Anyway, I’ve decided to give it a go again this year, however after my dedication and hard work last January I’ve decided that this year it will be less of a challenge for me as I won’t be blogging every day.  Last year it was ‘won’ by only those who are basically elite-ish type runners that can put in serious mileage.  I’ve been assured that there is no winner this year but it has still tainted it for me as there was not a ‘level playing field’ previously.

Don’t get me wrong, I do like Janathon and Juneathon and how they help to motivate people and create a sense of community between fellow runners from around the world.  Everyone supports each other and helps keep you going; and that’s great.  So, I will be spending January doing as much running/exercise as I can for my own personal goals and supporting those who are also taking part so they can achieve their own personal goals.

Another reason I won’t be killing myself to complete 31 days of running this month is simply  because it isn’t possible this year due to my work and family commitments.  Instead, I have other goals in mind which will bring me up to the Reading Half Marathon on 1st April 2012.

Goal 1:  Lose 1 stone (14 lbs) by 12th Feb

Goal 2:  Lose a further 1 stone (14 lbs) by 25th March

Goal 3:  Complete Reading Half Marathon in under 2 hours

Now, I’m not promising to complete all of those goals but I am certainly going to do my best to achieve them.  I mean, I lost over a stone in the run up to Xmas (sure I put about 9 lbs back on eating turkey etc) and I’m confident that I’ll be able to do it.

Finally, I’d like to take this opportunity to wish all of you taking part in Janathon the best of luck and I hope you achieve whatever goals you’ve set for yourself.  I’m sure with the support of your fellow Janathoners and a smidgen of pure willpower you’ll do it.  Keep up the good work!

I haven’t been writing, running or doing much of anything I’m afraid.  I’ve lost so much motivation that it was difficult to climb out of the pit I was eating myself in to.  Honestly, I think the slow crumbling of my motivation began after all my training for a full marathon and then not being able to do it when I got ill.  It really got me down and I haven’t really been the same since. If you top that up with some laziness then there you have it; a recipe for weight gain.

The past couple of months I’ve been trying to get out of the rut and I had a ‘trigger’ the other day whilst at work in our London office.  A colleague of mine (Dave) was trying to get healthy too so I decided to make a small wager with him.

Whoever loses the most weight by 14th December 2011 gets £2 from the loser for every 1 lb the winner has lost (i.e. 1 stone = £28).

It was a great nudge for me and I’ve been running most days and watching what I eat.  I’ve also been utilising an app that I have used in the past called MyFitnessPal and it’s quite handy.

Ideally I want to get down to 200 lbs or less and I’m going to try hard.

Well, wish me luck everyone!  I’ll try and stop by here a bit more often.  This weekend I’ve got my long run tomorrow (Sat) and I’m off to Wembley on Sunday evening to watch the Tampa Bay Buccaneers v the Chicago Bears.  Should be good!

My bracelet (picture shown) arrived on 12th April and I’ve been wearing day and night ever since!

According to their website, the bracelets and other products available are ‘designed to balance the body’s magnetic and electrical fields, Trion:Z combines the therapeutic properties of magnets and negative ions, bringing you the most powerful complementary health product on the market today.‘

Some of the reasons people might purchase these ‘magnet therapy’ products is for general health & wellbeing, pain relief, better performance in physical activity or relief of stress. They also claim that 89% of 200 consumers surveyed experienced a ‘noticeable difference’ whilst wearing it.

Now if you do a Google search on ‘magnet therapy’ or ‘magnets for health’ you’ll see a lot of sites selling products, a lot of sites stating that magnet therapy is not actually proven to work and many other sites claiming it does.  As for ‘negative ions’, again the research is a bit iffy but there are researchers claiming that negative ions help to increase mood and improve health.

However, figures don’t lie.  According to Wikipedia, the annual sales of magnet therapy products exceeds 1 billion dollars a year.  So, regardless what research may say about the effects of magnet therapy, it doesn’t seem to stop lots of people going out and purchasing the products.  Like their website claims, 89% of people experienced a difference whilst wearing the product.  That’s a lot!

Now, how do I feel since wearing the bracelet?  Has it had any effect on my running?  My mood?  It’s hard to explain, but the simple answer is: yes.  I can’t explain it but since wearing this bracelet I feel as though my mood has improved.  Also, my running has been suffering quite a lot lately (mainly due to a lack of running!) but wearing this bracelet has made those painful runs (all of them!) feel better.  This is a fantastic product that looks great and feels great and I have no intention of ever removing this bracelet and I certainly recommend that you all give it a try.

With such a wide selection of colours and styles available, you’ll find the right one for you.

If you want to find out more about Trion:Z you can visit their website at:  www.trionz.co.uk.

I’m happy to report that by posting this to my blog that I have fully competed Janathon. God I’m good. And so are all the others that have taken part. We’re all freaking amazing!

That’s it for now. Short and sweet. Plus, I’m writing this on my iPhone and I can’t be bothered to write anymore.

Distance covered today: 1.60km
Total for Janathon: 192.14km

YEAH BABY! TAKE THAT JANATHON YOU TYRANT!!

