Apologies for the lack of blogging of late, there’s been quite a bit going on in my life – more on that later!

As many of you know, I work in a running shop and I’m often asked by customers how many miles a week I run.  When I tell people, most cannot comprehend how I manage to fit it in.  I’m not alone in clocking up that sort of mileage of course, but to the average runner, it is difficult for them to understand.

There’s no two ways about it.  If you want to be a successful endurance runner, you simply have to put the miles and the hours in.  There are notable examples of athletes who have performed well  off lower mileage.  But my experience is that that type of runner tends to break down with injury more frequently and is more inconsistent in their performance.  A higher mileage runner is stronger, more robust and performs more consistently.

Fitting it all in is hard, bloody hard.  There are two things which I think really make the difference.  The first is routine.

When I first entered the world of work, I was still living at home with my parents, and lived a short 10min drive from my workplace.  I was working as an accountant for the NHS and my hours were brilliant.  I was on 37.5 hours per week, and had core hours of 10:00am til 12:00pm and 2:00pm until 3:30pm.  How I made up the rest of those 37.5 hours was entirely up to me.  At the time, I was only training once per day, and would simply run as soon as I got home from work.  My tea would be on the table when I got back from my run, life was so easy back then!!

About a year after starting in the NHS, we relocated to Manchester City Centre.  Our premises had showers and I decided to start running to work and back on non-session days.  This introduced double day running to me and I noticed quite an improvement in my running.  I would take a direct 6 mile route to work, and I had a standard 9 mile route home.  Over time, I started running to work every day, catching the train home on a night when I would be doing a session down at the club.  I was following this routine when I first started marathon training.  I remember in 2004 that I had 12 days holiday to take before March 31^st and I decided to take every Wednesday off work and drive out to Lyme Park and run between 2 and 2 and a half hours over hilly terrain. 

At the end of 2004, a fantastic opportunity came up to jointly manage a specialist running shop in Hyde owned by Ron Hill and his family, and take on the accounting side of the business.  It was a dream – continue with the accounting career, but in a more hands on role and in an environment where I would be interacting with runners all day.  The shop (later to become Sweatshop) was only 2 miles from home and I continued my routine of running to work and back, however we now had a full one hour break and it was customary for staff to go running at lunchtime.  And so I moved to a new routine of running at lunchtime, and straight after work. 

I did used to love running in the mornings as it gave me discipline and lunchtime running in a shop environment can be a risky game as an unusually busy day could mean you miss your run.  It did happen, but fortunately not too often. 

I am now trying to figure out yet another routine as I have recently started a new role managing the Sweatshop in Wrea Green, near Blackpool.  This move has impacted quite heavily on my spare time and partly explains my lack of blogging recently.  I am now travelling an hour each way to work and back, and it is more of a challenge than ever to fit it in. 

Running on my break is still an option most days, however there tends to be days where we work alone which makes this impossible.  Today was one such day, I left home at 8:15am, and got back home 12 hours later.

This morning, I left deliberately early as I got up to run before work.  But my PF was a little tender so I decided to head to work and see if it was better when I got there.  It was and I managed to get in a 4 mile run before opening.  When I got home, I spent a few minutes sorting myself out and headed out at 8:45pm.  I managed to fit in another 6 miles.  A day like this is always going to be the most challenging, I am just going to have to plan in advance to make these days my easier days.

Planning is as important as routine, but all plans have to be flexible as you never know what is round the corner.  Let’s take last Tuesday for example, when I had planned to do 6 miles in the morning with a session of long hills in the evening, possibly making it 15 for the day.  However, plans don’t always go to plan.  Virgin Media were coming round to install a new TV, Internet and Phoneline anytime before 1pm.  Needless to say, they phoned at 12:55pm to say they would be there in 10mins.  The job was completed shortly before 4pm and the first run was scrapped.  I did get 13 in including the session, so it was still a reasonable day.

At the moment, it is feeling very difficult fitting in 80-90 miles per week.  It makes me wonder how I will fit in 120 when I next attempt a marathon but I have always found where there’s a will there’s a way.  Other runners manage under more demanding lifestyles, it’s just a question of finding the optimum routine, more careful planning and managing my time more effectively.   I’m doing alright so far this week, but it isn’t easy.

I’ll try to get a blog up in the next few days updating the situation with my PF.  It is much improved, and I’ve been able to train far more consistently and effectively in the last five weeks.  That’s largely down to a few changes I have made to my training, which I will talk about in the blog.  Just in time for my favourite few months of the racing year!! 

Cheers

Dave