Two weeks to go to London marathon - but it doesn't feel much like tapering yet, at least for me. Because of my various injury woes it's been a while since I did a long run (too long, really) and of the last four weeks I've been out of action for two of them. So this weekend was something of a test - could I get through a 10 miler on Friday and 16 on Sunday without part of my body deciding it had had enough?
I could! Hooray! Admittedly it wasn't sprightly, and a personal training session on Saturday at the gym left me with legs of jelly, so the entire 16 miles yesterday was an effort of willpower over common sense, but I did it. And then promptly collapsed into some long grass and watched the geese meander around the track where I had finished. I'm pretty sure they were going faster than me.
So that's my last long run until the marathon then. And I sincerely hope the taper makes my legs feel a little fresher, because I couldn't have done another 10.2 miles yesterday. Not even if you'd dangled a cake in front of me, bobbing along at a steady 8 min/mile pace.
Thinking about incentives to get me trough those last miles on legs that last did a 21 miler in late February made me think about raising some money for a charity. While I don't generally ask - I do so many races that I'd be asking constantly - it is my first marathon, and it seems wrong not to try and raise a bit of money for charity in the process. And maybe, just maybe, it'll help me finish it. So here's my freshly created justgiving page, in case anyone is generous enough to make a donation. I'm raising money for Born Too Soon, who look after babies and their families at Kingston Hospitals neonatal unit. They looked after my eldest - and her parents - when she was born poorly and too soon, and I will always be grateful.
