What a difference 42064.8 metres makes

What's the ultimate running distance, the ultimate word related to running,the ultimate goal, the most famous of all distances?

I would say the 'marathon'.

The biggest race with the biggest race day crowds, that brings thousands and thousands of spectators to the city streets.

Everyone can name the fastest man over 100m, but how many out there can name the worlds fastest man over the most famous distance of them all?

The world record holder for the 100m has 3.5 million followers on Twitter.

The fastest man in the world to run the famous 26.2 miles has just 2300 followers.

The wonderful world of sponsorship and celebrity!

Running rant # 2 - The price of races

I haven't done a 'Running rant' since the ill fated 'Ultrarunning' post (which didn't go down well at all if you recall). I don't regret that piece, what with freedom of speech, having an opinion and all that malarkey!!! It's just a shame I lost a lot of longterm ultrarunning Twitter followers in the process whom I communicated with and always congratulated them on their achievements even if I didn't agree with the distances they were putting themselves through physically and mentally.

*takes a deep breath*

Anyway......

Hopefully this is a rant everyone will agree on....THE PRICES OF RACES THESE DAYS @!!?**#¥!!!!

*takes another deep breath*

I haven't competed in a race since September 2013 and the Loch Ness marathon, so I decided to look at running a half marathon in the spring/summer. 

The Surrey half, a nice local race in Woking, taking place for its second year.

It's a half marathon remember and the price for entering the London marathon this year, one of the worlds major marathons was a very reasonable £35 for 26.2 miles. 

Now I understand the pricing for street closures, police etc etc, so that's £35 for shutting down the Capital of England. Woking is a Surrey town...the price?...£41...yes 41 flipping sterling pounds for running a half bloody marathon!!!

The Hackney half marathon.......£44!!!.....$$$

Over the last few years there has been the introduction of chip timing, which I'm sure most people agree has been a positive for racing and I can understand that this has had an impact on the race fee, but there's not many races that aren't chip timed anymore, so why still so much variation between the prices of races of the same distance?

Has running become a victim of its own success? The number of people running has continued to rise year after year. More people running, more opportunities for people to make money. 

Here is a selection of races coming up, I've separated them into 'Daylight Robbery' for races around the £30 mark and above and 'Bargain Buys' for £25 and below which I think is a reasonable price.

Thank God for Parkruns.....Running for free and funded by sponsorship.....hang on a minute, don't most races make money out of sponsorship as well as charging us!!!

Daylight Robbery

Surrey Half - £41

Hackney Half £44

North London Half - £42

Brighton Half - £34

Bournemouth Half - £31.57

Robin Hood Half (Nottingham) - £29.75

Northampton Half - £29.40

Llanelli Waterside Half - £30

Bargain Buys

Fleet Half - £23

Stafford Half - £22

Yeovil Half - £22

Chippenham Half - £22

Farnham Pilgrims Half - £25

Roding Valley Half -£22

Goals

I go into this year injury free, coming off the back of a runstreak at the end of last year, I'm in relatively good shape, a few pounds overweight but the best I've come into a new year for a while.

So what now for 2015? Well im quite enjoying the daily routine at the moment which consists of running generally about 4 miles most days. The thing I'm most enjoying though is mixing up the training, doing fartleks, throwing in some hills, running at low intensity. This has mostly come off the back of the runstreak.

If you're running everyday, you are forced to vary your running. You cant go out everyday running at full tilt, so most the time I was paying a lot of attention to my heartrate and keeping it low.

Now with taking 1 or 2 days off a week I can speed things up again and learn from my heartrate stats when I need to rest or slow down.

Im not missing marathon training, I'm quite enjoying the shorter distances I'm training at. This is the first winter I havent done my 13 mile run to work every Friday, getting up at 5am and running in what ever conditions the weather throws at you, and I've done them runs in every type of weather you can think off!!!

So back to goal setting for 2015. Marathon's are off the radar this year (but never say never!) During spring I would like to get back to half marathon fitness, getting my Friday run to work back and then throw a couple of half marathon races in late summer.

To be honest though after the last couple of years I've had with my ankle and achilles just being able to run again regulary, is goal in its self that I've achieved.

Did you know...

Note:

1,022 runners were randomly selected, and asked a series of questions about their running habits. The survey targeted male and females (50:50 ratio) between the ages of 25-50 years old, who all run at least once a week. 

#TomTom