So, with last week culminating in a hard 21.5 mile run on Sunday evening, I was feeling too stiff and tired on Monday morning to run into work. However, a slow run home in the evening helped to ease out some of the stiffness. Tuesday morning then required a run into work in order to take my laptop home on the tube in the evening for the next day in Oxford. (Weeks like this are as much logistical challenges as anything else.)

On Wednesday, with no chance of the club run and already a good few miles down on where I’d originally planned to be, I opted for a steady 13.5 miles after work through the streets of Oxford. I was running comfortably and fast, with a few slower miles due to lack of streetlights in places and pedestrian congestion. Either way, I was comfortably keeping an average 6:41 per mile. However, after a good strong run a 2-hour drive home is probably less than ideal for preventing muscle stiffness…

Come Thursday, I had a repeat of Tuesday in reverse, catching the tube into work in the morning and running home. The run home was largely steady, with the stiffness working out of my legs over the first couple of miles. I then bumped into my girlfriend at Finsbury Park cycling home from work. We ran/cycled the remaining two miles home, but since she was cycling at a comfortable pace I found myself needing to stretch out my legs and pump hard to keep up. It felt good to push hard and I finished strong.

On Friday – my traditional threshold run day – things didn’t quite go to plan. Lunchtime, when I was planning to run, got swallowed up by a two-hour meeting. Since we had evening plans in town, I needed to get out for my run by leaving work promptly. I think the time of day makes a massive difference to the efficacy of my threshold runs, so this wasn’t ideal. By the end of my first lap of Regent’s Park I’d kept broadly to pace, but didn’t have time for another full lap. I decided to throw in 6 x 100m(ish) sprints up one of the paths in the park, which felt like a decent mini-speedwork session, before heading back to the showers at work.

The final run of my week was 3:15 of long, slow, hilly running around Alexandra Palace, Highgate Wood and Hampstead Heath. The weather was less than ideal – strong winds and pretty constant rain meant that mud and the feeling of pushing to little avail against the not-quite gales became predominant features. Overall, I managed just over 24 miles with 524 metres of elevation gain, with no gels. I finished feeling tired, but surprisingly not with the kind of stiffness and pain that characterised the long runs of my previous marathon training build-ups.

Finally, Sunday was a rest day. Time to load up on complex carbs and proteins to help my muscles recover for the next week’s efforts. Although I only (!) managed 63.5 miles this week, I had seven days without a rest day (during which stretch I ran 85 miles, which is a heavy load for me) and I think it showed. I need to make sure that I’m building in rest days (and sticking to them) to keep fresh. It all comes back to the question of quantity versus quality, and there’s always a temptation for marathon runners to compromise the latter for the former.

In case you haven’t seen it, there was an article in the New York Times about a small study of cross country runners, charting incidences of injury versus heel striking or fore-foot striking. You can read the article here. Naturally, this has been linked to endlessly within the running community online (and I’m just perpetuating that here) and people have started to link this to the barefoot movement.

So, first things first, the barefoot movement follows the principles that runners can gain benefits by running either without shoes or with minimalist shoes – most notably (and commercially successfully) the Vibram Five Fingers, which are like gloves for feet. There’s a common assumption that barefoot/minimalist running can help reduce the chances of injury, and naturally there’s a certain level of interest in injury reduction amongst runners.

Now, the key facts about the study in the New York Times article:

• The study followed 52 runners from the Harvard Cross Country team
• 36 of the 52 were heel strikers
• 16 were forefoot strikers
• Over the course of a year, the heel strikers were more likely to get injured (injured in the study’s definition being something serious enough to make the runner miss a training session)

However, the study didn’t monitor the type of shoe that the runners used. So, the forefoot- and heel-striking groups included a range of footwear, from cushioned to minimalist. What’s piqued runners’ interest is that this small study (note that it’s a very small group, and only one study, so it’s certainly not statistically significant) seems to endorse the fact that heel-strikers get injured more…

… and the implicit connection is that minimalist or barefoot running reinforces a mid-foot strike. Therefore, running barefoot reduces your chances of getting injured. You have to admit it has a certain tempting logic.

