Painfully slow progress

My mission to run the London Marathon in 2010 (aka operation dancing badger) is stumbling along.

Stumbling, because it's mainly nibbling around the edges of the need to train for a marathon as my knee's still not up to much.

I've been spending most of my time either fiddling with this blog (I'm quietly very proud I managed to edit the html to get three-columns!*) or researching what I should be doing to make sure I make it around this time.

A brilliant book that's been helping me understand more about training and marathon running has been Pete Pfitzinger and Scott Douglas's Advanced Marathoning.

Most people seem to buy it for the schedules at the back (there are 12 , 18 and 24 week plans in there for those prepared to go up to 55, 70 or even more than 70 miles a week), but, as I've got a bit of free time at the mo (physio exercises aren't as time consuming as a run) I've been absorbing as much as I can from the theory behind marathon training.

If, like me, you had to withdraw ill or injured from the London marathon so you have a guaranteed place next year, I strongly recommend giving it a look.

The second chapter on the elements of training is a great eye opener and helps understand why just building up the miles and constantly running at the same pace isn't going to give you the boost you'd like.

It breaks down the characteristics of successful marathoners, and explains how different types of training can improve the ones you can do something about.

On the downside, there is that word "advanced". The book does assume you're already a regular runner - not necessarily a marathoner though - which given the title isn't exactly a rash assumption.

Saying that, I've had two successive winters of training for London, and this has really helped me understand why they haven't worked.

So, thinking ahead to 2010, I can now either:

1. build up training over the summer/autumn so I'm sufficiently prepared for one of their specific schedules for the London Marathon; or
2. use the info to put together my own

As I've not got a lot else to do at the moment, I like to think I'll do the latter. But, I am painfully aware of how I can get distracted and confused, so I fully expect that to go out the window when I realise I haven't done anything like enough research/planning, so I'll just end up grabbing one of theirs to save the effort!

* UPDATE - turns out I'd screwed that up so had to revert to normal. Must properly learn some basic html at some point...
** UPDATE II - may have worked it out. Though possibly not. If you see everything ok with three columns, congrats, if not, my bad!