collo.me.uk - Graham's stuff

SKRUM has now visited over 300 schools in Swaziland and continues to grow.  Due to work commitments I recently had to step down as a trustee but will continue to give as much time as I can to this excellent project.

I recently became trustee of a new UK charity working in Swaziland.  Swaziland has the worst hiv/aids infection rate in the world with life expectancy of around 38 years.  The charity SKRUM is using the sport of rugby to bring people together and to educate young people about hiv/aids and is also working in conjunction with other non govermental organisations in the country (such as Swaziland Action Group Against Abuse SWAGGA).  The charity has already visited and signed up 100 schools to the program.  There's loads

I really was not looking forward to this event. Having done it last year I knew how much the hills take out of you so I was dreading the long climbs towards the end. I'd done much more training this year so I just kept trying to tell myself this year was going to be different. I could do it this year. And none of that being ill afterwards!
We got out to the start nice and early and met up with the two brothers willing to take on the challenge again this year - Richard and Matthew (David was away in Las Vegas for someone's wedding or something). Richard was starting up near the front somewhere due to his decent performance last year, I was starting near the back somewhere due to being a plodder and Matthew had somehow blagged a mid field starting spot.

This Sunday was the Great Wales Run. The course was 10k around the Cardiff bay area and was mostly flat apart from a 50 metre climb over about half a kilometre. Somehow I managed to average under 6 minutes a kilometre and finished the course in a personal Best of 56 minutes 44 seconds, finishing in 1300th place out of around 3000 people. I've shaved almost 4 minutes off my previous 10k time from 2 weeks ago.
Back to training for the great north run again now.

Ran the Capital run today in Hyde Park. Felt pretty good. Ran with my brother Matthew most of the way round but he seemed to find a bit of extra energy after the 9k mark and legged it! Finished in 1 hour 13 by my watch. Doubt the official timing will be any less. Will have to push a bit in Cardiff in two weeks to get the time under 1 hour.

... until next year that is!
I'm a little disappointed with myself as I didn't manage to run all the way. But I completed the course in about 2 hours 25 minutes, better than I thought I'd manage when I originally took on the challenge but not as good as I hoped I might manage after all these weeks of training. It turns out that the hills were much worse than I thought they would be and I'm not nearly fit enough to tackle the full course in one go. Even with the four or five walks I took I still ended up well and truly shattered by the end of the course. Something everyone with me got to share in as my stomach decided to empty itself all over the floor. Yep something disagreed with me - it was either all the running or the lucozade sport or a combination of the two. Nevermind I felt much better after that and scoffed down an after run snack and we joined the queue of traffic to leave the finish line.

Well, I've done my last training session tonight. There is nothing else now between me and the Great North Run. My left shin was a little painful but I ran through it and by 30 minutes it wasn't anything to worry about. Just need to sort out my music mix now and I'm ready to go!