Well, Sunday 11th March finally arrived marking the day of my attempted world record of the "Fastest Half Marathon dressed as a Nurse (Female)"  All I had to do was run 13.1 miles, dressed in a nurses uniform in under 2 hours! Simples!  Hmmmmmm.......

As usual the pre race nerves kicked in....even worse than normal as this time I couldnt just blend into insignificance as I was going to look like a blimmin LOONY!  Lucky for me everyone at the Friends of Mick and Phil Half Marathon were absolutely wonderful!  I had some great "nurse quips" along the 13.1 mile course, lots of smiles and lots of encouragement.  I would recommend this race to anyone, such a great atmosphere :D  

I set off rather quickly and had to "calm this shit down whitlock" and get into a nice rhythm before I blew up! So I settled down to a 8:30 min/mile thinking that would give me a bit of bunce towards the end of the race.  I did start to tire towards the end but apart from one mile I managed to keep under 9mins/mile and averaged 8:38 mins/mile over the whole run!  Which gave me a finish time of.......
1:53:53
WOOOOOHOOOOOOO!!! WELL IN!

Full results of the winners are on the GUESS THE FINISHING TIME page

So now All I need to do is collate all the Evidence of the run and send off to the Guinness World Records and hopefully before long I will have Official Confirmation that Myton Nurses are the best in the world!  Well the fastest anyway lol!

BIG Thankyou to the Race Directors, Tess and Noel who were so encouraging and provided witness statements :D

Well my JUST GIVING PAGE stands at 95% right now and I have yet to add the Nuneaton Ropewalk Collection of £417.00!!  So that will take me over my target which is very exciting!!  But id like to carry on and raise as much money as I can so if you havent donated yet please consider taking part in my GUESS THE FINISHING TIME competition for the Marathon!  For just £1.00 you could win some amazing prizes!
Another big SHOUT OUT to Mark at Sporting Touch, Nuneaton for printing my Nurses Tunic ready for the race on Sunday!  It looks BRILLIANT! :D

Well this was "RACE WEEK" so the training was cut right down in preparation for the Half Marathon on Sunday.....

Tuesday:
6 miles tempo run in 51:24 at a pace of 8:27 mins/mile
not a bad run and was quite pleased with the sustained effort.

Wednesday:
Hill Repeats! 4 x hill intervals, jog down recovery.  Sick making!

And that is it until Sunday! 3 full days rest!

This was the weekend of the Nuneaton Ropewalk Fundraiser and we had a great time!  I cycled for 6 hours and ended up with a numb bum!  My crazy family and friends came and supported me and danced around in a bear suit and shook tins.......and we raised......£417.03!!
How amazing is that!  So THANKYOU people of NUNEATON!!!  YOU ROCK! :D

Plus we got the printed cycle shirts just in time for the day and very smart they looked too!  So a BIG SHOUT OUT to.....
Sporting Touch for the Printing 
Horeston Metals
Charlies Hair Design 
Showerdoor Rollers for the sponsoring :)

Another hard week but actually felt a bit stronger this week so maybe I broke through the plateau!! Hope so!

Monday
REST! and a SPORTS MASSAGE with Nuneaton Sports Injuries - wonderful!

Tuesday:
Long Run - 17.5 miles at a pace of 9:14mins/mile which was a big improvement on last week and I felt a lot stronger in the last few miles than last week so that was encouraging!  GOt home, Ice showered my legs (Oooooooof!) and did some stretching.

Wednesday:
REST!  Well core and stretching but essentially rest!

Thursday:
Cycled to work and back - 15miles there and 22 back.  Average of 13.5 - 14mph which isnt bad on Claud!  I really did feel tired when I got home though but was pleased with best part of 40miles in the bag ;o)

Friday:
INtervals!!  4 x 5min sprints with 1 min recoveries.  Best Interval was 7:43mins/mile, slowest was 8:08 so Not bad!  Recoveries were around the 9:15-9:30 mins/mile but Id prefer to see a bigger spike inbetween the intervals and the recovery!  That means faster sprinting!

Saturday:
6 hours on the Turbo in the Nuneaton Ropewalk shopping Centre!  Was worth it as we raised a fantastic amount but my bum was numb by the finish!

Sunday:
The weather was DIRE! But I made up my mind I wanted to cycle so me and one other lunatic "Wheeler" set out on a wet and wild 35 miler!  Not before I had to swap from Gerard to Claud due to a flat tyre!  Made me realise how much heavier Claud is than the milano as I was getting unceremoniously dumped on the hills!  Still it made me work hard and as the ride was only short it wasnt a bad thing!  Was damn FREEZIN when I got home but very smug in the afternoon that I had gone and done something productive :D 

Ive just noticed.....Donations stand at.....£1477.48!!  The minimum amount I have to raise to take part in the Bike Challenge is £1450.00....SOOOOOO!!!  Ive MADE IT!  I am actually going to be cycling the mountain you can see in the video!  OH DEAR GOD!!!

