Welcome back everyone - Being totally honest, I started writing this blog post in November and have only just got back to it in February. I have been busy, running, would you believe it? So if it seems a little out of sync, it is, everything will be ok, I promise. It is definitely worth a read, stay with it... it'll be well worth your time. No refunds!!!
Here we are again, the countdown is well and truly on, with only 3 months left of my running challenge it was time to up my game. With my boxing event out of the way I could now focus just on my running and start pushing myself again and getting in the miles. By the end of September I had completed 273 days of consecutive running, covering 691.2 miles in total. I now had 92 days to try and reach my goal of 1000 miles for the year. With 308.8 miles left until the new year, I had to run an average of at least 3.35 miles every day to complete my challenge. I knew that in December I would have Christmas parties and a bit more drinking going on, so I had to step it up and make sure I covered enough ground before that time came. I didn't have to wait long to up the mileage with the small matter of the Chester marathon coming up on the Sunday. I had been running every day and was fittest I had ever been, I wasn't marathon fit though. My longest run to date was on the 9th August, covering 23 miles. With my marathon scheduled for the 4th October, I had only covered 101 miles since that long run leading up to the marathon. I knew it was nowhere near enough and I would not be able to run to my full potential.
The 3 days before my marathon I only ran 5.2 miles, completing an easy parkrun the day before in a time of 20:02. Even though I hadn't done that much running recently, I was doing my best to save the legs for the mammoth task of my first marathon. As it was my first marathon, I decided to treat myself and booked in at the Crowne Plaza in Chester. Just because it was about 5 minutes walk away from the start line, which meant I could sleep that little bit later on the morning. Also the small fact of a swimming pool and Jacuzzi I could use to relax the night before, room service came in handy as well. As I hadn't trained for the marathon or prepared a schedule, the day before I was all over the place. My meals before included chicken/steak tortillas, then burger and chips at about 9pm, I was following the protein and carb diet which I read was the way to go...or maybe not. Either way, the night before I was well fed, well hydrated and was ready to go and smash the Chester marathon.
The morning had arrived as I awoke to the 6am alarm call, I was very tired. I was up straight out of bed and down to get some breakfast. A nice choice of fresh fruit and yoghurt is what I went for first of all. After that the temptation of Bacon, eggs, beans, sausages and toast got the best of me. It was hard work such early in the morning but I managed to get it down and thoroughly enjoyed it. Quite a lonely place on your own at that time, after speaking to a few other experienced marathon runners on the way back to the room I felt better about it all and started to get myself up for it. After waiting around for another 1 or 2 is was then time to walk down towards the start line. Running shoes on, headphones on and water bottles filled up, it was time.
It was a great day for it, the sun was shining on a cold October morning and the weather was pretty much perfect. As I made my way to the race start I started to get a little excited, never thought I was say that at the prospect of running over 26 miles. There was no pressure on me for the day, except the fact a certain Allan Jolly messaged me the night before saying he was the only person at Red Rose Road Runners to run a sub 3 marathon that year. He had put it in my mind, even though deep down I knew I couldn't achieve it, I was going to set off and aim for that target... Could this turn out to be a silly mistake?
So one last toilet break then I went and mooched into the starting grid, in front of the sub 3 hour pacers, bald decision but if you don't have confidence in yourself then no one will. Headphones in and music on, the race began and I was off. 26.2 miles for the first time in my life, I was loving it. I set off really well and felt comfortable for the first half of the marathon, was really enjoying it and taking it all in. At the half way point I had covered the 13.1 miles in about 1:29:00, which was roughly about 6:48 /mi. To achieve a sub 3 hour marathon I needed to keep that pace up and run at nothing more than 6:52 /mi. As I had never raced further than a half marathon it was something completely new to myself.
