Well, this time last week....

I was just past half way round..... gor blimey, I'm glad it's over!

I just did a quick totalise on the sponsorship and you have very generously donated £3,070 to the PDS and CRUK so I'm very pleased and grateful - as are all the beneficiaries. I was hoping we would get to £2,500 so the fact we're already £500 above it is fantastic - and I know there is some more to come yet - so thank you all.

I mentioned after the swim in August that a very kind couple had been extremely generous in their donation but wanted to remain anonymous. Well, blow me down if they haven't done the same again, I cannot thank you enough, you know who you are!

I'm pretty much back to normal now, my aches and pains are gone, the only 'physical' reminders of last week are my 4 black toe nails but even they aren't as black as they were: it will soon all be a dim & distant memory... a memory that will last forever - he, he, I did it!!

A few facts and figures...

From the official FLM web site:

More than 34,000 people finished the 2008 Flora London Marathon after 35,044 people started it. By 6.30pm, 34,420 runners had crossed the finish in The Mall, making the 2008 race the third biggest in the 28 years of the event.

4093 runners required medical attention during the race, plus six marathon officials and staff, and 60 spectators. Approximately 40 runners were admitted to hospital accident and emergency departments but there were no fatalities and no intubations.

92,000 people originally applied to run in this year’s race, and approximately 45,791 applications were accepted. More than 35,300 had registered to run by 5.00pm on Saturday.

And me personally:

Position: 20785 (i.e. I came in the top 60% of all runners - I'm pretty happy with that!)
Position in group (50 - 54 year old men): 1576
Number of finishers in group (50-54 M): 1812 (i.e. in top 87% - not as impressive!!)
Official time: 5:15:32 (but, according to my GPS, I ran 27.08 miles)
Time at half way: 2:23:26 (i.e. it took me an extra 29 minutes to run the second half!)
Unofficial time: i.e. the time my GPS said I completed 26.2 miles 5:09:30 - still not inside 5 hours!

The final training figures...

So, all the training is now over and done with, these charts show how many miles I've run, jogged, struggled, walked, since September when I started on all this tomfoolery. It's a total of 562.1 miles and I'm so glad it's over, I'm going to have a ritual burning of my trainers at the weekend!

I've just thought, in 2004 I cycled from Land's End to John O'Groats (End 2 End - click on 'view my complete profile' to the left of this text) and it was 1031 miles, so I've run more than half way from Land's End to John O'Groats while preparing for and completing the London Marathon, no wonder I'm tired!

It's all a bit piecemeal....

Well, I'm slowly recovering, half a can of freezer spray on the ankles and feet that are extrememly swollen and sore and then Deep Heat on the muscles that are extremely fatigued...

This is the route we took. You can see a much better quality version if you click on the 'view my route' link in the post below, not only can you follow me around if you go to the map player but also you can tell it to export to Google Earth yourself and then you can blow it up if you wish (the image, not London you fool!), the above is a screenshot which, if you double click it, will expand.


The GPS I use has a built in heart rate monitor, the image below is a plot of what the old ticker was doing. The formula for working out your maximum heart rate is 220-age. I'm 50 so, my theoretical maximum heart rate is 220-50 = 170.. look at the chart, I peaked (at the very start) at 233 beats / min and averaged 160 for the whole 5 hours of the race, which is 94% of max... please don't say I wasn't trying.

Dunnit!!

5:15, slower than I wanted but..... I don't care...... I did it!!

Click here for the general info and this is the route, click on it and press the play button on the left. The pause near the start is where I had to nip into the park and have a wee, not that you want to know a lot about that I presume.

I'm physically and menatally shattered so will write some more tomorrow.

I'm so pleased it's over.

Colin.

Less than a week to go!

It's now Monday and this time next week it will all be over!

Birg and I went out for the last long run yesterday, it was just under 11 miles and in the snow! I didn't look forward to going out at all but..... I'm going to have to put up with whatever Mother Nature throws at us next weekend so I may as well get used to it.

It was actually very nice once we got going. The sun came out and it got hot towards the end, hence the sweaty me in the self portrait going through the woods, please remember I'd run about 9.5 miles when I took this... You can see how sunny it was by how dark my glasses have gone.

Anyway, I was pleased, my feet didn't hurt, since I've started tying my laces the same way as Birg, and I kept to my time (10:14 minutes / mile) without a major problem.

I went swimming last Friday (it was great to get back in the water as I haven't been since before Easter). It's OK now I'm dropping the mileage, I've got a bit more energy and swimming is good as it keeps the fitness there without overly tiring the leg muscles (in my case without tiring them at all!). It was hard work though and I felt to be a lot slower than a couple of months ago, never mind, I'll soon be back into it.