That was awesome! My first running event other than Parkrun, and it was brilliant. The weather was perfect - clear blue skies, not much wind, not too hot.

Thanks to everyone who’s been sharing advice and tips - it’s been really helpful to make sure I’m prepared for this.

And I’m really pleased with the time too! I took it easy for the first few km and then ramped it up. By the end I wasn’t completely wiped out and could have gone on longer, which was what I was aiming for feeling.

My knee is a little but niggly, but nowhere near how painful it’s been.

Lovely to see friends from school after the event to celebrate their fundraising for a new computer room, and to devour some much needed calories at Honest Burger afterwards.

All in all, that totally went to plan! Next one at the end of March...

My last run before the Big Half this weekend, and it’s the first time my plan has set me a marathon pace long run. I’m aiming for 5.15 m/km at the moment and that seemed to go pretty well!

I opted for a simple route round and round the park because it was so wet and I didn’t want to have to navigate around cars.

Kept my stride length about normal but put extra effort into lifting my knees and trying to be fluid.

I the process, got a 10k PB too! Roll on my first (non-Parkrun) event on Sunday 🎉

I have questions about stride length! After Emily pointed out I had an unusual running style I’ve been watching a few videos about stride length. It seems I’m probably shuffling more than I’m lifting my knees, so today I actively tried to reach my knee up and stretch out more whilst still landing my foot directly underneath me. I can feel the difference when I do it but it’s hard to maintain.

On the downhill side of the park I let myself go quick with that longer stride and that felt pretty good.

Any tips appreciated!

My plan has me running three days in a row because I have the Big Half at the weekend, which will be my first running event, not counting Parkrun. Exciting stuff!

Pleased to see the blossom peeking out now that we’re coming to the end of February, although I hear we are in for a cold snap this week!

It’s two months until the London Marathon! 🙀

Because these Sunday long runs are somewhat unrelenting now I thought I’d get some inspiration and go and see the finishing line at the Mall first hand. This is the fifth week in a row where I’ve run a half marathon or longer, so I thought it would be good to vary things.

The RunGo app is really helpful for drawing out routes, and I had an idea - don’t start from the doorstep of our home, get a bus a little way in to the city centre. Then run from there to see some new places.

This meant today I got all the way up to the Wetland Center and Hyde Park.

The only problem with this bus and run idea is getting cold, but I found that a thin down jacket squashes down just enough to fit into the 5 litre hydration pack that I’ve got, so that’s helpful on the way back.

Also, I’ve been polishing my new running blog yesterday, and it seems to be working pretty well. You can find it at run.stef.io

No photo for this update, but a few of you folks have mentioned that doing some strength exercises is a good idea. So I went for an induction and have a plan involving lifting metal bars and pulling myself around with straps. I’ve never been to a gym so it was a little bit intimidating. Let’s see how this goes!