99 problems but running aint one... this is just an indication that I have passed the 99 run marker and made it to 100 runs for the year. Such an achievement so far, but it still leaves me with 265 days left to complete this journey I am on.
Would like to say a massive thanks, thank you and thanks to everyone involved in what I am doing. As of today I have raised £581.15 in the 100 days I have been running. It has touched me this week, I have had people donating that I have never met before which is such a kind gesture. People as far away as USA have also donated, fantastic work. It is an overwhelming feeling and it shows people do care and appreciate the work I am putting in. I set my target of £1000, in my head if I got a few hundred over the year I would have been happy, I am well past that and on my way to my target with 9 months remaining. Please keep sponsoring as much or a little as you can as it all goes towards a great cause.
Since the last time I blogged a couple of weeks ago, training has stepped up again but only on the cycling side of things. As already mentioned, I have hit the 100 mark for running and I am elated with this... Nearly 1/3 of the way through the year and still going strong... well a part from the fact I have been carrying an injury for over 2 weeks now. Since I last blogged 16 days ago I have only covered 23 miles, averaging 1.4 miles for the duration. Not wanting to mention injury, it has definitely slowed by progress down with gaining running miles. Not really worked out what is wrong yet, a sharp pain below the knee, down the outside of my leg and my calf are making me limp for the first few hundred yards of each run. Once I get it the flow it does settle down and I can run at my usual pace, as soon as I stop though it does start to hurt again. Anyhow, I will not be mentioning this again and I will carry on no matter what, nothing will stop me running this year. In the past couple weeks, as always I have been partaking in the Cuerden Valley Parkrun. The week before last I had my first, first finish with a time of 19:42. Was great to get a maximum of 100 points for the run, even though I was still 2 seconds below my PB. My aim with this now is to try and finish first again but with beating my PB at the same time. Last week I finished 3rd with a time of 19:43. I haven't improved on my time now for a few weeks, which I was expecting. I cannot be running every day with no rest and improving on times week in week out, I will keep pushing though and hopefully get below the 19:40 mark, sooner rather than later. All in all I am very impressed with what I am achieving and will keep at it.
So to add up the figures, for the year I have run a total of 286.5 miles. This averages out to just over 2.8 miles a day, happy with this but at the moment this figure is slowly decreasing which I don't really want. Once I am back to full fitness the miles will be getting covered again. To reach my target of 1000 miles I will need to average 2.6 miles a day for the remainder of the year.
The cycling is a different story, the miles have been increasing by the day. With only 9 weeks left until the epic journey of cycling the UK begins, training is well and truly underway. As it nears the realisation of the mammoth tasking ahead is starting to sink in, I want be prepared so I can enjoy the cycling as much as possible.
The first of my training rides was the Cheshire Cat 2015, which was based In the Crewe area. In total the ride was 106 miles, taking over 8 hours to complete the event at an average of 13.8mph. On the day it was the worst weather I have ever cycled in. From the start it was raining and very windy, this was the story for the first 70 miles. At about the 50 mile mark I could have quite easily given up. There is no worse feeling that being wet and cold and having no options of warming up. Not being able to feel my hands or feet it became very difficult, I was having to change my gears with my fist as my fingers were too cold to manage this simple task. From the chemotherapy I don't have any real feeling in the tips of my fingers anyhow, so it made it one hell of a struggle. If I'd have had a puncture I would have been in big trouble. For the final 35 miles it was fantastic, the sun came out and I could get back to enjoying the ride itself. Was such a great feeling completing such a long distance for the first time and I thank Steven, Jim, Dave and Neil for inviting me a long as it was a great experience and has definitely set me up well for future rides. At the 20 mile point of the event, there is a hill called the Mow Cop, which is just short of a mile in distance and at the steepest point has an elevation of 25%. The aim is to get to the top without putting your foot down, most of us completed this except for Steven, unfortunately he was having technical problems and couldn't find the right gears. I did actually feel for him, even though he completed it the year before. To show us up though he went to finish the course 10 minutes before everyone else, so touché. Seriously though thanks for a great day, I would be very surprised if I got a harder days cycling on my trip. Just to mention at the finish line it did start raining again, and the good times returned. The car park was on a local field, so we spent a good 30 minutes pushing the cars out of the field at the end, was a nice warm down. As of ever, after I got home I was out running again and did one mile in just over 7 minutes.Next on my list was a ride to Manchester, as I had an appointment coming up at The Christie the week after, I thought I would give myself a test ride. The ride overall was 71 miles on a pretty cold and windy day. I set off at 1pm and got there at 5pm, this was due to the fact I saw an accident involving a cyclist just in front of me, so I had to pull over and make sure everything was ok. After the ambulance had arrived and had given my details to the relevant people, I set off again about an hour later. This meant I had arrived later than planned and the café was closed, was pretty unhappy with this as I was starving. Snacks can only satisfy your hunger for so long. As it was bank holiday Sunday a lot of the local shops were closed. So I turned back and started to cycle home, nearest shop I saw was about 12 miles away, so I had cycled 50 miles without anything proper to eat. The sandwich, wispa, toffee crisp, pepparami and Lucozade went down very well. The cycle home was hard but was a good test of character. In total I had completed 71 miles in an average of 14.4 mph. The mile I completed after this cycle was in 7:48, so not too bad considering.