But then another small-sample study has been published, which concluded that barefoot runners (for the study, this was runners who had been running barefoot for four or more months) were 1.35 times as likely to get injured as runners wearing traditional running shoes. You can read the study itself here.

The basic facts of the study are as follows:

• It was conducted over a period of 12 weeks and recorded the results of 45 runners
• The runners were separated into shod (wearing conventional shoes), transitioning (fewer than four months in minimalist shoes) or barefoot (running for more than four months in minimalist shoes)

It’s not surprising that the transitioning group was prone to the most injuries – minimalist forces certain changes in gait, which puts more emphasis on the lower legs – but the higher rate of injury for barefoot runners goes contrary to popular expectations. As with the Harvard study, this is a small sample size and the results are yet to be replicated in a separate study, so both need to be taken with a pinch of salt.

So, assuming that the results from these studies are correct – or at least indicative – that means that the best way to reduce your risk of injury is to consciously adapt your running style rather than blame it on the tools of your trade (i.e. your shoes). Although barefoot running offers benefits (building up your lower leg strength gives you a stronger toe-off, which makes you faster), could those same benefits be gained through focusing on footfall? In which case, where does that leave the barefoot running revolution?

Sure, I could break up a long run on Monday, but I’d be carrying a rucksack through crowded central London during rush hour. And although nearly 50 miles in five days of running was okay, few runs had really been at the pace they should have been. Even my Friday tempo effort had only flirted with the speed I’d wanted.

I could either suck it up and mope around on a cold Sunday evening, or I could man up and get out there. Spurred on by a pot of coffee and keen to use some of the pent up energy in my legs, I set out for a run.

With no real plan of how far I was going to run, or how hard, I fell into a comfortable fast pace and set off down The High towards the City. The streets were quiet, there was the slightest spitting of rain, and I was breathing easy with no signs of the lingering cough. I quickly became aware that my Garmin was having a bit of a moment, since it registered a sub-4 minute mile. I was running fast, but not that fast!

I kept on going, keeping an even pace (with the exception of the odd break for crossing roads or navigating through traffic works), turned right and passed the Bank of England, found myself on Embankment, wound out past Westminster and having passed through the lit paths of Battersea Park, I crossed over to Chelsea Embankment and headed back home.

Passing the 15th lap on Garmin (normally that would be 15 miles, but since the readings were a bit out I suspected it was around 13) in 1:28 I consciously slowed the pace to around 7:10 minute miles to save my legs. With the absence of hot water, it made sense to try to run into work and make the most of the showers there.

I arrived home quite late, around 9pm, uncertain of how far I’d really run. I’d always felt in control of the pace, never feeling fully drained, and fully glad that I’d decided to take my long run. A bit of time with Map My Run, comparing notes with Garmin, revealed that I’d run 21.5 miles at just a smidge over 7:00 minute miles (including several minutes spent at traffic lights), putting me pretty much bang on my training target. Pacing and random split points can be found here.

So, Week 7 was actually 71 miles. And with a substantial portion of my longest run clipping along at 6:30, I’m intrigued to see what happens in a couple of weeks time when my long paced run reaches 24 miles along the traffic-free canal paths of North London.

Personally, ice baths aren’t my thing. I like to get back from a run (particularly in the bitter winter) and douse myself in a scalding shower. Then, once I’ve washed off all the grime, I like to have a good sit down in a warm house. You know, really bask in the heat of creature comforts and let the stinging cold of dry winter air fade into my memory.

All of which is a roundabout way of saying I haven’t had my long run this weekend because our hot water and heating has broken. With nightly lows around -5°C and the back garden still sporting a virtually perfect coat of snow from last week’s snowfall, this is typical timing.