Shortly after it all started to fall a part. I completed the 14th mile in 7:28 and the sub 3 hour pacers strolled past me with such ease. This definitely got into my head, even though there was no pressure half of me thought I could pull the sub 3 out of the bag. I was wrong. Then I ran the 15th in 7:00 as I tried to catch up some time but I couldn't keep it up. 16, 17 and 18 were all about 7:45 mi/m so I had dropped off the pace by a minute every mile. That's when it happened, the myth of the brick wall that everyone had spoken about, it hit me. My legs just didn't seem to want to run any more and I couldn't get it back. I was just slowing down to a pace I had never run at before. Legs started to seize up, groin, hamstrings, pretty much everything below my waste. I was up to the 20 mile mark in 2:24:00, I would need a PB in a 10k distance to get below the sub 3, it wasn't happening. I re-adjusted my targets and aimed for 3:15, it wasn't long until the pacers for this time were passing me as well. Miles 21, 22 and 23 were all above 10 mi/m and I will admit I walked on several occasions. The lack of training had bitten me right in the arse. I had never had a scenario in which I couldn't run, I didn't know what to do. My competitive side kicked in so I got my head back on it and wanted a strong last 3 miles. That didn't happen, the last 3 miles of the race took me just under 30 minutes. As I was coming down the last 1/2 mile stretch of the race though the crowd got me going and I started to enjoy it all again. Everyone cheering you on and the fact I only had minutes left to go. The last 400 meters from somewhere I got a nice adrenaline rush and began to sprint, getting up to the pace of 5:00 /mi and overtaking a good 20 people on the home stretch. It was a great way to end it and was nice to actually finish the race with a bit of running. Overall the marathon was harder than I expected, the last 6 miles just seemed to last forever. I will definitely learn from this and take it in my next marathon, plus a bit of training would go a long way. My final finishing time was 3:27:28 - 28 minutes less and I would have hit the sub 3 hour mark. I don't know when but I will get under 3 hours. I could tick the marathon off for the year and another run boxed off. 276 runs done, leaving me with just the 89 runs left for the year.
The rest of October I decided to relax and enjoy the my running, taking the pressure off myself. I only took part in the once race in October which was the Vernons 4 mile event, which saw me finish in a time of 23:21, working out at 5:50 /mi - I was really pleased with this as I was starting to get faster but was able to sustain it over longer distances. Over the past year, my pace wasn't the issue, it was my stamina and being able to progress past the 5k distances. I knew I had it in me, I just needed to find some real focus to what I was doing. With no other events scheduled for the month, I continued to enjoy the Saturday morning parkruns at Cuerden Valley - Completed 3 in the month in 19:13, 19:23 & 19:37. This had been my routine since the start of the year and even come the end of October I was still enjoying the Saturday morning get together with the great bunch that turn up every week. By the end of October I had covered 801.8 miles, leaving me with pretty much 25 miles a week to reach my target.November came and I was feeling focused, something had clicked with me and I told myself I needed to take it a little more serious. I had my last 10k of the year booked in for the 22nd November and I really wanted to finish off with a PB. My previous best in this was the Wigan 10k in September, which I ran is 38:29 - I knew I had more in me than this. I also wanted to run a sub 18 5k before the end of the year as well which I hadn't managed so far, 18:01 being my best. I was eating well, sleeping well, pretty much doing everything right for myself in preparation for the 10k. After 10 days of training well in November I decided to test myself over the 5k distance after work. I ran a time of 17:57 which included crossing busy roads, dodging people/cars etc. I was chuffed to bits with this, proving to myself that with a bit of focus I could improve even further. If I'd have finished 2015 without hitting sub 18 I would have been very annoyed, didn't have to worry about that one any more though.
