ITS THAT TIME OF YEAR AGAIN
by Bud Baldaro (April 2008)
The headline on a major broadsheet on Monday April 14 was “It’s that time of the year again”. The two page picture spread then featured shots of skimpily clad models, camels, mister men characters, celeb chefs, blind runners with guides, people being laid on a stretcher et al.
Yes it certainly was that time again for the annual London road party more commonly known as the Flora London marathon; 35,000 plus participants trudging the roads of the capital to run their 26 miles journey.
The direct result of Sundays London marathon is that 20, 000 new runners will take to their local roads, parks, gyms in a quest for new fitness and a new challenge in the next 7 days.
Runners in Bristol are now offered the perfect preparation for London 2009 with the new Bristol 10k an initial stepping stone in May (Bank Holiday Monday 5th), and then one of the country’s biggest half marathons the Reebok Bristol Half Marathon on September 14th 2008.
Over the past 26 years London has done an incredible job both in terms of inspiring the nation to seek a greater level of fitness and of meeting a fantastic challenge. The Race for Life series which now involves fabulously over ¾ million women was born from the upsurge of popularity in running spawned by London. Incredibly London has raised in excess of £200 million for numerous charities.
London caters for the world’s greatest athletes and some of the country’s greatest characters.
This year it served as the Trial for the Beijing Olympics and it was wonderful to see Run Bristol ambassador Liz Yelling earn selection as she ran a personal best time of 2.28 for the 26 miles 385 yards. Local Gloucestershire athlete Dan Robinson also confirmed his Olympic selection with a 2.13 PB.
One week later Liz Yelling will be helping Bristol athletes prepare for the Bristol 10k and Bristol half marathon at the residential running camp held in the Forest of Dean.
The 10k is just days away. The half marathon 22 weeks!
A perfect time to begin preparing for your first half marathon. There is obvious logic in both using the Bristol half as a stepping stone for the London marathon next year and equally and perhaps more relevantly in using our own Bristol 10k as a step towards preparing for the 13 mile event in September. Indeed within 24 hours of the London Marathon over 300 people entered the Bristol half marathon on line.
It would be wonderful to see 20,000 folk participating come the early autumn.
If you are about to begin training for this years Bristol half there are couple of pointers to consider:
· Kit – please always buy from specialist running store and get advice from people who know the score. Bristol Olympian and holder of UK record for 10km on the road, Nick Rose has recently opened the Bristol Up & Running store and teamed up as a sponsor of the Bristol 10k.
· Running partners – why not join a local club to benefit from running with others; in the process seeking coaching advice and possibly enhancing your social life. You don’t have to be a superstar to join nor do you have to commit yourself to “x” amount of times per week.
· Failing that find some running partners/buddies from work or your locality.
· Be realistic in your training plans and progressing of such training.
· Look at your life style holistically and get shape and structure to your running program.
· Determine which days and time of day is best for you to run.
Running is so great because you can run from anywhere and it is time to your self and if used well will allow you to come to terms with life’s stresses and frenzies.
It is also a very simple sport. Given appropriate rest and recovery the more you run the more you will improve
If you want detailed training programs then there are training programs on the Run Bristol web site.
Above all make sure you have fun and enjoy your running.
Excitingly more training days /weekends will be available as RunBristol strives to become the Best of British in the running scene.
You can be very much part of the activity so accept the challenge
As one of the sports brands would say
