Its been a postive experience!

My last blog, I’ve not blogged as much as I should have done, so sorry to Murray about that, hopefully the message I have got through my blogs is the positive experience I have had preparing and taking part in the Parish Walk and its definitely given me an appreciation for race walking and ultra-distance walking which the Parish must come under! Just touching on the day not the end result I wanted I must be honest, but on the day getting to Jurby was the best I could do and on reflection I’m happy enough and have learnt from the experience, and hopefully I can get round the full distance in a time I am happy with one day, I will definitely do it again but not until 2017 I am supporting my wife Karen next year who is giving it a go for the second time and in 2017 I may only go to Peel and aim to go further again in 2018 and beyond I have got the bug for the Parish Walk! The day was still really positive the support you get from your fellow competitors and spectators is amazing on par with the London Marathon and much better in some ways because you know so many people! I’ve said it before if you are thinking of taking part in the Parish Walk get signed up in January you won’t regret it. What about Richard Gerrard an amazing performance but I must say if you get round in 14.40 or 24 hours it’s a super human effort and everybody should be really proud of their performances. Also well done everybody – which ever Parish you got to a great effort. The good thing about sport is when things don’t quite work out there is always something else to go for the Lighthouse challenge is only a couple of weeks away and I’ll definitely continue walking ! I’ll sign off there whatever your targets or challenges you have set your yourself best of luck and good health.

Less than 24 hours to go

Less than 24 hours We are nearly there, excitement and nervousness all in one! It still hasn’t really sunk in that I am talking part this year in some ways I still feel like I’ll be doing my normal marshalling slot at Rushen I’m sure that feeling will soon disappear when I am on the start line!! Whatever happens over the next 48 hours the whole walking experience has been a good one and I’m sure I’ll continue walking in the future whether its 5km – 20km events I’m keen to try and improve my times. Although I know most of the walking community through being involved in athletics for nearly 30 years I have met allot of new people who have been really supportive and helpful, if anyone is reading this and is not involved and is thinking about getting involved in walking definitely do it, it’s a great sport. I’m the sort of person who struggles with attention to detail so making sure I have enough food and my support is going to be in the right place at the right time is proving stressful but learning from my Sara Killey experience food and support are crucial to hopefully getting round! Although I haven’t blogged as much as I should I’ve enjoyed writing them and as I started my first blog back in December a big thank you to all the volunteers who will be helping to make this weekend the fantastic event that it is. Best of luck to everyone taking part, hopefully it will be a positive experience!

Nearly there!!

Nearly there!! Well the talking bit is nearly over and the walking bit is nearly there! I’ve had a pretty productive period since my last training blog including a mixture of walks, runs and cycling. I had a very pleasant surprise with a time much faster than what I expected in the Manx Harriers 5km walk, it’s a long time since I’ve had that sort of surprise, running wise for the last 20 years my times have been going in the opposite direction! The speed sessions that I have been doing on the NSC track must be paying off I now have my sights on a 10km on the 16th July which is just under a month after the Parish hopefully I’ll be recovered. I mentioned in my previous blog I had one more long walk planned, I covered the Parish route to Peel plus a couple of extra miles, I left my house at 6am and arrived at Peel Swimming Pool at 1.35pm averaging about 4.5mph. After the Sara Killey I paid more attention to my food and enjoyed a mixture of peanut butter + chocolate sandwiches and energy bars which worked well, however, my legs were pretty sore, hopefully that was due to the hard weeks training I had put in before the long walk. When I arrived at Peel Pool the reality hit me that I wasn’t even half way, so on the 20/21 June the mental battle is going to be key to whether I finish or not! So about 10 days to go not much more I can do now really just try and look after myself the best I can and avoid the temptations of TT Week, junk food and beer! The whole experience has been harder than what I envisaged going back to my decision to take part in the Parish last October I can honestly say I didn’t think the training and preparation would be as hard as it has been I just hope I can now finish it off by getting round the 85 miles next Saturday – fingers crossed. I’ll get one more blog in before the Parish and a final one after – happy training – G