I kept up the hard work for the next couple of weeks until the Chorley Fire 10k arrived. I had really tried my best to behave and looked after myself as much as I could in the lead up to this. Before the race I set myself a target of breaking 37:30, which would be a full minute off my previous best. Race day was here again and I was feeling it, had a good warm up and felt confident in my abilities. I know I had run every day so far but I was still an amateur when it came to racing. My aim was to go out as hard as I could and just try and hang on, leave nothing left in the tank, I wanted to cross the finish line knowing I couldn't have done any more. There was some really good racers lined up at the start, so that motivated me even more, just wanted to prove to myself what I could do. The gun went off, the race had started and what a start it was. I set off at a very fast place, I was blowing after the first few hundred meters, I pushed through it though and settled in nicely. The first mile was the fastest I had ran in a race of any distance, 5:30 to start with and it felt good and was lying in a good position and going strong. Second mile was a little slower but covered this in 5:45, by far the quickest 2 miles I had run. Just off these first 2 miles, I knew that I was already well up on my PB with just over 4 miles left, I wanted to push on even more. Naturally my inexperience showed and I slowed a little, next two miles I ran in 6:06 and 6:05. I was still very happy with this and I was on to beat my target. I had a couple of other runners in front of me which I wanted to catch so this kept me going. I kept the pace up with my fifth mile completed in 5:58 then 6:12 for the sixth mile. This left me a 400m sprint to finish off and I knew I was on for a great PB. My finish time was 36:33, taking 1:56 of my PB of only two months prior. I couldn't believe I had ran so well, stepping up the training for just a few weeks made such a big difference. My average pace was 5:53 overall, I had never dreamt I could run so fast. Was a great day and finished 11th overall out of about 450. Me never being satisfied, I had set another target and was determined to beat this time in the future for sure.
To finish off November, I took part in my first cross-country race which was held at Sefton Park in Liverpool. This was a GB qualifier so there was a lot of quality runners there, both male and female. Watching the women run first of all, they flew round, made me realise how much of a gap there is between good amateur runners and the big boys/girls. I won't go into to much detail but it was a great day out with Red Rose and was happy with my performance. Completely different running to my usual road race, testing my XC spikes out for the first time. It was a 6 mile course and I finished in a time of 39:22 - Exactly the same as a certain Mr Daniel Hughes. It had been a tight race between the two of us and we ended up crossing the line together, was a great finish to a great day and another great outing for the mighty Red Rose Road Runners, definitely more to come. November being over, I had now taken my tally to 924.2 miles, leaving me 74.8 miles left to reach my 1000 target. 334 days into the year, I had completed 344 individual runs and was smashing it, December was surely to be a breeze.December had arrived and I thought I was going to have an easy run in and enjoy the festivities. That was until Steve Taylor decided to create a 12 days of Christmas running challenge. The idea was to run 1-12 miles over 12 days, the option was there for a few rest days as well, I liked the idea of pushing myself for 12 straight days though. 78 miles in total for the 12 days, averaging 6.5 miles a day, was going to be tough but it was what I needed to keep me on track. Completing this would also mean that I would cross the 1000 mile mark, so it was on. It was pretty easy to start of with, once the longer distances came into it got a lot harder. The first 11 runs I did in this order, 7, 4, 2, 3, 5, 12, 11, 10, 9, 8 and 1. The middle runs were very hard, 12 miles after work in the middle of winter took lot of commitment but it took me closer to my target every day. After the 11 days, it took me to 997.1 miles, leaving me day 12 and 6 miles to take me over the 1000.
On the 11th of December it was the works Christmas do, I had a very good drink, I think - Cannot really remember... I remember arriving at Cuerden Valley in the morning though, spent quite a lot of time before the run in the bushes being sick. I was questioning what I was doing with myself, it was the day I was going to reach my 1000 target and to be doing it at Cuerden Valley was a great pleasure. It was the people from here that got me into running and those that had supported me all year long as well. The time to run had arrived, don't really recall it, I was told there was a strong smell of booze coming from me. Setting off I felt pretty good considering, the running was actually taking my mind off the fact I felt horrific. I managed to get over 2 miles into the course without being sick, then I had to venture of the trail and have a few seconds to gather my head and get rid of some more of the alcohol from the night before. Back on the track I was still encouraged to stop walking and get running again, which I did. Anyhow, I finished the run in 21:12 and that took me to 1000.2 miles. For a few seconds after the run I took time to reflect on the year, before going back to the bushes to be sick again. You get the point, I was rough, as I hadn't drank that much all year, it didn't agree when I did. 1000 miles done, it was then off to bed. After recovering, I then went out and did another 3 miles later in the evening to make up the miles to 6 for the day, completing the 12 days of Christmas in 12 days. I felt much better on this run - I spent the full 3 miles smiling. I set myself a target 345 days prior to this, I had worked my arse off to achieve the distance and I had done. Just the small matter of running for another 20 days to complete the year.Going off the topic of running for a short while, it was time to appreciate why I had started my challenge and raising money for The Christie. I had been invited to a sports awards at The Christie that week, the idea behind it was to appreciate the hard work that people had put in to raise funds for the charity. For this sort of occasion I had to take my mother a long with me as she has been through as much if not more than I had over the previous years.
