Combining these two things can be dangerous. Sometimes it can be positive, sometimes they can be negative. This is the reason I have a trade, am doing an MBA, got engaged, travelled around Spain with my bestie, built a school in Nepal, went to India by myself, taught Engineering, got multiple tattoos and piercings, moved to England, learnt to SCUBA and a variety of other random events in my life.
Recently I signed up to do a half marathon after being inspired by some ultra-fit, awesome people in Nepal to put it on my new years resolutions. This is the latest "Yes, I'll do that... wait ... oh sh*t.." in my life. Up until a few weeks ago 4km was the longest I'd ran since high school. I would classify myself as reasonably fit, but not marathon fit by any means.
For example, I eat McDonalds most days, have an addiction to Coca-Cola, I hardly ever cook or grocery shop, I drink alcohol 6 days a week and do not get 8 hours sleep most nights.
But I do run short distances often and dance all night long at least twice a weekend. Excellent fitness regime!
And this is where the "wait.. oh sh*t.. " comes in. Obviously I needed to step it up a level with longer runs and potentially better food.
I would like to say I stuck to my training schedule like a world class athlete, but alas I did not.
The Hawthorne theory is where by simply monitoring an occurrence you will cause it to improve. So with this in mind I started monitoring my compliance to my running schedule/fitness/drinking habits. I can now say that I achieved a 44% compliance to eating well, a 36% compliance to not drinking excessively and a 50% compliance to my running schedule.
Not a great result. Imagine if Hawthorne wasn't involved!
But I did it!! – I ran the 21.1kms in 2hours, 7seconds and although I struggled every step of the way I’m stoked I did it.
Now for the bombshell… (in my classic “whats next” style)
The morning of my half marathon I received an email saying that my group has been accepted for the Oxfam trailwalker. This is a team race through the bush, over very steep hilly terrain, for 100km.
Yup, 100km.
I'm told it is an ultra marathon...
It’s from the central coast into Sydney and we’ve got a target time of 18hours. 18hours of running/jogging or walking, 18 hours of pain, 18 hours of fun!!
I can’t wait but oh sh*t, what have I got myself into?!
Check out the course here:
http://trailwalker.oxfam.org.au/sydney/trail/
However it is all for charity and this is where you come in. Our goal is to raise $5000 for Oxfam who do amazing work all across the world and make a difference to millions of lives every year. I’m running with a group of architects so donate or check our team here: http://trailwalker.oxfam.org.au/sydney/teams/team/?team_id=12595
The race isn’t until August so I’ll send through progress updates as the time gets closer. I’m also doing a marathon as part of my training in June. Yup, just a training run of 42kms… Oh sh*t.
Not to worry, here comes the stubborn part – bring it on! :)
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