lightweight....

Our training programme must be ramping up: Runkeeper has told me for two weeks running that I've just done my most mileage in a week.  I've been using them to track all of my runs since 2008, and have trained for several half marathons in that time, so with something like 13 weeks still to go before the London Marathon, and with a lot of significantly longer runs still in front of me.... I imagine that record is going to be broken a few more times yet before we're done.

I ran 28.8 miles last week over five runs, with the longest 9.9 miles.  It started to feel like all I was doing with my spare time was eating and sleeping.  After parkrun on Saturday, I had a good snooze in front of a fire and the rugby, and then did exactly the same thing again on Sunday afternoon after my long run.  I'm also not ashamed to say that I was tucked up in bed with a cup of tea by 9.30 on Sunday evening and slept like a baby.  Given that the longest single week on my training programme includes a 22 mile run, I can only imagine that I'm going to be doing both a whole lot more running and a whole lot more sleeping.  We're travelling to Vienna this weekend, and as well as planning how I'm going to fit in my training runs whilst we're there, I'm also trying to work out how I can get my mileage done whilst factoring in the trip to the airport and various other inconveniences coming between me and my normal weekly running routine.  I've reluctantly come to the conclusion that, instead of cycling as usual, I'm going to need to run to work this week at least once.  It's the only way I can think to get a six mile run done (in two instalments) before we fly.  I'm also looking at the distinctly snowy weather forecast for Vienna and wondering how I'm going to make a ten mile run work on Sunday.  Should I take my trail shoes or rely on the Austrians being somewhat better at clearing snow from paths than our council?

If I'm this bad now, then I'm sure you can only imagine how boring I'm going to be in a couple of month's time.  I've started modifying my diet to make sure I'm taking on the right kind of carbohydrates before running, for goodness sake.

I weighed myself today too.  I don't really make much of a habit of this, but I stepped on the scales out of idle curiosity this evening after we got back in from running club.  Apparently I weigh something like 83.4 kilos and have a body fat percentage of 9.9%.  I have no real idea of what to make of that body fat measurement, but I do know that this is probably as light as I have been in my life since I was about seventeen years old and coming up in the other direction as I discovered beer and stopped having compulsory sport as I left school.  The scales also told this evening me that I have a metabolic age of twelve (which is their lowest possible reading, and intensely annoyed my wife, who stubbornly receives a reading that equates to her actual age).  I don't really know what to make of that either, to be honest.  It certainly doesn't feel like I have the body of a twelve year old.  My feet hurt, for starters.  I was rather worried that it was my plantar fascia flaring up again, but a closer examination of the sore area seems to reveal that it's not my PF at all, and the special insoles I wear in my running shoes in an attempt to stop my left knee collapsing inwards as I run are doing their job so well that they are bruising my instep on longer runs.  I think that means that they're working, right?

Marathon training, eh?  Apologies in advance for the next few months.