The Other main point they highlighted is the fact that in a number of years, the numbers will increase from 1 in 3 to 1 in 2 that will have cancer at some point during their lifetimes. Due to people living longer, unhealthy lifestyles, obesity, smoking, drinking, eating bacon... The list goes on. It's pretty much a fact that it is hard to escape from. I find this a shocking figure as pretty much anyone you love will be involved some way. I know myself over the past couple of years, in my family I have had it, my mum, auntie, grandma, when does the list stop? We've been lucky and had a great survival rate. As you grow older though, you realise it is everywhere. The amount of people that have had it, are going through it and have lost their lives to it is just ridiculous. I have had friends losing parents - It's just horrible. I understand there are many other diseases out there which are as bad, I am not trying to compare by any means, 1 in 2 people is just a joke. To put a positive swing on things, the survival rate is also going up, which is great news all round. This is where The Christie come into it big time, they are pushing technology to the next level trying to keep up with this horrible disease. This is why I choose to support them and will for the rest of my life. I want the hospital to keep growing, I want the technology to keep progressing and I want more people to survive this. I don't know enough about it, in my eyes a cure isn't going to appear over night at all so we will have to learn and progress with the disease over the next how many years. Well - mini rant over - cancer is a mean bastard and it takes no prisoners - The sooner is disappears the better. I will in 2016 go into a lot more detail of personal stories etc and carry on my story/rant that I started early last year. - ha-ha.
With cancer, comes a lot of great work - As I was saying about how much money raised went towards the extension to The Christie, it's great to see. It is all down to the people involved, who have all grafted one way or another and put in great effort and discomfort to raise vital funds. On the night there was a whole list of activities people had partaken in, running, cycling, skydiving, climbing the highest mountains in the world and so many more. Towards the end of the night, everyone was awarded with a badge from the Chief Exec of The Christie, which was a nice touch. Was really nice to meet her and was good to see she took time out of her busy schedule to appreciate the hard work of many people. It was very touching, I was awarded for raising £1500 over the year, conquering cancer and being an inspiration for those going through cancer at the moment. Also the small fact I had cycled 900+ plus from Lands End to John O'Groats, ran every day of the year so far, achieved 1000 miles, got a beating in a boxing box, completed tough mudder, completed a marathon and number of half marathons a long the way as well. The badge given to me meant a lot and will follow me wherever I go, just a symbol of what I had achieved so far in 2015 and in my life. I do have a picture of me and the mother, she had a bug and had to leave the presentation half way through to be sick, she continued to be sick as well. She didn't miss my part of the night though. I won't post the picture as she'd kill me - Love her though and she is a big part of my life and always will be. Had to throw that in there to keep her sweet.
Well briefly back to the running and to finish off 2015. After the 12 days of Christmas, I was probably the fittest I had been all year and was feeling really good. As I had booked a holiday over the New Year, I knew that the 19th December was possibly my last parkrun at Cuerden Valley in the year. With the weather taking a turn for the worse I knew I needed to perform at this event. Earlier in the year, I was running hard and on the 3rd January, I achieved my 2nd best time at parkrun in a time of 20:53. At the time I was delighted with this as I was a new runner, now I expected more from myself. 35 parkruns later I wanted another PB. Within those 35 runs, I had achieved 11 PB's and my best stood at bang on 19:00. With only the one run left at Cuerden in the 2015, I wanted this new PB and sub 19. in the valley. To confirm, parkrun isn't a race, it's a run to enjoy yourself and to get what you need out of it. For me, it was just to keep improving on my own times and to get fitter. Well it was one of those days, I turned up in the morning feeling good and focused. Setting off, after the first mile I was about 3-4 seconds up on my time, which added a bit of pressure onto myself. 2 miles in and I was pretty much the same and knew I needed a strong last mile to finish. I could feel myself slowing and was tired, I give everything up the last hill and on the final sprint. Crossing the line in 18:55 and beating my time by 5 seconds, not a lot, enough to achieve what I wanted though. Was a great way to send off 2015 in the valley and was delighted with myself. Set your goals high, keep pushing until you achieve them, I certainly did that. As ever I was shown great support by everyone involved. Being totally honest, if it wasn't for the people at Cuerden and Red Rose Running Club, I probably wouldn't have achieved what I had done in 2015. The friendly atmosphere and encouragement you receive is second to none. It's not forced either which just adds to it. Every single time I had run there in 2015, there was shouts of my name, from people I had never spoken to before. Was delighted to end 2015 in style but I would be back in 2016 to take on the course again with a new set of targets, yet to be decided. Pita - Keep it up at Cuerden, doing a great job. As you always say, it's not just yourself that's involved. There's a list of 100's of people that make the event special and continue to do so, by the looks of it that isn't changing any time soon.
