4 Weeks To Go…
In just 4 short weeks, a matter of time that will fly by before I even know it, I’ll be running my first marathon. Of course that’s not new news — apologetically I've been harping on about it for months now — but with such a short time frame until the big day it seemed like a good time to sit down and get a few words out of my mind. It’s something I've wanted to tick off my bucket list for a long time, and with 12 weeks of training done it still both excites me and terrifies me on equal measures.
The marathon in question is the first Newport Wales Marathon, taking place in my home city over a route that takes in some of Newport’s landmarks through a fairly flat country lane course. Whilst admittedly several years of attempts to enter the London Marathon resulted in fairly, there’s somewhat of a romantic notion to having your first major marathon entry take place at your home city and I appreciate that fact greatly. The first time I entered a half marathon was at Silverstone and it still gives me a warm fuzzy feeling thinking back to it and knowing that my first half was at the same place where so many of my heroes have created their own memories. Again, the hopeless romantic in me feels like I created my own on a far more personal level.
It’s hard to explain how to feel about the actual marathon, because right now it’s still quite an equal measure of excitement and terror. Over the past 12 weeks I’ve gone through training with my friend Sarah, who is also running the race and will kick plenty of arse doing so, and as training has progressed the increase in distance for these training runs starts to hit home as to the challenge that lays ahead on April 29th. Even with a few disruptions in the schedule with freak weather and prior engagements, we’re still on course to hit our training target and that makes me feel a lot better.
At the same time, there’s no easy to run a marathon and I fully understand that all the training in the world can’t quite prepare you for setting off for 26.2 miles on the big day. That’s absolutely terrifying to me. At times I think of all the anxieties that develop in questioning my own ability and it does scare me a bit of what lays ahead. What if I can’t do it on the day? What if I get a freak injury the week before? What if I change something in my preparation and it knocks me out of the loop? And the worst of the lot…?
What if I let people down?
I think that’s my biggest fear of all. Pressure is a double edge sword — it pushes you on to succeed and offers a real driving factor to reach your goal — but for someone as anxious as myself it can easily overwhelm. Anyone close in my life knows why running for a mental health charity is an incredibly important thing for me and I’m incredibly proud that I’ll be running the marathon for Newport Mind. Not only do I want to raise awareness and support through fund-raising for them, but I want people to know that there is help out there for those that need it with their mental health and running for a local charity and putting something back into Newport for a Newport run seems fair and logical.
Fear of failure is a common thought process that crosses my mind when it comes to putting myself out there and trying something new. It might seem stark and perhaps too honest to say that, but I think it’s important to always challenge oneself even if that fear seems a bit terrifying. The combination of that and the actual challenge of pushing my body for several hours over 26.2 miles is a hell of a combination, but even amongst all of these worries I’m still equally excited to push myself out there and just smash it to the best of my ability. The thrill of finishing is something that I think about a lot with my preparation simply because there’s nothing quite like running over a finish line in a race and knowing you’ve accomplished something great — even if to yourself and no one else. Self accomplishment is something no one else can take from you.
As for my training, as I say my friend and I have been pretty on the ball even with ridiculous weather patterns like snow days in the middle of March knowing a few training runs out of schedule. Physically and mentally it is pretty gruelling as even training for a marathon takes several hours out of a day to get a long run in and get the body used to that much physical impact. It blows my mind a bit just thinking that by the time the marathon comes round in 4 weeks we’ll be closing off a chapter of 4 months of training for something we can say we’ve done even if we never do another one again. Although, I must admit, the idea of doing a triathlon as the next big challenge is mighty enticing…
So there’s not long to go now. Over the past few months I’ve had pretty wonderful support and quite frankly I wonder sometimes if I quite deserve how much people have supported me to get to where I am with my sponsorship. At the time of writing my total is sitting at £580 following my target of £500 which I can’t really thank people enough over. Everyone who sponsors me I try and thank personally because it means so much to me that I can’t quite believe how much everyone has helped me raise. If you still wish to sponsor me, the Virgin Money Giving page can be found here and I can’t thank you enough if you want to help support Newport Mind and give something back to those that need the support with their mental health.
Hopefully these last few weeks of a few more final long runs will get my final preparations ready for the big day. Regardless of how the run goes, regardless of the time I post or how I feel about hating running and everything it consumes during the run or just wanting to stop even when I know I have to keep going, all of it will be worth it for the moment that finishing line appears on the horizon and I can tell myself that I’ve done it. Maybe then I’ll finally be at peace with all my worries and my anxieties knowing it was all worth it for that moment of success and accomplishment.
