The Year That Didn't Happen - 2015

The New Year

By the start of the new year I was itching to get going and the best way to do that was to book an event. First up the Greystones to Bray 10k cliff run. I signed up with my brother John and friend Ger and was ready to get started. Queue the rocky music. Within days I was back in the gym, going a minimum of 3 days a week. In between gym sessions I was out running again, this time with an emphasis on speed, completing several sub 30 min 5kms. By early February I could see the physical improvements and was getting a real kick out of the work at the gym. When my brother suggested we start running home from work, I said yes without a second thought. We began by running to the Red Cow, a distance of 9km. It is all uphill but neither of us struggled. On the very first run we turned to run up a footbridge and John took off, initially a couple of yards behind, I caught up and we jogged side by side as we reached the top. Buoyed by the speed at which I picked up my fitness I decided to plan my year. Early one morning at work I began booking all the events I wanted to do. The cliff run would be followed by the Connemara adventure race, July is the Clontarf half marathon and it is back to Mayo for the GaelForce West in August. This is going to be some year and I can't wait to get started.

Unfortunately, with my new job came renewed focus and the year never really took off. I did manage to complete the Connemara adventure race and took another stab at the GaelForce West. In the GFW I managed to improve on my time, reducing it from eight and a half hours to just over six. But my training was haphazard and although I was getting fitter, I was not getting faster. By the end of the year I was not happy with my progress and began planning my attack on 2016. I booked six adventure races before the year had even begun and created a training plan that optimistically set out how I would conquer the world, or at least be a bit faster.