The last challenge I had scheduled in the country for 2015, was the Christmas day parkrun, which was held at Preston. Some of you will think getting up early on Christmas day to go running is just madness, it is, that's why I love it. It made a nice change not to be hungover in bed from the usual Christmas eve partying. Instead me and fellow LeJog member Ste traded the sickness for some fresh air down by the river on a beautiful morning, think it was raining. Was a great turn out from the mighty Red Rose again and was great to see everyone for the last time in 2015, which had been a memorable year so far. As ever, I didn't turn up to take it easy, I was there to push myself in the last 5k for the year. With a young Joseph Monk attending, I knew it would be a fast run, which I wanted. From the start he had gained a lead that no-one was catching. I have to say since I first started running at the beginning of the year, I had been watching Joe and his improvement. For such a young lad, he has so much potential. He can go on to achieve pretty much whatever he wants. As long as he doesn't get too involved with the ladies and the lager now he's 18. It's runners like Joe though that have helped me push on and encouraged me to carry on working hard. So with Joe setting off fast, I did my best to keep up, wasn't happening. He carried on pushing on, with a few runners around me I kicked on myself. On the final lap I was up on my previous PB of 17:57, if I could finish off with beating this, it would have rounded off my year. I did, finished in 2nd position with a time of 17:52, 5:45 /mi for the 5k. Considering it wasn't the flattest of courses I was well happy with it. Great way to celebrate Christmas, it was then back home to celebrate the rest of the day with my family, was a great day as always.
As I was away in Barcelona for the new year, boxing day and the 27th December saw me complete my last two runs in this country. That took me up to 361 consecutive days of running, with 374 separate runs in that time, covering 1039.1 miles over the year. My challenge wasn't complete yet, I had to run at least one mile a day for the full year, just the small matter of arriving safely in Barcelona and completing the 4 runs. I could talk all day about Barcelona as it was a great trip and I would recommend it to anyone, Camp Nou to see FC Barcelona is a must. Las Ramblas, Magic Fountain, pretty much just everything about Barcelona is superb. The 3 days before the new year I only did 5.8 miles and didn't really cover any of the city. I was saving that for NYE, I had planned to run past as many sites and attractions as possible and finish the year off in style. I hadn't planned how far I was actually going to run on the day, was just going to enjoy it and take it all in. Headphones in, shoes on for the last time in 2015, I set off through Barcelona. Being totally honest, the first few miles I don't really remember any of it. I was more focused on the fact I was running through the beautiful streets of Barcelona, sun shining, breathing in the cold air which nicely hit the lungs. My last run wasn't a time to push myself, it was a time to reflect, not only on the year that had just gone, years before that, also to look into the future. It started out as just a random idea on New year day earlier in the year, 365 days later I was here in the moment, completing my final run. Yes I had decided to do it for charity, of course it was for myself as well, to prove I still had commitment and desire to achieve goals if I put my mind to them. I had smashed this one massively. Thinking back to the LeJog trip... pretty much 90 miles of cycling on average over 10 days, getting up at 6am to run, or being awake until 11pm and running after a hard day on the bike. I need to give myself credit for that, not everyone would be able to motivate themselves do this after 8 hours in the saddle. Not just the once, it was for 10 days, saying that, I trained for it for 4 months or so before the event, even through training I was going through this sort of routine, supposed I was used to it.
