A special day

Today is my trainer's 2nd birthday. He was thrilled to receive Happy Birthday messages from as far afield as Singapore and New Zealand, as well as from people closer to home. Of course, 2yr olds need some of their presents building for them. At Christmas it was the easel, and now, the trampoline. Of course, this is where the whole househusband / working wife arrangement is invaluable. The other way round and he wouldn't have got his trampoline until just after dinner - dangerous!

Anyway, here he is taking me through a few exercise routines.

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Being realistic...

I'm not big on personal ambition. In fact my goals for the marathon are quite modest:

1. Overtake the pace car.

2. Set off a speed camera.

3. Win the race.

4. Get invited to appear on Strictly Come Dancing 2007.

Actually, it would be nice if:

1. I finish without too many injuries (see #3 below).

2. I don't have to subsidise the sponsorship too much.

3. I avoid the rhinos.

4. I don't get overtaken by Mr Tickle with half a mile to go. How embarrassing would that be, Woody?

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Mission accomplished!

15 miles is a long way, but I did complete the run in under 2 hours (although this was put in doubt by amateur pacing as a result of initial overexuberance). At 12 miles, I had an encounter with The Voice:

Me: "I'm tired - I think I'll stop now."

The Voice: "But you said on your blog you were going to run 15 miles."

Me: "Come on! No one reads the blog!!"

The Voice: "How do you know? There might be one or two."

So thanks to the blog, I managed to con myself into running another painful lap to complete the 15 miles. Fortunately, I have to look after my trainer next weekend, so no long run for two weeks.

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Meet my personal trainer...

I'm really fortunate to have a trainer on hand 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Okay, he takes a bit of looking after, but he's basically good value - a bit of pocket money in a few years time and he'll be happy.

Here he is taking me through the theory of long distance running, and just in time too, as tomorrow afternoon is going to be the first real test. 5 three-mile laps through and around Regent's Park. I'm looking for a time inside 2 hours (so I'll probably need to check my watch some distance before the end.) Of course, telling people you're about to do something stupid is often the first step towards attempting it. If you want to join me, let me know!! And, if you want to listen to my trainer's opinion on the run tomorrow click here.

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I'm being watched!

Tuesday night's run was postponed.

"Come on! What kind of commitment is that?"

I didn't say 'cancelled', I said 'postponed'. I managed to put a ¼ marathon behind me last night in just under 50mins, so back on track. It was very cold, but as the Norwegians say, there's no such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing. If you'd seen me, you'd have thought I'd just rolled a six and was about to attack a block of Cadbury's Dairy Milk with a knife and fork.

Now, much of what I do goes unrecognised, and so it was as I stretched down after the run. The concierge saw me on the security camera and came rushing over from the other end of the building because he thought I was having a fit. I assured him that all was well and later reflected that it was the burglars coming through the windows he should be worried about.

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An ill wind...

Well, the wind has swung round. It was coming from an Oxford direction, now it's coming from a Cambridge direction and that's bad, really bad!

Change of route for tonight's run (last Thursday turned out to be only 5¼ miles.) Not looking forward to it - I hate running!

Oh yes, as part of the deal with running for Breakthrough you get a free biomechanical analysis. This will outline any weaknesses, muscle imbalances or potential causes of injury that I may have. Apparently, I'll get a detailed plan to correct these problems. But do I really need to go all the way to Chiswick for someone to tell me "your legs don't move very quickly and you have the flexibility of an iron girder", "your lack of muscle is perfectly balanced", "running a marathon may cause you an injury" and so "you need to do more training."

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Don't Panic!!!!!!

Okay, so on Wednesday I found out that I had a place in the world's most famous street party (a.k.a. the London Marathon). 11 weeks of training and 2 weeks of tapering isn't quite enough to challenge the leaders but I ran in 2002 and remember the crowd can be quite encouraging. Lots of "keep going Spud" and upon hearing "these are still the real athletes going past" at about 23 miles I nearly fell over laughing. I need to get some training done to get round in a reasonable time - the marathon begins on 22nd April and our second child is due on the 28th - so we'll see how things go over the next couple of months...

Ran for 45 minutes on Thursday night. I'm hoping it was 6 miles - it better not have been less, but I'm refusing to measure it on the map!! Yesterday, went to Hyde Park/Kensington Gardens. Intended to run 3 laps which would have been half distance, but I packed in after 2 laps. I was slowing down anyway and the slight incline up to Hyde Park Corner brought me naturally to a stop just by the tube station. Got home and realised I had a cold. Great!!

Legs feeling pretty weak this morning so it was time for an admin day - filled in the Golden Bond entry form. Still no official acceptance of househusband as an occupation so I'm a '99 - Other'. I've pledged to raise £2500 for Breakthrough Breast Cancer and I'm beginning to think that was a bit foolish. Okay, so I managed £8000 in 2002, but I wasn't a 99 back then.

I know it's a bit early to plan your day, but if you're going to be watching the race on the TV, my number is 34764.

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Does anyone remember this from the summer of 2005?

BBC SPORT Cricket - Ashes 2005 - Fans hail England's Ashes heroes

Australians must be feeling pretty embarrassed about it now. As they moved towards their 5-0 victory one can only assume they were becoming increasing haunted by their defeat in 2005. Did it really happen? In 2000 years time, will anyone actually believe that England beat Australia back then? At least it’s reported on the BBC, so we have a trustworthy record of it.

My suggestion is to have another open-top bus tour, following the route taken in 2005, only this time driving in reverse.