I have a friend who lives life to the max, on a 1-10 scale he is the ‘Spinal Tap’ 11. ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4xgx4k83zzc ) A few months ago he got in touch and described his new health kick using arbonne products. ( https://www.arbonne.com/discoverau/) . Now I’m not endorsing these products just saying, as part of the post, how Gary was transforming his life, and lives of those around them if they liked it or not ! He suggested we went out for a run together so we arranged to meet outside my office and off to Kings Park we trotted. Now Gary is new to the running game and we jogged along at a reasonable pace for the first 5k or so but then the pace slowed as Gary’s cardio fitness started to write cheques for his earlier exuberance. Anyway along the way I mentioned I was hoping to run in my 10th in-a-row Perth City to Surf Marathon in 4 weeks time but was hampered by a bad case of Plantar Fasciitis, which is the end would put an end to my streak unfortunately. On hearing this Gary piped up that he would join me and we would start together at the front of the pack.

Now I have known Gary for many years and when he says he’ll do something he normally does, well actually he always does so I did make an effort to poo-poo his idea citing the old adage of , call me old fashioned, training or is his case , lack of training. He was not for the turning and insisted I help him in his goal. Begrudgingly I agreed as I was worried that he would injure himself or worse ! So of he trotted and started the journey from nothing to marathon ready in 4 weeks. In his corner was his new found devotion to everything arbonne and an unwavering believe in himself and his ability to run a marathon on limited training. Intermittently he would get in touch and ask for advice on his next block of training. He was a keen student albeit a tad out of control, in a nice way, and did everything asked of him and more.

Towards the end of his mammoth 4 week training block he rang me very excited with himself, which if you know Gary is the norm. ! This time though he was even more excited than usual and after he calmed down  he explained that he had just ran 42k in training just to see if he could do it. It was a spur of the moment decision to keep running on his planned 20k Sunday morning long run. When he hit 42k he rang an Uber and then got them to take him to a garage and buy him some nutrition as he had no money on him, only Gary could get away with this trust me ! I then persuaded him to taper after his 3-4 week training adventure and he got to the start of the Perth City to Surf ready for his first marathon with a bib on his chest.

Unfortunately I didn’t make the start line so was unable to see Gary take off like a rocket and head off into the unknown with a big smile on his face which, by the look of the photos below,  was the standard look for the rest of the day.

So how did he do ? Pretty bloody good if you ask me. His splits are things of nightmares though, going through halfway in just over 2 hours and then finishing in 4:39:35, nearly 40 minutes positive split for the second half of the race. Although not ideal, in Gary’s defence, the second half does have more hills compared to the first half but not 40 minutes worth. Looking at the photos though it seems his pace challenges did not dampen his enthusiasm and he was smiling from the start to the finish.

Not deterred after Perth Gary entered the Melbourne marathon and takes it on in just over a week. So two marathons in less than 3 months after starting at zero training kilometres. You’d thought that would be more than enough right, wrong ! Remember what I said at the start of this post about Gary living life at 11, well he has already decided marathons are not challenging enough so has also entered the Bussleton Ironman in December. ( http://ap.ironman.com/triathlon/events/asiapac/ironman/western-australia.aspx#axzz5T8EyTvYC ) Yep, that’s right a full ironman on probably 3 months training, again starting from zero; he only brought a bike last week !! He probably can’t swim. You really have got to admire his tenacity and the reason I know he’ll complete the Ironman, and also smash Melbourne next week, is because mentally he is so strong and his attitude , in my view, is worth months of training for ‘normal‘ people, i.e. people who live life on a scale of 1 -10 .

The point of this post is never underestimate a good mental attitude when it comes to sport, personally I feel it is over looked by so many people. You have to believe you can achieve your goal and see yourself doing it in your mind pre-event. Of course there needs to be that feeling of trepidation as well as you can’t be over confident, that leads to a fall apparently ? It’s getting the right balance between nerves and confidence, both are needed for you to perform at your best. Of course I’m more of an old fashioned athlete preferring to trust in my training (one of my mantra’s) as well as concentrating on the mental toughness you need to succeed.

Finally as I have said many times the actual event itself is the fun part of all your training. Everything that has gone before is for that time you creep up to the start line, bib on your chest and look forward into the unknown that is the race before you. Tell yourself ‘this is why I get up early in the morning, push myself in training and sacrifice so much time and energy, this is why I do what I do and today it will be all worthwhile, today is my day’……