Deprived of running, I’m feeling fidgety and moody. I’m all but seeing babies crawling across the ceiling and finding myself idly sucking on pens.

But perhaps a two-day break isn’t such a bad thing for me (he says begrudgingly). Despite not being 100% better just yet, I ran Monday to Friday, clocking up a non-insubstantial 49.5 miles with a combination of commuter runs and a harder lunchtime session on Friday. It’s felt good to be out and running, but I’ve noticed where I don’t have full chest capacity. I’ve also had to be more cautious than I would otherwise have been with patches of ice still hanging around the streets of London.

So, the  last two weeks have been a little off-piste (note snow-related pun), and the next week is going to be slightly more improvised than I’d like since there’s a trip to Oxford bang in the middle. My plan is to double-run on Monday, with the second run of the day taking a significant portion of this week’s missed long run. Wednesday could be an opportunity to clock up a good few miles in the evening around the quieter streets of Oxford before heading back to London. And the long run at the weekend is essential.

Unexpected and unplanned things happen when training for a marathon. It’s happened before, and it’ll happen again. But 10 weeks away from the London Marathon I’m feeling more relaxed about it this year (believe it or not) because I’ve got a B race.

The view from my Sunday run

Anyone who has been following this blog for one of my previous marathon build-ups will know that two things happen without fail: I get ill and it snows. Now I’m hopefully knocking off both those staples in one week’s worth of interrupted training, leaving the remaining two and a half months of build-up before the London Marathon disruption free.

So, this week I’ve not been running much. I ran into work on Monday, and then spent Tuesday and Wednesday in Oxford. With an overnight stay in Oxford, I had planned to make my way down to University Parks before work and knock out a decent speed session. Instead, however, I found myself nursing a sore throat that was threatening to turn into a chesty cough.

I’ve been here before many times, and in the past I’ve typically run until it turns into a cough, and at which point had to back off running until it clears. Inevitably this means a longer stint without training. So this time I was sensible, drugged myself up with Strepsils and Lemsip and let things return to normal.

On Friday I was beginning to feel much better, so opted for a very easy-paced run home to see how I managed. It felt great to be out and about, and the run loosened some of the lurgy that had made its way into my chest. However, I spent the Friday night and Saturday morning with a more limited lung capacity while my body worked hard to clear the rest.

Saturday became a rest day because the lurgy was still hanging round. Ideally I’d have switched in my long run for Saturday since heavy snow was forecast for Saturday night, but it just wasn’t sensible.

We went out for food and a few drinks with some friends in Kings Cross on Saturday night, at which point – true to forecasts – the snow started to fall and settle. And on Sunday morning, North London was very quiet and covered in a good few inches of snow. Since no where I knew around here would be cleared, I decided to shorten my planned run by a considerable margin so I could just get out and see how my recovery was going.

Snowmen and sledges in Springfield Park

There’s something lovely about running in fresh snow, and while I’d originally thought of running just a couple of miles to stretch my legs, I ended up covering just under 9 miles. The Lee Valley was largely quiet – with the exception of the parks, which were filling up with snowmen, and Springfield Park had been turned into a toboggan run – and the snow around Hackney Marshes was virtually untouched.

Running on snow tests you in very different ways from running on tarmac. You have to reduce your stride length, land more carefully and be prepared for your ankle to roll. I find it places more emphasis on my hips and core stability, which contribute to a better running style. So, although it’s not the 3-hour cross-country long run I wanted, it wasn’t a wasted effort by any means.

At the end of this week, I’ve clocked up just 21 miles. I’m feeling a lot better for being sensible about when to run, even if it means that I’ve been frustrated at times by not being able to expend the energy I usually reserve for running. However, marathon running is a long game, and this week should mean I’m able to put in a solid week’s training next week when I’ll be back to full health.

And if you’re into cooing at photos of snow, there are a few more over at the Foot4ward Facebook page…

Channel 4's Fat Fighters, inspiring couch potatoes or shouty super-camp panto?

