Abbeyfords In The Community

Barry's March Training Update

Hi All,

I thought I’d increase the frequency of the updates now the countdown to the big day has begun. The marathon is 5 weeks on Sunday, with about 3 and a half weeks of serious training to do. I’ll be glad once I complete that last long training run towards the end of March.

Last week I increased the training during the week and managed two runs, 10 miles on Tuesday and 11 on Thursday in preparation for an attempt at 17 miles on Sunday.

My trusty training partner, Andy, over did his training the night before (I think he must have done about 20 stellas, - yes really he probably did!). Unsurprisingly I received a text from him at about 11:30am on the morning of the run to tell be that he didn’t feel
too good. My response to him was “Tough, see you at half one!” to which his reply was
not too nice; I had to point out that you don’t spell twit like that!!

Anyway, undeterred I arrived at Andy’s at the normal time to be greeted with the sad sight of Andy, slumped in the chair nursing his head. After a short delay while he went to speak down the big white telephone and he donned his padded shorts, we set out from Halewood to Hunts Cross, Woolton, Allerton (by this time Andy started to feel
better), Sefton Park, Wavertree, back through Childwall, Woolton (by this time I felt a lot worse), back via Hunts Cross and back to Andy’s! 2hrs and 34 minutes later we had done 17.12 miles!! The additional training had done the trick. Although tired we made it. We celebrated in the usual manner, bottle of the finest stella for Andy, fruit-based lucozade for me, as Al Murray would describe it!

Andy quite liked the Sefton Park area, where there were a few more runners of the female variety wearing lycra, so he’s suggested 2 laps there next weekend on the basis that it’s safer than on the streets!!!! Well, I guess I’ll have to oblige and suffer…. What a friend I am.

Yesterday, I did an hour run to loosen up and tomorrow will do an 11 miler in preparation for an attempt at 18 miles on Sunday.

On the fundraising front Liz and the Abbeyfords team have done a sterling job. The date for bag packing at Morrisons has been set for Sunday 30th March. Let me know if you would like to volunteer, am or pm slots available. Some fantastic prizes have been donated by local businesses for the raffle, including 26” HD-ready LCD TV, Apple Ipod
Nano, Panasonic DVD player plus lots, lots more! Cronton school are going to distribute these tickets to all families in the school but if you would like to buy or sell some raffle tickets let me know and I’ll arrange to get them over to you, they are £5 for a book of 5, the draw will take place in a local meeting place (the pub) the week after the marathon.

Liz has been fantastic, she is due to give birth in the next week or so and has still managed to organise all this. Thanks a million, I’m looking forward to buying you a few wines!

In addition on the publicity front, the press release that Liz put together has caught the interest of the Widnes World local newspaper; hopefully I will be meeting with them shortly to gain some local coverage.