2020 - How I used the pandemic
Going into 2020 I was ready to have a great year, race wise.
After finishing the Alpha Wolf the previous year, I really wanted to push myself. In total I had 10 races in the calendar and was ready to go.
We all know what happened that year and I know we all found it hard for a lot of reasons. What I want to focus on is the positive I was able to take from that year.
When the first lockdown was announced, and it became clear that no races would be happening for the foreseeable future, I decided to jump on the virtual race band wagon that was going on.
This enabled me to constantly have something to keep my motivation up and keep on training. To begin with, these challenges were to run the same distance as the postponed races, but, as the year went on, they got a lot harder.
In May of 2020, I ran my first ever half marathon. July saw me accumulate the height of Mount Everest over the month. And August was my first marathon and had my son waiting for me at the finish line. Still the best finish line I’ve ever crossed!
I also used the time to really research training. I read everything I could find online about how to structure training. What types of sessions promoted the best responses. In short, and unknowingly, I’d started my journey to become a coach.
2020 was also the year that I started to connect with people via social media who shared my new found passion for running and training. I’m pleased to say that a lot of these people I now class as good friends. To me, this shows one of the positive sides of social media and the pandemic (if that’s possible).
In October of 2020, I was finally able to take part in a proper, in-person race. Whilst it didn’t have the normal feel, with staggered starts and social distancing it was great to get out on a course. Amazingly, I was the first person to complete the race (personally, I don’t class this as a win as it wasn’t chip timed). For someone who had next to no athletics background apart from playing football occasionally, this was a massive achievement.
As the year drew to a close, I continued to train consistently and finished the year having ran over 1000 miles.