Not much to report today I’m afraid.  Got up with the monster this morning and then after Mummy got up I went off to do my long run.  I managed over 15km this time and it was pretty good.  My legs are feeling it still though.  After the run I called my daughter and got her up and made her come with me for coffee.  I went home and picked up my son first and then we went to meet her and go to Costa.  Very nice sitting there with them both and drinking yummy latte.  Tastes even better after a long run.

I quick visit to the supermarket and then it was home to have a roast chicken dinner and chill out with the family until wifey had to shoot off to work.  Whilst she was at work my son and I ventured outside to clear out the carport as a man is coming tomorrow to tear it down and to start rebuilding another one.  I cleared out the carport (filled with junk) whilst my son pushed a wheelbarrow all over the garden.

Now, it’s a bath and bed for him and dishes and tidying for daddy before sitting down in front of the tv.

Tomorrow, 10 mins (1 mile) of running and then I’m off to London for a day-long conference.

• Distance Covered Today:  15.28km
• Total for the Month:  190.54km

After the walk it was a quick bath and then my son and I went off to the cinema to watch Tangled.  My son is only 4 but he is very good at the movies and I’ve been taking him since he was 3.  He just sits and watches the whole movie and never causes any problems at all.  What a good boy.

We got in to Reading and went to Starbucks first so Daddy could have a latte and my son had hot chocolate and a cake donut.  After that it was in to the cinema, getting the tickets and then buying some sweets for my little monster.  As for the film, I think it was really funny.  I quite like a lot of the computer animated children’s films and I consider myself a bit of an expert because I’ve seen so many!  So, so many.  Anyway, tangled was pretty funny with some great gags.

After that we were off to the supermarket to get some shopping so Mummy/Wifey wouldn’t have to.  We (the boys) like to help out as much as we can cause we know that Mummy/Wifey takes care of us most of the time.  And, we’re messy boys.

Rest of the afternoon, chilling out at home with my son and playing Lego.  Lego is the best toy ever…

• Distance Covered Today:  6.06km
• Total for the Month:  175.26

Today I did a whopping 20 mins of running this morning and then sat at a computer all day.  For dinner… pizza.  Lots and lots of yummy pizza.  Completely off-sets the running in the morning and I’ll probably be running off the calories for a good few days.  But you know what, I don’t care.

My daughter’s birthday was/is today and she was out and about today with her mum and grandmother to shop and have lunch.

My son is now upstairs with mummy getting ready for bed and I’ll be heading up to read him a story.  I read my son a story every night before bed.  Tonight, Hansel & Gretel…. the strange evil dad who gives in to the pushy stepmother and takes his kids and drops them in the middle of the woods and the strange old witch who decided building her house out of sweets was a good idea.

Tomorrow I get to go for a nice long walk of about 1 hour 20 mins and it’ll be a nice change.  I’m actually enjoying the Saturday morning walks and I hope to keep those going well after Janathon has finished.  After the walk my son and I will be off to the cinema to watch Tangled (in 3D of course).  My son is only just 4 but I’ve been taking him to the cinema for quite some time.  Even when he was little he was very good at movies and sits there like a good little boy and watches the whole thing.

After the movie we gotta go to Starbucks and take care of daddy’s needs.  Daddy wants a latte!  I absolutely love latte, especially from Starbucks.

Anyway, I’m done boring you with my life.

• Distance Covered Today:  3.15km
• Total for the Month:  169.20km

It looks like it would be a great day out and the number of runners is a bit more than the Reading Half Marathon. The only thing is, I’d like to go along with someone else to do it but I don’t have any friends that run. I may see if I can rope a work colleague in to doing it with me but who knows. If not, I guess I’ll have to drag the wifey along with me and do it on my own.

Did anyone do the one in 2010? What was it like?

• Distance Covered Today:  4.94km
• Total for the Month:  166.05km

From a training point of view I don’t really want another day in a row where I’m not really doing much so I think tomorrow I’ll have to force myself to make more of an effort.  My iPhone isn’t handy (it’s downstairs and it has my training plan) but I’m sure I’ll have to do about 45 mins tomorrow “easy” and on Friday I’ve got to do 1 hour 10 mins with 8 x 1 min intervals at race pace.  I’m so slow at the moment, does that mean my “race pace” is walking speed?  I’m guessing no.

Out of all this Janathoning (spell-check doesn’t like Janathon, especially Janathoning) I’m not just happy with my getting back in to running.  I’m also very glad to have discovered all kinds of fellow runners and bloggers out there and to have increased the number of people I follow on Twitter.  I hope that we can all manage to stay in contact and in December 2011 we’ll all be talking about Janathon 2012 and how we did in the last Janathon.

Let’s just hope some psychopath runner out there doesn’t come up with the ridiculous idea of “Febathon”; cause that’s just crazy….

• Distance Covered Today:  1.60km
• Total for the Month:  161.11km (100.10 miles)

This morning I got up and got ready to go run like normal but I was just so tired. I didn’t want to give up because that’s too easy. Instead I made a token effort of a mile in order to keep up the Janathon momentum. I’m sure I’ll be fine again tomorrow.

Not much else to report I’m afraid. Today I was working like normal. Got lots of things to do and everyone always wants things yesterday.

Distance Covered Today: 1.60km
Total for the Month: 159.62km