THANKYOU to everyone who has donated so far and I hope people will continue to support me so I can reach my personal target of £2000.00 :D  although lets not stop there hey!  The only limit is you guys! ;o)

On a lighter note I am in possesion of my Nurses Tunic all ready for next weeks run!!  As if running a half marathon is not crazy enough I can categorically say that I am going to look like a blimmin lunatic in this get up hahaha!  So please if you havent already.....make a donation and GUESS MY FINISHING TIME!  You never know....you could get lucky!

And from the sublime to the ridiculous....I think I got a bit overexcited by the sunny day today and decided Id cycle home in my shorts!  Well after 20 mins I had to stop and stick my legwarmers back on lol!  It might be nice in the day but it still gets chilly quite quickly in the evening.....shorts!!! Hmmmmm we are not quite there yet lol!

Donations still continue to trickle in!  THANKYOU KINDLY PEOPLE! :D
Id still appreciate everyone sharing my blog / facebook page to help spread the word.....
The 1/2 Marathon is looming so only a couple of weeks to get your predicted finishing time in for the "Guess the Finishing Time" Competition! so come along people.... ;o)
I have finally heard from the Guinness book of world records about the time required to break the record for the Fastest Half Marathon dressed as a nurse!  2hours!  Im in with a chance!  I need to be able to find some "independent Witnesses" for the day though to sign a statement that I did indeed run the race!  So if you know anyone from a running club or such like who may be interested in helping me, please let me know :o)
And if this is not enough to be getting on with.....I am cycling in Nuneaton Ropewalk on Saturday 3rd March!  PHEW!!!

Starting to up the anti now.....races are looming! ARGH!

Monday....Day of rest!

Tuesday
Long Run - 18 miles in 2hrs 52.  Pace 9.30 mins/mile which I guess is not too bad over this distance but nowhere near a 4 hour marathon!  But I felt much better than last week. Felt good up until about mile 14 then got very tired and my pace per mile slowed drastically!  But I guess the only way to solve this is continued long runs!  Great! lol!

On Saturday March 3rd we will be descending on the Nuneaton Ropewalk along with Gerard, Turbo Trainer, Monty Bear and some lovely volunteer tin shakers.  So while I get busy cycling and burning LBS.....it would be great if you guys could shed some £'s!! haha!
It would be great to see you there so please come along and say helllloooooo :o)
We will have entry forms so if you make a donation please dont forget to have a guess at my Half Marathon / Full marathon finishing time!  Who knows, you could be a winner! :D

Tuesday:
Cycled to work!  Went the direct way on the way there and felt pretty darn good and made good time :)  On the way home I did the slightly longer route and although a bit slower it was against the wind....Ooooof!
Total of 21 miles done today.
Wednesday:
Spinning! Another fast paced interval session working on endurance to start with as if you were climbing a hill then moving onto sprints.  Hard work!
Thursday:
Long Run! 15 miles in 2hrs 23 mins giving an average pace of 9:28 mins/mile.  I have to say I was very dissapointed with the run.  Its the slowest I have run for a good while and although I cant be running full throttle on every run I did want my "easy" runs to be around the 9:10 min/mile mark.  And it felt HARD!!!  Really struggled today, no endorphin high and I was a misery guts when I finished!  Plus I dont mind admitting the thought of running the marathon after this performance has really scared the shit out of me! :o(  I persevered with the Ice Bath and froze my sorry ass off! Then massaged my legs.  I have to say that this is definitely helping the recovery process so I shall reluctantly continue with the ffffffrrrrrrreeeeeeezin water!  Oh yes, I am having my SIS Recovery shakes too that I got left over from the bike challenge last year.  Its all working well.  Shame my legs arent! lol
Saturday:
5 hours cycling on the turbo trainer in the shopping centre!  I did try and mix it up a bit by standing / sitting / high / low resistance......last hour was hard going both physically and mentally.  Its definately easier when you cycle for real!  At least the scenery takes your mind off it a bit!  Numb Bum saturday eve!
Sunday:
Hill Repeats...........OOOOOOOF!!!  That kinda sums it up!  Did just over 1.5 mile to warm up then did six X hill repeats approx 1.3 min up with a 2 min recovery jog back down.  Worked really hard and thought I was gonna hurl after number 6!  Intervals ranged from 8.06 mins/mile to 8.17mins per mile.  Not bad up quite a steep hill :)

If im gonna sum the week up - Id say slightly below par.  Felt quite tired.