Paul's London Marathon training diary

Running the London Marathon. One of my bucket list goals. And, after 10 years of ballot woe, I’m finally in.

(No, I didn’t finally get lucky with the ballot; I’m running on behalf of a charity - Tommy’s - more on that in a bit.)

So now the hard work begins and I’ve got 158 days to get marathon fit.

The good news is that I’m not starting from scratch; since we launched Wareable back in 2014 I’ve ran pretty regularly in order to test the vast array of sports watches and fitness trackers that land on our desks.

In 2017 the Wareable team even did the ultra-marathon (100km) Race to the Stones. By ‘did’ I mean we ran a fair bit but also treated it as a massive hike. We finished in around 18 hours and I’d guess we probably ran 40% of it, mostly in the first half.

So I’ve definitely covered the marathon distance before but I’ve also definitely not ran a full marathon distance in one hit.

Plus, I’m 5 years and about 2 stone north of where I was then.

The London Marathon is, without a doubt, going to be the hardest running challenge I’ve ever attempted.

I’ve done a handful of organised half-marathons, but even then I think it’snearly 3 years since I’ve done one of them.

My running now consists of 2-3 runs a week (on a good week); always at least 5k, with a pretty regular 8k thrown in and the odd 10k too.

For context as to how ‘running fit’ I am, I did a 10k last week in 65 minutes. My 10k PB is around 52 minutes and I used to always do them under 55 minutes.

It was a slow, hilly, windy run but still… there’s a lot of work to be done.

That’s where this ‘diary’ comes in. I’m going to document my training journey. I’m doing this for a few reasons.

Obviously, this being a wearable tech website I’m going to look at the best running watches and devices to help me get into shape.

I’m lucky that Wareable has access to the best brands in the sports tech industry - and their teams of data scientists - and I’ll be making the most of those contacts.

We also have a bunch of great contributors who also happen to be elite runners, and I’m planning on tapping into their expertise as well.

I’m also writing it all down because it makes it ‘real’. I can’t just quit if I’ve made a big song and dance about the fact that I’m doing it.

The extra motivation to not publicly shame myself will hopefully mean that I stand on that starting line on 23 April 2023 in the best position to get round those 26.2 miles.

Finally, as mentioned up top, I’m running own behalf of Tommy’s.

So I’m also going to use this diary to raise awareness and, crucially, money for what I think is an incredibly worthy cause.

Read part 2 of my Marathon training diary here

• You can read about Tommy’s and sponsor me right here.