’ll be thankful later
Looking forward to 10 miles this coming weekend…looks like more hills scheduled…
More to follow...
Ronan