It’s January and the UK’s TV channels have been falling over themselves to fill lounges across the country with health and fitness programming. Surely this is a good thing since Britain’s on the verge of an obesity epidemic?

Channel 4 kicked off the new season with Fat Fighters, which follows four personal trainers in a London gym as they try to help their clients lose weight over a period of months. The programme consists of three distinct sections:

1. Following the clients trying to get fit from their initial consultation to their final weigh-in
2. Auditions for a new type of workout (from the ‘spare tyre workout’, which involves lugging around a car tyre to the ‘high heel workout’ which involves strutting through an aerobics class in 6-inch heels)
3. An audience participation aerobic workout at the end of the programme

The four personal trainers are at absolute extremes, from the macho body-building champ Matt ‘The Pillar’ Miller and rottweiller-esque Dan ‘Action Man’ Corvett, to former high-jumper and perpetually leotard-clad Della ‘The Diva’ Mikneviciute and former personal trainer of the year and clothes shunner Tamaya ‘The Pussycat’ Adams. Everyone has a costume (Matt must have a massive wardrobe since he insists on ripping his way out of at least one t-shirt each show) and a character from the Spice Girl school of subtlety. Fat Fighters, in case you hadn’t guessed, is for healthy living what Cinderella is for theatre.

Techniques for making progress with clients include shouting at them, taking them shopping for dresses, telling them you’re going to kill them and driving half-way across the country to try to stop them from dropping out when the shouting gets too much. Heaven forbid you let your Gym Box membership slip.

The other primetime ‘health’ programme is The Biggest Loser on ITV. In this series, dieters are teamed up with the objective of losing the most weight week-in-week-out in order to stay on the programme. Three personal trainers work with them to help shift the weight, and like Fat Fighters, each programme follows a set format:

1. A challenge, where the prize for winning is often immunity from eviction
2. Last-chance training, where the contestants slog it out on a rowing machine/elliptical trainer/circuit training course until they vomit/collapse and paramedics are called in
3. The weigh-in, where we see how much they’ve lost

Given that the programme is essentially an hour-long advert for an online weight-loss club and meal replacement shakes, you might assume that it would take a sensible approach to weight loss and give some kind of information about healthy eating and sensible exercise. You would, however, be completely wrong. In fact, it does the opposite.

Week after week we’re confronted with:

• disappointed faces where contestants have only lost 5lb (with no mention that a weekly 2lb weight loss is the maximum recommended for sustainable and sensible dieting)
• challenges where contestants need to eat as close as they can to 500 calories from a buffet table loaded with French Fancies, sausage rolls and pizza, and
• a single exercise session with the implication being that if they really push themselves they can shift extra pounds in a day.

For all its pantomime characters, camp gimmicks and the questionable value of its audience participation workout (which features ‘normal’ people alongside highly toned men and women in their pants), Fat Fighters genuinely gives useful hints for exercising sensibly and even (shock horror) talks about sensible eating. For example, a recent episode featured a woman who lost two stone in her first month, who was promptly taken to task to make sure she was eating enough and not skipping meals. It also featured an anorexic woman who was overcoming an exercise addiction, reintroducing her to sensible exercise alongside healthy eating. (For all Matt ‘The Pillar’ Miller comes across as a shouty beefcake with a propensity to refer to himself in the third person, he handled the reintroduction to exercise very well and sensitively, even shedding some ‘Hulk smash’ tears.)

And yet, despite this, I’m not entirely comfortable with Fat Fighters as a shining paradigm of the kind of programming that’s going to get Britain off its expanding butt. Part of my problem is that the programme is so… well… extreme (although in a different league of extreme from The Biggest Loser). At no point on TV is regular moderate exercise and healthy living seen as normal – you’re either a super-buff muscle mountain who bench presses small elephants and needs the calorific intake of a small country just to make it through the day or you’re a jelly-mould of a human being who doesn’t so much use cutlery as a Generation Game conveyor belt at mealtime.