The biggest ride in April saw me travelling to Goodison Park, the home of Everton FC. My friend Steven has selected Everton in the community as his choice of charity, it is a leading sporting charity and is proud to deliver a range of programmes to
promote health, education, social inclusion and equality of opportunity across
Merseyside using the power of sport. http://community.evertonfc.com/about-us/ Steven will be promoting his ride through the website and travelling to Goodison on a number of occasions, so we thought it made sense to have a test ride just in case we needed to go again. This was Stevens furthest ride and I had only done one bigger to date.. I thought we both smashed it, 82 miles at an average of 15.7 mph - Not bad going really considering we had to deal with the dual carriage ways and busy roads heading into Liverpool. Overall it was a good day and great progress had been made by both of us.
This week I was back at The Christie for my yearly appointment, I had already practiced the route so it should have been easy to find... well it wasn't. I did well for about 25 miles, but leading up to Manchester I lost my way. Taking us down busy A roads, no need for it as it's just dangerous. We did eventually find our way and decided to pass through Salford Quays and head towards Old Trafford for a great photo opportunity. As a die hard united fan, it was the first time I had been there this season. Manchester United do a lot of great work and work alongside The Christie. Every Christmas I know players visit the hospital which must bring a big smile to a lot of peoples faces. After I had finished treatment, we was invited to play at Old Trafford and met legends such as Lee Sharpe and his celebrity love island girlfriend, Abbie Titmus......My appointment was just a general check up to see how I am doing. All the tests came back well and I am as fittest I have ever been. I invited Steven a long and he was more than happy to come along and get a tour of The Christie hospital that has been involved in more than 1/3 of my life. Going back to The Christie opens my eyes every time and makes me realise how lucky I am. To see children, teenagers and young adults going through treatment, it does make me feel upset and brings back certain emotions. On the other side though with the treatment nowadays a lot of them will have a long healthy life to look forward to. Easy saying that when you're not going through it any more, but always good to look on the bright side of things. It has made me want to put even more work in and put my body and mind through as much as I can. The harder I work, the more I maybe able to raise which will only lead to good things. It's about respect as well, I have had a lot of money put my way so far for the charity, I want to show them I am working hard and that they have sponsored me for a good reason.
Anyhow, as we arrived on the ward, the nurses were very impressed that we had cycled from Preston, but even more impressed with the lycra outfits. They couldn't get enough of it. Only joking, but the lady I saw for the appointment was really happy with what we was doing. I thought it was great for Steven to come along and see in first hand what I was raising money for. Once the appointment was over, we had a bite to eat then back on the road again. We got lucky as it was a really sunny day. One of the problems on the way home though was lorries and dry dirt, not good when you're breathing it in and getting it in your eyes. For this day we travelled just over 72 miles at an average of 15.7 mph. The pace of our rides are getting quicker and I believe setting us up very well for the LeJog trip in 9 weeks. We have a number of rides already planned in that will test us even more, time to attack the hills. 70 miles on the flat is far different to 70 miles on the hills.
Just to summarise my first 100 days, loved almost every minute of it. Cannot wait to be 100% fit again so I can push on with the running. I have enjoyed my first club 10k race, cycled over 100 miles for the first time, plus met a lot of great people so far that have given me encouragement all the way. I have a massive task of cycling the UK soon which is my main focus and really enjoying the build up to it. Come the end of June though, my aim is to get involved in as many running competitions as possible and to starting racing properly for Red Rose Road Runners.
Summary - Running
January - 31 runs - 116.8miles.
February - 28 runs - 85.3 miles.
March - 31 runs - 71.5 miles.
April - 10 runs - 12.9 miles.
Total - 286.5 miles.
Summary - Cycling
January - 211.9 miles.
February - 378.3 miles.
March - 240.5 miles.
April - 360.1 miles.
Total - 1190.8 miles.
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