This time tomorrow I will be somewhere on the Manchester Marathon course. It’s been a pretty torrid few months with the injury, but I’m happy to say I will make it to the start line in one piece!
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It seems like it’s been a long week this week, Nick has had a viral infection for the last seven days, and my body has gone into overdrive trying to fight it, meaning I am crazy hungry all.the.time. It’s doing a decent job, other than a sore throat and feeling a bit drained I’m holding it together. I’ve been having plenty of smoothies to give me a boost too.
I had a sports massage on Thurs, which was slightly unorthodox but really good. It was with a Thai massage therapist, so he did all these strange moves, including standing on the bed, and sitting on my calves! He also did the most painful acupressure release on a point just above my foot 4 times, I actually had to laugh after he did it, or I would have cried!
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It’s been a while since my last marathon-Dublin 2012-so I’m eager to get out there and have a good race, I know in my mind, my training hasn’t gone to plan and I also have to bear in mind London 2 Brighton next month which I am using Manchester for as a training run. I need to have my sensible head on.
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The weather forecast is awful, and having not run in the rain much this year, it’s thrown my plans for what to wear up in the air, in the end I packed everything and anything and will decide tomorrow morning what to go with. I’ve also carted more food than clothes to Manchester with me- pre, during and post race fuel!! As a Vegan it’s hard to travel light on the food front, I like to make sure I know I have something with me just in case. I also packed an absolute vat of my favourite pre-race breakfast for today and tomorrow: Porridge with coconut oil, cinnamon and chia seeds.
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Today we are going to do a little bit of exploring Manchester, but nothing too heavy on the legs, mostly it’ll be pretty chilled, and full of carbo loading!
Realistically I’m going to have to shoot for just finishing this marathon again like Dublin rather than aiming for any particular time goal. The last time I ran over 13 miles was the 2nd Feb, so endurance wise I’m a little concerned, but I’m sure on the day the adrenaline and crowd will pull me through. Headphones are also banned for this race, but I’m taking mine to carry with me, just in case things get absolutely desperate.
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I’ve got all my stuff lined up: gels, Ella’s sachet and dates for fuel during the race, as well as coconut water and Viridian’s sports electrolyte fix to carry in my Camelbak. I usually start fuelling around the 6 mile mark, and will take something on every 4-5 miles. I’ve briefly looked at the race course, but nothing major stood out for me other than a very long out and back section towards Altrincham and back.
After 3 weeks of 30+ mileage I am feeling a little more confident about tomorrow, and my weekend run with the TNR ladies last week gave me a big boost too. I’m just raring to go now, I love the race morning build up and can’t wait to soak up the atmosphere.
It’s race time!