Granted, as a marathon runner there’s an element in this post of pot and kettle by most people’s standards, and a TV programme about someone exercising moderately and eating sensibly might be a bit dull. But no matter how many New-Year-new-you shows find it to our screens, no amount of gimmicks and contrived scenarios are going to change the fact that the most effective way of getting fit and maintaining a healthy weight is to exercise regularly and eat sensibly. Yet, so long as the mainstream media portrays exercise as an intense and unpleasant experience, the preserve of the outlandish, and weightloss of less than 5lb a week as a failure, the more likely people are to drop their New Year’s resolutions when changes to their body haven’t been immediate.

My first run of the week was on Tuesday, which combined a commuter run with a speedwork session. The run into work was at a relaxed and easy pace, leaving the first couple of miles of the run home to build up speed. True to last week’s plan, the speedwork consisted of pushing full pelt for four lampposts along Embankment, recovering for one and then repeating. Carrying my rucksack and trying to improvise starting and ending points when the lampposts became irregular (around bridges, monuments and piers) probably meant I didn’t get the best out of the session. However, it felt tough and I think it achieved my aim of getting outside of the limited range of gears. These short bursts should have been at sub-6 minute mile pace, which is where I want my threshold run be.

Wednesday saw my first run with the Serpentines this year. My best-laid plans for running their Wednesday 7.2 miles have so far fallen to the wayside, and eventually I’ll reconcile myself with the fact that Wednesdays are bad days for me. The Wednesday group always under-eggs the pace, so while no one stepped forward to run 6:30 miles, there was a decent group of us prepared to run 7:00 miles. We set off and I found myself pushing the pace, taking a few other runners with me. Around Green Park I got talking to one guy who was training for the Paris Half-Marathon, and despite running quite fast (the lighting was pretty poor, so I wasn’t able to check the mile splits as we ran) I felt comfortable and in control of the speed. Coming to a stop at Speaker’s Corner it turned out that we’d been running at 6:27 pace.

Despite a decent cool-down run on Wednesday (I ran back to Euston to catch the tube after jog club), my Achilles tendon in my left foot was feeling very tight on Thursday morning. I decided to take it easy and catch the tube into work and see how I felt about running home later in the day. A day of intermittent stretching and walking on tip-toes later, my heel was feeling much better. I ran home at an easy pace, focusing on my footfall and easing out my tendon.

Fridays are the hardest running days of my week at the moment because I’m trying to pick up the pace of my threshold run. Or at least make my threshold run stand out from the pace of my other runs. The pace of first and last mile and a bit is dictated by road crossings, but the two laps around Regents Park are virtually interruption-free, depending on walkers. This week’s run felt tough, which may have been related to the combination of headwind and chill, despite each mile passing resolutely above the 6-minute mark. And while last week’s threshold run included a 5:59, this week’s splits were more consistent. However, they still need to be faster if the run is going to resemble a threshold in anything but name.

My running week ended on Saturday. With a party in the evening, I wanted to get my long paced run out of the way so I didn’t have to worry about being especially fresh the following morning. My plan was to run 20 miles at an average of 7-minute mile pace. One of the problems I find with long runs is that I tend to set off too fast and pay for it later, so I was determined to try to regulate my pace better than my last long paced run. Although the first mile along the roads up to the Lee Valley passed in 7:01, I didn’t quite keep control of the pace as I wanted. I passed the first few miles trying slow down, but finding that I was clocking each mile at sub-7 by a decent margin. However, I was feeling good, so focused on using my legs more than my arms, keeping my breathing even and landing mid-foot. I’d set off late, so spent the second half of the run chasing the sunset and returned home in the dark. I was thirsty, but didn’t feel ragged and didn’t have the kind of leaden legs that sometimes characterise my long runs, and I’d kept to an average split of 6:49.

Which begs the question: What’s the difference between a threshold run, a tempo run and a long paced run?

