The bluffers guide to a half marathon.

Decide to do the race at the last minute, make sure you haven't planned or trained towards it at all.

Make sure you have never run the distance. In fact keep any running you do under 5kms.

Two days before the race eat and drink as much as possible. I recommend the Dom Perignon 1999. Exceptional. Wash this down with at least 5 pints of heineken. Not necessarily in that order.

Get a rotten nights sleep.

Get to where you are going, register, then go out and buy some gear (socks, shorts etc.)

On the night before the race, eat as much as possible. To aid digestion of the Goats cheese, scallops, pannacotta and 1/2 bottle of pouilly fume, I recommend a peppermint tea to aid digestion. Drink a lucosade sport before bed.

Get a rotten nights sleep.

Get up, have a Lucosade Sport, two poached eggs, two sausages, some brown bread, toast and two cups of coffee.

Pee. A lot.

Tog out and run the marathon. Make sure that you have vaselined your balls and nipples throughly.

Feel a sense of elation and satisfaction at having run a 1/2 Marathon.

Eat a banana and some snickers. Go and eat a throughly repulsive lunch. Have a pint of Guinness.

Begin to feel pain, drink some more lucozade sport. Eat a three course meal, Drink a bottle of wine (Bordeaux, if possible). End the night with a gin and tonic.

Wake up. Really feel extreme pain. Have breakfast (full irish). Have a bath. Go home, go to bed.

Wake up. Feel less pain. Go to work. Go for a swim. Go to bed.

...TBC...

Puny Channel

Look at this picture, the channel is only 1cm wide from 518.64km up. If I can build a machine that can maintain this perspective for the swim it'll be a doddle.

Xhersize

Hey there. I have spending a lot of time exercising recently, mostly as part of a get-fit buzz but with a couple of extra carrots. As a result I am soon to breach the -20lb (9KG) mark. I'll let you know, Im gonna be eating cake that day.

I am concentrating on a few things:

1. Running a marathon in 2009

This isn't going to happen, so I suppose I am not really concentrating on it at all. I can happily run 5-6kms without too much bother, but running really doesn't do that much for me. It's useful as a means to an end (that end being weight-loss), but I haven't really got the will to push it up to 40kms. One day soon I think I'll run 10k just for the laugh, but that's as far as it goes. Sinead is the runner.

2. Swimming the Channel in relay

This has more legs (bada-boom, tish!). My swimming isn't all that strong, getting better sure, but still far short of where it needs to be. I am getting involved in Total Immersion training in October, with a view to transferring the skills to other members of the team. The coaching aspect of this is a little daunting to me. Sinead doesn't think so though, and she's probably right. I am going to do the training and work on the drills and see if I can pass it on to the rest of the team. Have a sea-swim planned for this weekend in donegal. Brr-Cold.

3. Triathalons

Definitely going to do a couple of Triathalons in the new year. Need to increase all my times (Swimming, cycling, running). A little worried about running on the road (danger of shin-splints ouchy). I will looking into getting a new bike too, my poor old mountain bike isn't really up to the task. More on this in the new year. Going to do some serious concentrating on this in conjunction with the swimming.

4. Weights

My Weight training started this afternoon with an abs class. This is going to be a long journey. Looking forward to adding a bit of definition, not looking forward to the pain. Going to be tricky to fit it in around everything else, but we'll see.

Gosh, boring blog entry what?