Then I look back, this was easy compared to having to deal with months of harsh treatments, chemotherapy and radiotherapy as you already know. Having these poisonous chemicals pumped around my body, not through choice, due to the fact if I didn't I would die, simple as that really. The harsh reality was I had been on the planet just over 6000 days and I was faced with a life or death situation, there was only ever one outcome in my mind and that was survival. Throughout treatment I went through a physical and mental battle that many of you can't even start to imagine. My life was put on hold for months never really knowing what the outcome would be. Everyone at my age then was going out, playing football, enjoying life to full. I was watching from a hospital bed - (timed it well in 2006 as the world cup was on), cannula attached the my arm or embedded into my chest, pretty much getting fat and bald. I kind of excepted that when I was maybe a little older but not as a teenager. Some days after treatment I didn't have the energy to go to the toilet, make food, even play on computer games. The thing is though, I am an absolute hero, even though I was going through hell at times I didn't let it phase me. I always knew I would come out stronger on the other side and I did. Who am I to complain about having the opportunity to cycle to country, run marathons, half marathons, take part in a boxing match, to push my body to it's limits in what is was designed to do. From what I went through over the ages of 17/18, there was only one outcome to these challenges I set myself in 2015, that was to complete them and to do it in style, which I thought I did. 
I just want to follow up on a few things as well whilst I am in this frame of mind. I shall keep it brief, just like all of my posts that drag on forever.. Physically I went through a lot of changes, gaining a lot of weight, yet losing pretty much all of my muscle definition. I had to work my arse off to get back to any sort of fitness a few years ago. I didn't just get fit again over night. It took me probably a good year or two to get back to full fitness and a state in which I was truly happy with myself again. Once I had finished treatment, I couldn't run. Not that I didn't want to run, I couldn't physically run. My legs didn't have the strength to physically carry my weight from stride to stride. You know what I did, I fell over, I got laughed at, I stood up and proceeded to fall over again. Eventually I was no longer falling over and I was striding the hell out of it. I was able to play football again, got back to the gym and got fit. All through hard graft, no-one else was going to do it for me, so I went out and did it. I have heard so many excuses over the years about why people cannot get out and physical improve themselves, I could write a list longer than this blog which is saying something. I am not here to preach and to tell you what to do, if you're reading this though, just have a little think to yourself... Is there anyway you can improve the way you are living?
I'm not looking at short term goals here, I'm talking about long term goals that will change your life for the better, not only your life, your families, friends, everyone around you. Let's face it and be realistic, if you haven't been through difficult times in your life, then you're lucky. Saying that, without them it's hard to appreciate the truly great things in life which are health and family in my eyes, these are the 2 things that will stay with you in your time on this planet. Over my living years, I have been through so much stuff that only certain people know about, some great, some not so great. This is the case with a lot of people. No matter what it is, just try and let go. Otherwise you will stay in the same frame of mind for years to come, wasting vital time to change your life around. I'm not going to point out anyone's problems, that's not my job (yet) - It is up to you to realise them and to target a way forward to improve the situation. On the fitness side of things, if you genuinely wanted help with anything, any advice, any fitness sessions to get you started, I'd be willing to help out for sure. Any advice on what I have been through as well, I'd be more than happy to share if it meant changing the way you live and do things. 
For now I will get back onto topic, in my next blog I will go into a lot more detail on the health and fitness side of things and relate my life experiences to try and help other people out in different ways. For now, I was about 3 miles into my last run as I approached the Arenas de Barcelona which was a great view and was the venue for my NYE celebrations. For now I had to pass it and head towards the Magic Fountain of Montjuic, then up a good few hundred steps to the Museum of Barcelona, which offered great views of Barcelona overlooking the fountain as well. I wasn't stopping there, I knew I could go higher, I didn't really have a clue where I was heading at all but I wanted the highest place possible for the best views. So after passing the museum I then stumbled across the Olympic Stadium which hosted the 1992 Olympics. I didn't actually know the location of this so it was a good one to come across for sure, was well happy with this. Looking on I could see the summit I was hoping to reach, only problem was there was no direct route, so I had to go venturing off road for half a mile. Running through wooded areas, there was no one else about, really questioning myself as to what I was doing, was loving the little adventure though. I could have been running somewhere that offered no view whatsoever, that wasn't the case. I had ended up over 600ft above sea level and from nowhere appeared the Castle of Montjuic which was surrounded by tourists. I came out of this wooded area, panting, sweating not realising where I was, no idea what the people had thought when I appeared. Anyhow, I had reached my destination, what a beautiful place it was. I took 5 minutes out to just take it all in, sea view to my right, then a great view over most of Barcelona. The picture really doesn't do it justice at all. It was great though, 365 days of running, half way through my last run, I had done it. Was pretty much on the highest spot I could have been, sun shining on my face, taking it all in, I felt on top of the world. Such a great sense of achievement. Felt lucky and privileged to be having this special moment, this was one that was going to stick with me forever. 
