Sub 3

M. Welcome! Surely there's no such thing as too slow for an easy pace, especially as your tempo pace should be in the 6:30-7mm range?

Selbs: have a good time in NZ - sounds like you need it!

Njord: You skinny bugger. Feels like I've got all your excess lard. Weighing in here at 13 st 4lbs on NY Day. Peak race weight is 10st 10lbs 9as you are now. So it's 4 alcohol free days a week, 50 miles a week and a change of diet.

PP: Envious of your fitness as well...

LD: I've been loading all the runs and bike rides from my Garmin Connect account onto Strava. Not sure which site I prefer right now. The Strava segments bit is a lot of fun.

I've calculated that in the last 20 months since VLM 11 when I eased off training due to a morale-destroying run that day, I've run 2,200 miles less than I would have done if I had just carried on. That's 220,000 calories, or 60Lbs of fat. So it's not surprising that I've gained 30lbs in weight since then.

To make the training possible I've written a detailed training plan (basically P&D 55mpw, but adjusted for races, prior experience and weekly preferences), stuck it to the fridge and put the weekday runs into my work calendar to stop people booking meetings on me. 

This week I've done 4 miles easy, 8 miles with strides, 9 miles home from work with a rucksack and 10 miles this morning with the dog. Parkrun with the dog tomorrow (so not fast) and then 15 planned for Sunday.

Cooking has been fun this week. Salmon parcels with braised spring greens on Monday, Slow cooked ribs with home-made coleslaw and baked sweet potato on Tuesday, Honey and soy glazed chicken with spicy cucumber salad on Wednesday and slow baked sausages with pumpkin, plus more braised spring greens last night. Decided to change the diet from the usual family cooking (curry, chilli, spag bol, sausages and mash etc) to make it more interesting. Having a good time discussing with the girls what we're going to have the next day. They're still having carbs, but me and Mrs MtR are cutting right back. 

As a result, I'm feeling hungry and tired much of the time and getting to bed by 10pm. But I'm feeling far better today as my body adjusts.

Good luck to padams this weekend

CW - yes, I've plotted the route on bikehike, but I wasn't going to put it on my Garmin for two reasons:

1) I thought it might be more fun trying to follow the map!
2) I don't really know how to use the mapping on my Garmin.

I'm not particularly bothered about this race (hence point 1 above), although it would be nice not to have to do 10M extra. I don't mind running a bit slower for the first 20M because I'm running with people - in fact, that's probably a good way of ensuring I don't start too quickly. Given how much time you can lose/make up in the last 10k of a marathon, I'm guessing the same will be true (or even more so) of the last 20M tomorrow.

Anyway, might try out the mapping thing this evening. Thanks for all the info!

Welcome, M.

Sounds like you've got your mojo back, MtR.  If you start cooking exciting veggie food, let me know

Good luck tomorrow, Padams.  I'm the last person who should give anyone navigation tips, so I'd say follow advice from CW et al.

11M (ish) for me in beautiful sunshine at lunch.  Garmin had a mad 5 minutes, clocking the first mile at 7.11 and one of the miles through the Staple Hill tunnel (out and back on the bike path today) at 6.24, neither of which was accurate.  So I added on 0.25 and decided that was probably about right!

X-post with Selbs.  I'm looking forward to my 98 minute marathon

Got overtaken by a lesser-spotted on my lunchtime run, merrily padding along at ~7m/m.  Sign her up!! 

Brian. - are you staying in York on Saturday or Sunday night?  Either way, definitely up for a beer.  Will send you a message.

Padams - I've run it three times and I don't think I've run the same route twice despite having Charlie's excellent tcx file uploaded (route hasn't changed AFAIK).  Last year, I had trouble last year finding the footpath out of Latimer (it's not that difficult to be honest, and was probably caused by my complacency about 'knowing' the route).  My best (and unplanned) strategy was following the leader in 2010, who kept stopping to check navigation and in doing so allowed me to catch him up.  Once we got to the canal, I think he took about 20 minutes out of me in as many miles, but up until that point I hadn't needed to consult my map once!  Best advice is to stay calm and relaxed and accept that you might have to think on your feet a couple of times in the first few hours.  There's plenty of opportunity to stretch out once you hit the canal.

Charlie W / MtR - a potential trouble for me is my predeliction for very spicy food.  And spicy food demands a bottle of beer as company!  I've become quite good at limiting myself to just the one most nights (instead of a regular two or three) - and I prefer small changes in lifestyle like this sustained over a long period of time.  Unlike my good mate Pug (by his own admission!) who needs to see the weight fall off on a daily basis!

