Well, that didn’t go to plan. I needed 71:30 for a London Marathon Championship start and ran 1:14:37, and the honest version is my legs just went at mile 8. New video’s up now if you want the full story, including the bit where I’m stood on the start line with tingling lips from a caffeine shot that probably wasn’t my best decision of the morning.

Back on the same Cheshire roads where I set my 5K PB a fortnight ago, so it’s not like the course let me down. I went through halfway bang on pace, then there was nothing there. Could’ve been the humidity, could’ve been the caffeine, could’ve been a heart rate of 145 on the warm up before I’d even started. Probably all three doing their bit. I go through it all in the video, mile by mile, because I think there’s more value in showing you when it goes wrong than pretending it never does.

Here’s the thing that’s keeping it in perspective for me. I went from 2019 to 2024 without a single PB at any distance. Five years. Then I ran 2:24:35 at London. So one bad half marathon in a field in Cheshire isn’t a verdict on where I’m at, it’s just a bad half marathon in a field in Cheshire. I talk in the video about whether I’m actually better than I was two years ago, and what my heart rate numbers were really telling me, because it’s not always as simple as “I blew up, therefore I’m not fit.”

You’re not a runner if you’ve not blown up at some point, and I’d rather film it and talk through it honestly than cut it from the channel. Twelve weeks to Valencia now, so this is very much part of the build, not the end of it. Go watch the full thing, there’s more in there about what actually happened at mile 8 and what changes from here. Just keep running.

---

New videos go up on the channel regularly. Subscribe so you don’t miss the next one.