I couldn't hang around forever though, yes the sun was out but it was still slightly cold. I had to get moving again, just the small matter of another 4 miles back to the hotel and I was done. It was the best 4 miles of the year, taking in the same views on the way back just topped it off. I had always planned I would finish it in style. There's nothing wrong with good old England but it wouldn't have had the same satisfaction of running 8 miles around Preston, avoiding traffic and the youths of today hurling abuse at you. Instead I was in one of the most iconic cities in the world filled with history and great architecture, making my own little piece of history at the same time. Yes I wasn't with my family to celebrate the achievements, they understood though. It was my year and I wanted to finish it abroad in style. Finishing up now, I headed back towards the hotel, heavy legs from 7 miles of running, and no rest days since the 31st December 2014, I decided to finish with a fast mile. Well I completed it in 6:36, it was one hell of a sprint finish. I was in my lycra and Christie vest, running as fast as I could through the posh end of Barcelona, I didn't care. People walking the streets soon moved out of the way when they heard me approaching. It felt quite strange when I stopped outside the hotel, that was it, the journey for 2015 was over. I will give you some stats below soon of my achievements and all that. The day was still young though, it was soon time to go and celebrate the new year. One of my best friends Emma had made the journey with me and supported me all the way, so it was time to go and get pissed and celebrate my achievements. New years eve was spent at the Arenas de Barcelona, which gave the best views of Barcelona and the immense firework display, this is one place you need to go and experience, it was surreal, never seen so many people in my life. 
It was then at midnight, when I was a bit tipsy off the wine after a great meal that it all sank in. I had run every day of the year, through illness, hangovers, wind, rain, snow, absolutely smashed it. 2015 had been one of the best years to date and had loved every moment of it. It has tested my character and personality in many ways, ways that I hadn't been tested before. I had met some incredible people through the year and made some great new life long friends along the way, you all know who you are for sure. For 2015, I am signing off, I will be back with some more challenges in 2016 and will keep you up to date with these, now I am finished with this anyway. Some quick stats and you can get back to what you was doing :)Finish with my quote - 'All in the mind' - Put your mind to it and you can achieve anything...
Total runs - 378
Total miles run - 1052.9 miles, covering 5 countries and 2 continents.
Marathons - 1
1/2 Marathons and above - 6
10k and above - 30
5k and above - 120
2014 PB's
CV parkrun - 20:55
5k - 20:35
10k - 40:11
1/2 Marathon - 1:42:34
Marathon - N/A
2015 PB's
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CV parkrun - 18:55
5k - 17:53
10k - 36:33
1/2 Marathon - 1:25:12
Marathon - 3:27:28
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Also cycled over 3900 miles for charity as well.
Money raised
£1582.75 - The Christie
£50 - Cancer Research
£10 - Revitalise
This is the charity for my next challenge which I will explain more in the next blog. Whoop.
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Also, before I forget... There has been a great response to the challenge of running every day and there have been a good few people take on the challenge for 2016, please take time to follow them on facebook and strava to show them support. Only 366 days this years, timed it well :)
Steven Willetts
Jordan Dashti
Andy Morrison
Gary Parkington
Lisa Horsley
David Parkington - Gary, not your dad, another David..
Just like to say thanks to everyone who was involved in such a great year, I couldn't have achieved what I did without you all. The money raised will go towards a great cause and help change lives for the better. 2015 was awesome and hopefully 2016 will be bigger and better.
Karl Hodgson
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