Had a bit of a strained week but got my homework finished and sent off last night. Woke up at Gobi -60 this morning and couldn't get back to sleep. Ended up running 8 miles into work in a sort of interval tempo thingy (splits 7:13, 7:27, 6:19, 7:26, 6:10, 7:26, 6:11, 7:30) as I realised that Wokingham is only about 4 weeks off. Don't know if this session is of benefit and would appreciate comments.

If Strava is a Rolls Royce, Fetch is Del Boy Trotter's 3 wheeler. God, what an ugly site.

MtR - That's ludicrous weight gain! For once in my life I am at a respectable weight in mid Jan. Possibly a pound or two above the lowest I've been. I've just had two choccy bars and a curry in the knowledge that i can and I will still have a calorie deficit today.... what an unusual feeling to not be crash dieting, nor injured and piling the weight on, nor feeling pissed off running with too much weight.

Although the lightest I've ever been has been just over 11 stone. Whilst I've always regarded this as racing weight, I've always thought that losing another 6 lbs may still be possible.... and maybe, just maybe, there's a chance this time.

Greetings, M. I am also a UK ex-pat, living in Switzerland. 

Best wishes for your weekend run, Padams.

Nice to see MtR getting back to it.  I am sure you will drop the weight quickly with your disciplined program. 

After over a year of ~4 times a week gym sessions, I am in better overall shape than at any point in the last ten years, but not very sharp for running.  Weight has stood still over last year at ~75kg, but I have clearly gained some (small) muscles that had withered in last 5 years or so of doing little other than running.  I was shocked to learn what is probably obvious to many, that a program of nothing but running is not great in the long term. 

MtR - I didn't dare weigh myself in 2011 before I started sorting out my pre-op rehab exercise plan but I'm pretty damn sure I was a fair bit heavier than you are now.  Looks like a fine start to the training plan. I'll be round for dinner.

postie - Assuming you're getting a reasonable few miles in at somewhere around race pace, I'd say it's a useful session. Apart from anything else, varying pace tempo runs mix things up a bit anyway.

LD: Tell me about it - really shocking what a year and half of indolence, working hard and eating and drinking too much can do. Especially when I was actually training hard for the first 5 months of that period doing cycling and triathlons. So that's actually pretty much all in the last 15 months since my mum died.

Jools: I am planning to eat quite a lot of veggie food in the coming weeks as well. 

Al_P - Had a look at the website.  (What I presume is) your mate mentioning that he is injured is commendably honest but hardly inspires confidence!

M - Welcome.  Dublin is tentatively on my schedule.  Have you done it before?

Weight - I remain way too heavy but didn't really put on any weight while I was injured.

9st 10lb

PP - you're in charge then, you just seem to be too fit already. those sort of sessions are for March time.

CW - 20 it is then.

MtR - food choices sound yummy, nice to see you.

LS21 - still a heavyweight here too

Njord - I have 3 or 4 dry nights, but I bet you sink more in one night than I do all week.

7M, 1.75k, 8M. Thats the running week done with 47M for the week and 1M more than last week. All still very slow, knee still aches, hammy is still tight, Had to check if I had even got slightly out of breath at the end of this mornings 7M. Longish Turbo tomorrow, but have to be in jam jar by 9am Sunday for footy so I wont be bagging a long run this weekend.

Was dreading setting of for run home tonight. One of those days that once I got running it felt great to be out there. Comfy 12 miler at 10% to 20% slower than MP. A 16 miler tomorrow at similar intensity and a day of on Sunday. 

Sees me at a 55 mile week. Supposed to be 70. But today is my first decent run in at least a month, so a great end to the day

Good luck to all those racing at the weekend 

Well, it took absolutely ages and I now have a whole load of software installed on my work laptop that probably shouldn't be there, but I think I've managed to get the route onto my Garmin!

Next problem is getting the watch to show the route, and I won't be able to test that until I'm there. But I never planned to have the route on the watch anyway, so not a massive deal if it doesn't work.

Also, it is CW's trace, so I need to remember to ignore it at that fork in the canal!

If its CW's trace, then every now and then you'll be running 0.5M at 5:30mm !

Gah, the responsibility! Have a ball, Padams -- I expect most of your 0.5Ms will be at 5:30/M :- ) (All you have to do is enable the map screen in settings; probably work with "track up", another setting once the map screen is there; zoom in until it shows a scale of 300 or 500'; and do Training... Do Course... and select the downloaded course when you start, so that it shows up as a wiggly grey line to follow. Annoyingly it will restart your session if you start the course part way through, so it's best to 'do course' before you press start. Not too late to download a tiny route around the block if you want to nip out and practice!