It’s been almost a week since I signed up for an ultramarathon at 2am after an impromptu drinking session and for some reason I haven’t cancelled my booking. Friends have told me I should postpone it until another year to give myself enough time to train (alongside study and work), among them a personal trainer and an ex-marine.

 

Perhaps that’s why I’m keen to give it a go; being told I can’t do something triggers my resolve and makes me dig my heels in, absolutely determined to do (or at least attempt) whatever silly thing it is. So far it hasn’t proved fatal.

 

Anyway this week I started “training”. I’m reluctant to use that word as it seems too formal and serious, when really I’ve just been running a few times. I looked up 4-month 50-miler training plans, but a) they were aimed at seasoned marathoners, and b) I didn’t like them anyway. So instead I just ran. Maybe I’ll devise a written plan at some point, but for now I’ll focus on putting one foot in front of the other and not dying.

 

After last Saturday’s 13.1 miles, I ran 2.5 miles on Monday (with a friend, otherwise I would have gone further) followed by 10mins barefoot on the treadmill. I’m keen to train my body to run barefoot after reading Christopher McDougall’s Born to Run, but that’ll be another blog post. I did 7 miles on Tuesday followed by 12mins barefoot treadmill, 5 on Wednesday (with another friend) and 9 on Thursday. I probably shouldn’t have run Weds or Thurs because of the blisters on the balls of my feet – from the treadmill, although I’m reluctant to admit it – but I have an addictive personality and I was addicted.

 

Unfortunately yesterday and today I admitted that I should let my feet heal (and my legs rest, although they’re itching to run) before I make them worse, so no running. Somehow one blister has extended to between my big and second toe, where the flip flop strap goes, and has left a sore, red split in the skin. This is super annoying as you’ll rarely catch me in anything other than flip flops or barefoot from April to October. If it wasn’t for that I’d be running now. I hate resting.

 

So far I’ve found that the first couple of miles are easy, the next three-ish are the toughest, then it gets easier again. At the end of each run I thought I could happily carry on, but stopped because I had plans or felt I should go easy on my body to begin with. I’m the most impatient injured person ever to have existed. My breathing has been fine, I’ve had no joint pain and the initial calf soreness seemed to ease after going barefoot on the treadmill, stretching and using a foam roller. I’m being kind to myself by focusing on distance, not pace, and enjoying each run.

 

Blisters on the balls of feet are particularly irritating as plasters don’t do much, seeing as you put pressure on them every time you take a step. I’d never burst a blister running until Thursday’s 9-miler, when I was happily into mile 7 and all of a sudden it felt like my left foot landed on one of those washing machine liquitab things. I didn’t even realise that blister was still there until then, but it was horrible. Would not recommend.

 

We’re coming to the end of a mini heatwave which started on Wednesday, so the 5 and 9-milers were  balmy. The meadows, fields and streams I stumbled through on Thursday’s run were picture-postcard lovely, but I felt like I attracted, inhaled and swallowed enough flies to hit my protein target for at least the next week. At one point I tried and failed to extract one from my eye mid-run, only to come across it later as I attempted to apply mascara on my way to the pub.

 

Another thing I noticed on that run was that when I went exploring and ended up on rocky, rooty, hard mud-ridged narrow paths, it got easier and I got quicker. I was amazed that I’d been struggling a moment before on the smooth road, yet I hit more technical terrain and ran better. I suppose that goes to show how significant the mental aspect of running is – despite considering myself relatively resilient and self-aware, I was sub-consciously focusing on my tired legs until I was forced to concentrate on my footing in order to not break a leg.

 

So that’s where I am with four months to go. I’m hoping to get a run in tomorrow, foot-dependent. In other news, I finished Born to Run and started Eat & Run by Scott Jurek, an ultramarathon legend who featured in the former book, I’ve got a couple more blog posts planned (very loosely, in my head), and today I swam in a cold, dirty river. Uni is boring and I’m still poor.