More on Eddie

I've been thinking a lot about Eddie Izzard and the 40+ marathons. It seemed ridiculous, actually, so I dug around on the internet and as ridiculous as it seems, it also seems to be true. That is if you go to his website, here, you'll see loads of details about the runs, complete with comments from people who have joined him on various parts, and there are a few news stories about it and nothing at all about it being a hoax. I checked good ol' Snopes.com but they had nothing at all on it. I recommend checking out his website, actually, as it's interesting to see his running blog (posted by others who are with him on the running tour as far as I can tell) and his log of twitters/tweats/whatever the hell they are.

The marathons are not official races (which should have been obvious but I for some reason thought he had found 40 consecutive events to run in - duh Shifter). He seems to have varied his pace, some days stopping off along the way a lot, others trying to actually run straight through and get a PR. That doesn't really make it any less impressive given that he's not a pro runner and until he did this as far as I can tell wasn't really even a runner. What a marvelous thing to be able to do, really. And it looks like he raised oodles of dough for his cause. He's done now, so here's a belated "Go Eddie!"

My own much less demanding, and much more self-centered, marathon schedule is shifting all over the place (pardon the pun on Shifter's shifting). I had originally intended to do one on 10/2, but didn't get signed up in time, then was going for a different one on 10/10, but that conflicted with a family event, so then was looking at 11/21, but that one I just found out conflicts with my Beloved's work schedule, so now I'm back to the 10/10. Which means I've got 3 weeks to go instead of about 9. Fortunately, I've been training ahead and have 3 20 mile runs done so far. This weekend (tomorrow) will be a short 13 mile run because I have already done 4 days this week, including a 10K race with a friend this am, but next week I'll do a 22 and then have a 2 week taper. Quicker than I had expected, but still doable. I'm not, frankly, as fit as I was before my last marathon and so doubt I'll get a PR, but some time around 4:05 to 4:00 should be doable if weather cooperates. I'll post an update when it happens. I'm kind of proud of myself for not boring everyone with quite so many running posts this time around. I'm sure all the IR's are grateful as well :o)