Traditionally you wouldn't expect a threshold run, a tempo run and a long run to be at such similar paces

Um, not much… Currently, my threshold runs are around 6:10 per mile, my tempo runs are around 6:26 per mile and my long run was 6:49. This feels like a very narrow band of paces, and given how I felt at the end of my 20-miler this week it’s the threshold and tempo runs that should be faster in pace rather than the long run being slower. (Although my hilly timed long runs are generally around 7:30 pace, which probably makes a bit more sense in this picture.)

I think that my speedwork holds the key to improving the speed of my faster runs, and although it may take time for this to start to make some impact I clearly need to make sure I’m pushing sufficiently hard. This may mean ditching the backpack for the Tuesday repeats, which may only be a minor inconvenience. I may even take to a lunchtime speedwork session to see how that affects things.

Either way, my focus is on running faster rather than fretting over building distance, which is a good place to be when you still have a little over two and a half months to race day.

Colder than the tube, but a whole lot more attractive

I’ve still not fixed the puncture on my bike. Call it laziness, an unwillingness to deal with the horrors of Tottenham Hale Halfords, or perhaps pessimism around the longevity of my inner tubes if you will. However, waking up bright and early on Monday morning it quickly became evident that the recent spell of mild weather had broken.

Both Monday and Tuesday were frosty and ended up being double-run days. With daylight saving time still firmly in place in the UK, I generally have to leave the house around sunrise if I’m going to run into work, have a shower and be at my desk in reasonable time. Cutting through the hilly Finsbury Park gives me a great view of the city in the morning light. I packed my camera on Tuesday to make the most of the early morning frost (although in truth the conditions were prettier on Monday).

In all honesty, I’ve not been doing so well at sticking to the runs I’ve had planned. Monday was due to be a rest day, but ended up clocking in at slightly over 12 miles. Wednesday was meant to be a club run, but became a rest day as it was an ideal opportunity to celebrate the successful start of my girlfriend’s freelance enterprise. Thursday became a speedwork/run home rather than a commuter run. Saturday became a steady 6.5-mile run rather than a 13-mile steady run since a lazy morning and preparatory cooking for a dinner party colluded to mean I set out later than I’d originally planned.

However, I don’t see this as a problem. I’m incorporating the key types of run that I’d planned for, and actually running more than I had originally anticipated at this stage in my plan. I clocked up a total of 72 miles this week, which is a good 15–20 miles more than I’ve run previously during my most intense weeks of marathon training. Having built my base over the winter, I’m able to manage this volume without wearing myself down.

Speed is again the thing that I’m thinking about most. Once the cold snap had passed, the end of the week became increasingly windy. My regular threshold run of two loops round Regent’s Park on a Friday was around the same speed as last week (albeit with one mile ducking just under the 6-minute mark). However, with the strength of headwind (and although you might hope for an equally strong tail wind, the wind was only to my back for a small section of each loop) it felt tough and I was fairly pleased with the run.

I feel like I can probably make better progress if I tweak my speedwork run slightly. First off, speedwork should be on a Tuesday so my legs have a chance to recover for the tempo run on Friday. Secondly, I’ve been using a set of three minutes hard one minute easy repeats, which is good for lactate threshold but not necessarily changing gears. The two options I’m thinking about are:

• Taking a pyramid approach, with one minute moderate, one minute hard, one minute moderate, one minute recovery. A shorter hard section means I can run faster, but the moderate minutes mean that I improve my recovery at speed as moderate should be around marathon pace.
• Sprint repeats. Because my speedwork sessions typically take place along Embankment, I will have to use lampposts to measure the distance of the sprint and jog recovery.

In practice, I have plenty of time to find what works and gets the best results. However, where I’d originally thought to have one speedwork session every two weeks, I now think one session every week will help me get the progress that I want.

