The middle: A goal is set

So the bug had struck, I was enjoying my runs much to my own disbelief, my weight was dropping and my stress levels were down. I really was beginning to see all the oft mentioned benefits of exercise and a healthy diet, what's more I wanted to take it further. I discovered the Phedipidations podcast, a podcast that deals with different aspects of
running each episode and is in equal parts serious and light hearted but has a general tone of good humor that I really enjoyed. Though Phedip I discovered the Worlwide Half Marathon Challenge (a virtual race) and at the time I thought that 21Km would be pretty much beyond me. About a week after hearing about the WWHM I saw an article in the Runners World magazine that was examining setting goals and looking at the best training to meet that goal. Well next to the goal for Weight Loss the article recommended that you train for the Half Marathon distance. Things were falling into place. On a whim I checked up on the dates for the Melbourne Marathon and sure enough the MM date was the same date as the WWHM and from that point I was pretty much sold on the idea.

The training plan was set up giving me plenty of time to train, 5 months and I had already got myself up to 30 minute / 5km stretches so I really could see that this goal might actually be achievable. I started to extend out my long runs, keeping my week day runs at around 30 mins. 6 Km on Sunday became 7Km, I had a go at the Galloway Run/Walk method and stretched out to 8km and was really enjoying myself. I guess now, looking back at it, I should have worked out what was going to happen, I had steadily been increasing training since the start of Feb, coming off
a pretty low fitness base and I had not had a break or rest in a bit over 3 months.

I got hurt.

Next: Disaster strikes, Rehabilitation