sticking my head above the parapet

Now that the Dublin marathon has come and gone it's time to get blogging a bit more regularly these days. I flogged the race number and it seemingly passed through 3  different sets of hands with the eventual recipient getting a time similar to what i would have got  had I trained well and raced it. But that's all bollix conjecture really as I didn't did I ? That won't be happening again. No more headblocks. By the way if anyone thinks I broke some moral code by passing on my race number, too bad. It happens all the time. Anyway I still lost money on it.

All in the past now. Time to see where I am at now. Since late September and October the running has taken on a certain pattern. 40 minute recovery jog on Monday or walk depending on my routine for that evening. Tuesday I have been getting up at 6.30 am and heading out the door at 6.45 am running either a tempo run (25minutes ) or 5 X 4 minute repeats on alternate weeks. Wednesday I head up to Mayfield after work and run what I call a a "door to door " effort . Currently on a hilly course my time stands at 51mins 50 secs. A couple of months ago it was taking 55 mins so that's something. Thursday is a run when I get home on my favoured Cooleens route covering the hour. Friday and Saturday no running for the moment but i am working to improve on that . On Sunday I with the Mallow club doing the long run on Sunday (13 to 16 miles) . Pace is modest 8.40 per mile but the running is enjoyable.

I haven't used a Garmin in a age. The strap came off it in August and rather than carrying it around in my pocket I simply left in the drawer and used a bog standard wristwatch instead. That will do for the moment. Truth be known ever since the old Forerunner 205 bit the dust in December and came apart in my hands I haven't had a good relationship with the newer model so it will stay in the drawer a while yet.

Mileage wise it is between 30 to 35 miles. Let's kick on. The marathon number stands at a rather low 13 marathons.

leaving it go but looking beyond...

....the Dublin marathon. I have simply decided to leave it go. That's two marathons I have abandoned this year - Manchester and Dublin plus a 10 mile race in Dungarvan. I reclaimed the money back on them. In 2014 I gave Sixmilebridge a miss on account of a groin strain (which took 4 weeks to sort out) and Galway Bay in 2016 (on account of breaking my arm in the summer) but these no shows were simply not down to having the heart to do it.This is simply a case of not being boovered.

What that means for future marathons I don't know but thankfully I am still back running and enjoying it. The mileage is quite low - 25 to 30 miles with no speedwork and no Garmin either. I did run the half marathon in Tullamore (August) and Charleville (September).Neither run was great and it was painful in parts but I did enjoy it running 1.56 and 1.47 respectively. Last year I was running 1.33  to 1.35 for half marathons which gives a idea how things have changed this year.

I have a couple of races to enter this year but I won't be saying too much about those for a while yet.