All in all, though, I’m feeling good. I managed a 2 hour 50 minute long slow hilly run with no carb gels, and although it was hard work I didn’t feel the energy crash I’ve sometimes felt on long runs before. We’ll see whether I can maintain the energy levels over next week’s 20-mile steady run.

He shouted apologies after me as I rushed past, but I’d pretty much made up my mind about runners who listen to music on the run. They’re oblivious to everyone and everything, I’d thought. My prejudices were reinforced over time by cyclists gunning through rush-hour traffic in central London while taking calls on their iPhone, couples running together but blithely ignoring each other via their iPods, and even one remarkable man cycling down the middle of a road in Seven Sisters using both hands to play with his iPad.

So, when Three very kindly sent me an MP3 player armband to take out on my runs, I was a little skeptical about whether it would help my running or just turn me into a hazard. But, in the name of a balanced opinion, I donned it and my iPod and hit the paths around North London.

My first run was meant to be a relatively easy 10 miles. I headed down the Lee Valley, switched to an up-tempo playlist (which I’ve often used to get me in the mood before a race) and tried to keep a steady pace. It didn’t quite work out like that, though, because I couldn’t hear when my Garmin clocked off another mile, so I couldn’t keep tabs on my pace. Consequently my mile splits were a bit all over the place.

It also took a while to get used to the sensation of hearing my pulse in my ears, grappling with the wires as they got tangled with my arm and replacing my ear buds when they inevitably fell out.

However, with marathon training now kicking in, I’m taking my iPod with me on one run a fortnight: the long, slow timed run. With no real emphasis on pace, just finding hills, following trails and spending time on my feet. Rather than listening to music, I’m listening to podcasts as they’re less likely to interfere with my pace. Unsurprisingly, Marathon Talk with its 90-minute-plus episodes makes ideal running material.

So, here are my top tips for running with audio:

• Loop the headphone cable up your arm and out of the back of your top so the loose end of the cable doesn’t get in the way or get tangled up with your limbs.
• If you’re listening to music, try to pick tunes that are around the same tempo and that are not likely to affect your cadence.
• Create playlists that get you in the mood for running, and make sure your playlist is a good bit longer than your longest run so that you don’t need to fiddle with your MP3 player mid-run.
• Try something like Audiofuel if you’re looking for exercise-specific tracks.

The 2012 Bath Half-marathon has long since sold out. The over-subscribed race forms a perfect pre-marathon build-up race for anyone running the Paris, Brighton or London marathons, and the flat two-lap course makes it ideal for setting a new PB. And if you’re new to the world of 13.1 milers, it’s an ideal introduction with a carnival atmosphere, scenic route and a big and supportive field of runners.

However, it’s not too late to enter the race. Right to Play is a charity that aims to improve the lives of children in some of the most disadvantaged areas of the world by using the power of sport and play for development, health and peace, and they have 10 charity places for this year’s Bath Half.

Right to play do not ask for a minimum amount of fundraising, and runners can apply for the places through the Right to Play website, here.

About Right to Play

Right to Play works closely with many international organisations such as the United Nations, UNICEF, the World Health Organisation as well as community and government organisations at local level.

Once programmes are set up, the organisation trains local young people as coaches to continue the programmes’ reach for long-lasting, sustainable impact in the community.

A team of top athletes from more than 40 countries support Right to Play. As role models, these athletes inspire children and raise awareness about Right to Play internationally. Their aim is to engage key decision-makers from the development, sport, business, media and government sectors and further ensure every child benefits from the positive power of sport and play.

Money raised can make a big difference:

• £5 is what it costs Right to Play to teach a child about malaria, meaning that they are less likely to contract the disease, and they can detect the symptoms in themselves, their family and friends in time to treat the disease.
• For £25 the charity can include a child in their programmes so that they can participate in regular, weekly sport and play activities for a whole year, with long-lasting impact on their lives as they grow up.
• With £120 Right to Play can train a local member of a community to teach Right to Play games. That leader will access hundreds of children in his or her community and ensures that their programmes are long lasting and sustainable.