Disasterous runs and the last few weeks...

What an awful, awful, awful week. It has been hideous, I don't think I've had a training week so bad in the whole run of things.

It all started on Tuesday. I went out for my long run, intending to do 20 miles. Well, that didn't work out. After an hour and a few mins I had to stop running. From the moment I stepped off and started to the moment I decided to call it quits I felt like I was about the throw up. I was slow, everything ached, it wasn't a usual little bit of end-of-the-day tiredness that I could shake off, I knew that I wasn't going to be able to finish my long run. Upset and disillusioned I got my stuff from the office and went home on the tube hoping to relax.

Really nothing has changed. Today, this morning in fact, I went for a long run which was also a disaster, and yet here I am, on the sofa with a large blood filled blister (I haven't quite decided how to handle this one, it's really very gross and I don't know if I should prick it or not - I know, it's yukky, but this is what happens when you train for a marathon people!), all my running gear dripping on the floor and my trainers stuffed with newspaper, shivering in my dressing gown.

And yet, today, after this awful long run, life is good. Lots of things went wrong, and again I didn't finish the distance I set out to do. But I'm sitting here knowing that in two weeks on Sunday I will be running the London Marathon and I will be crossing the finish line.

To quote Bryn from Gavin and Stacey: And I'll tell you for why...

After the awful Tuesday night run that never went anywhere I went home and doubted that I could do it. I really wondered if I'd bitten of more than I can chew this time and if running the marathon might not be too much for me. On Wednesday I sent a few emails to friends saying that I'd had a rubbish week and explaining how down I felt about the whole thing.

And then everyone around me started to do the most wonderful things. My friends all sent me emails back saying how I could do it. Kim at work spent 5 minutes listing reasons that I would be fine. Helen sent me an email saying if I could just up and do 20 miles then I had nothing to worry about. And Ronnie, well she started a one woman fundraising campaign on my behalf in her office. On Thursday I honestly think that someone sponsored me every half an hour, or at least it felt like it!

And today's run? Well, yes, today's run was a disaster, but I have finished it feeling like I can take on the marathon and finish it. And that's what counts. I just have to stick to what I know is right for me and has been through all my training. I got up and had breakfast (scrambled eggs on toast) but I was impatient to get going so I didn't really have enough water. I set off and was doing fine, but realised by the time I got to Battersea that my gels (they are pouches of energy gel that you take with water to keep you going on the way round) had all fallen out of my pocket. It tipped it down with rain, it was very windy. I ran for over three hours, but I didn't finish, without the gels I was getting more and more hungry and tired, not tired in a 'I've just run over 15 miles way' tired in the way that was making me feel a bit dizzy. I walked for ten minutes before Tower Bridge but that was good, I have felt before like slowing to walk will only put me in more pain but ten minutes of walking really helped, so I know that if I'm that tired on the day a ten minute break will do the trick. But I was still dizzy, so as I got to London Bridge I diverted to the tube and came home.

But now here I am, on the sofa, looking at my blood blister, thinking that in two weeks time I am going to rock the marathon. I'll make sure I drink enough, not put my gels in a pocket with no zip (!), take my time and walk if I have to and enjoy the atmosphere and the people and the whole day... unless of course the weather is like this in which case I'll be the one on the elite runners heels trying to get round asap so as not to get so wet!