I never gave up, I just took a 3 year vacation!

Sorry to badly paraphrase the Eagles live album which is ingrained on my mind from mid childhood car journeys - thanks mum and dad - but it has been a while since I've needed to blog.

This is because of a lack of marathons for the past three years. I have been running during this time in between rupturing ankle ligaments (for the oldies, that's a sprained ankle) playing football. However, until recently I'd not signed up for another marathon but now I have - the Yorkshire Marathon in York on 20th Oct 2013. This time I'm raising money towards a SPARK sport scholarship. SPARK is run by York St. John University and aims to support students financially through university - no mean feat given the current hike in fees and rising cost of living. You can support the cause by clicking on this link (http://www.justgiving.com/gjowett-YSJU).

To date training is going well. I've been preparing for the Leeds Half Marathon on 12th May. Less than 3 weeks to go now, so I'm off the beer (and any fruity things like wine) and ran just over 15 miles last Sun, along the canal from Leeds Rd Playing Fields - Slaithwaite and back. We did take it pretty steadily 2hrs 25mins but it was good to get some serious miles in the legs. You'll notice the we, rather than I, and this isn't in the royal sense but I've got a training partner. This time Chris Giglia's (mate from school days) also running the marathon as well as Ben his mate from work. I've got to be honest, running with other people is almost like cheating. Having others around you really helps when the legs start to ache and there are still a couple of miles to go. Another psychological strategy I'm employing is switching to km rather than miles on the watch. Completing 1km every 5mins or so rather than 1m every 8mins seems to help so I'm sticking with it.

As part of the training I'm also running the York St. John Fun Run on 2nd May. Only 6k but the proceeds of this also go to the SPARK fund. Places are still available so get involved (http://www.yorksj.ac.uk/alumni/alumni-events/ysj-fun-run.aspx)!

Time for 10k or 6.21 miles for those who can't cope with the km conversion!

Bye for now!