Hello everyone!

Hope you’ve all had a relaxing and peaceful weekend.

Tomorrow, Monday January 23rd, I start my 12-week marathon training program for Boston. I’ve completed writing my own training schedule and it’s all ready to go!

I’m hoping very much that this marathon training cycle goes more smoothly than last year’s for Delaware. At the beginning of that cycle I struggled a little with lower back issues, which were treated successfully by a chiropractor. Things then went great until a couple of weeks before race day, when I started to experience an Achilles tendon niggle in my left ankle. It wasn’t bad enough to stop me training or prevent me from running the marathon, although in hindsight I should have sought the advice of a physical therapist or doctor straight away. I must admit that it was pretty painful after race day, and it took several months to fully heal.

Stupidly I never went to a physical therapist or doctor at all about my Achilles. Looking back, I’m not entirely sure what I was thinking, but I think it might have been the pressure of trying to keep up my mileage for Run the Year 2022. As I always, always say – as a running coach and personal trainer I would NEVER advise a client to run or work out through an injury and not seek medical advice, but sometimes when us coaches are training ourselves these rules go out of the window and the crazy runner mentality wins over the sensible coach / personal trainer mentality. This is something I’m going to try to be much more mindful about going forward, and I will seek (and listen to!) medical advice straight away in future over any running injuries.

Of course, I’m VERY much hoping that this marathon training cycle goes smoothly and that I remain injury-free throughout it and beyond. My training program incorporates strength training, cross-training and rest days and I’m hoping that this will stand me in good stead.

Wishing everyone a great new week ahead!

Lynne.