Me, me, me

My name is Craig and I'm a marathon runner. It's nice to be able to say that, plus it carries a great deal of positive and inspiring memories for me. It took a while, effort and a few tears to get to the start line of this year's London Marathon, but I managed it and came home in a time of 4hrs35min. Whilst not to be sniffed at, I did feel that my potential was yet to be fulfilled! I'll be talking about marathon training and preperation in future posts, for all you London peeps.

After London, I took a couple of months of running and focused on mountain biking, probably my favourite sport of all, during the balmy summer months. This kept the fitness ticking over and gave my body a bit of a rest. In September I returned to running with the New Forest Half Marathon and came home in 2hrs, about 20 minutes slower than my personal best. Not bad considering I had done little training. It was time to knuckle down....

I've always toyed with triathlon; I was a competitive swimmer until 18 and I've always enjoyed running and cycling. It was on the fourth day of the last England Vs Pakistan test that my Dad and friend Gareth challenged me to try one. I had to take them up, didn't I? Then the Pakistanis refused to come back on the pitch and I felt that I'd jinxed the whole thing.

So, I decided to find a triathlon club and join it. I went along to my first running session and was pleasantly surprised - nice guys, not too serious, really helpful. I've been going ever since and I'm slowly getting into my swimming groove again.

It was soon after that that Kate White contacted me to take part in her new project. I had known Kate for a while as she used to put me back together again after tough training runs and races. I was to be given a strict and tough training plan to help me reach the 'next level' and compete in a triathlon in May. After nine weeks I would be given a fitness test.

I have been on this training plan for a month now and it is all going quite well. I'll be talking about that soon in future posts.

So my current goals are (with estimated dates in brackets):

To achieve a sub 1hr30 half marathon (spring 07)
To achieve a sub 40 minute 10Km (spring 07)
To compete in a triathlon (spring 07)
To acheive a sub 4 hour marathon (autumn 07)
To compete in a half Ironman (spring 08)
To compete in an Ironman (autumn 08)

I reckon they are all achievable, but one at a time......