Final Push for Schools Challenge - News - Plymouth SSP

Final Push for Schools Challenge

The Schools Challenge – Just two weeks to go!!

Most schools are now nearing the end of their scheduled training runs and the 1200 plus athletes have certainly been racking up the miles.

I have visited a few of the schools over the past few weeks and a majority of students are already hitting the 12.1 mile target with weeks to spare. One of the schools, Eggbuckland Vale primary school, have been running their training sessions every Friday since the entry forms came out and on speaking to a few of the young athletes it appears that that these scheduled runs have certainly inspired them, with some running nearly two miles every week. Each lap of the school play grounds is 400m so a four lap course would give them the mile distance required for the big day. It was great to see nearly 60 keen students and teachers running for the full 20 minutes allotted most of which without a break and I am sure Liz Shaw PE coordinator at the school will be looking to use some of these performances when she chooses her athletics team for the forthcoming Plymouth and West Devon athletics events in June.

Last minute preparations for the day have also been organised and with t-shirts and numbers for each athlete arriving this week it’s now starting to come together and getting very exciting. This year we will have our very own schools challenge enclosure at the start and finish where we will have music and run information. We will also be having a dance style warm up 20 minutes before the start within the home straight area performed by Jane Dorwick (PE coordinator at Beechwood primary school) and her school dance crew.

This year many of the athletes have also been raising money for the Motor Neurones Disease Association our race nominated charity and I hope that we will continue to raise money for this worthwhile cause with collection buckets being present on the day.

It is estimated that up to now 13222 miles have been run and if all complete the 13.1 total distance the total mileage run by schools challenge runners will be 15746, that’s allot of running!!

With each of these young athletes now nearing the completion of the 12.1 miles required before the final mile on schools challenge day it is time to look at how training with the adult runners is going. Anyone actually doing the 13.1 mile distance on Sunday 30 May should now be looking at completing their final long runs and tapering down over the next two weeks. If training has gone well many of the runners will have done runs equivalent to or over the required distance and feeling confident about running the Plymouth half marathon in a good time. Others may have been impeded by injury or busy schedules and may be behind on their training programmes, now is not the time to try and catch up on those miles as you will only carry these into the day which will slow you down.

Many club runners will be returning to normal mileages and taking it easy with some easy runs or light cross training just to keep the legs ticking over. The main thing to remember is not to panic, if this is your first half marathon don’t get swept up in the euphoria of the day and race off with the elite runners, take your time, run at your normal pace and most of all enjoy the experience.

If you are wearing new kit make sure that you have worn it once or twice before the day and had it washed, there is nothing worse than wearing that new running vest for the very first time to find it rubs in places you don’t want it to rub and ruin the whole day. Also if you are running in new shoes make sure these have been broken in with a few runs, believe me blisters that pop after 5 miles are not nice!!

Good luck to all taking part in the schools challenge, fun run and actual half marathon.

Lance Chatfield

Coach Manager for the Sir John Hunt School Sports Partnership and Schools Challenge organiser

Level 3 Endurance Coach.

Edit Article