It’s Sunday 21^st April.  London Marathon Day.  37,000 runners have now completed what they have been training for over the last 3-12 months.

This staggering number of participation shows the growing mass appeal and the trend towards finding even harder ways to go through the pain barrier: 

• 145 full marathons took place last year in the UK (3 x the amount held in 2003)
• There were 336 half marathons
• The successful 5km Park Runs are attended by tens of thousands of people across the UK.
• Extreme, obstacle littered races are springing up all of the time – the latest most popular one being the ‘Tough Mudder’ which includes an ‘electrocution’ obstacle. 
• Themed races such as the ‘Rock’n’Roll’ series, and Nike’s ‘Run to the Beat’, both set to live music, are hugely popular. 
• Organisers have turned races into festivals, which provide facilities and activities not just for the competitors but also for their families.
• One of my personal favourites is the Cross Fit Challenge, which combines all spectrums of physical fitness from Olympic lifting, to climbing ropes, flipping tyres, pushing/pulling sleds, sprints etc – it is what I would call the ‘ultimate-athlete.’

To train well I need a focus, I need something to concentrate on, to aim for.  Now that I don’t competitively participate in sport anymore, I sometimes find this hard to do.  Therefore I highly recommend that we all have something to strive towards and that we are setting ourselves small challenges helping us to improve all the time 

I try to do a Charity Challenge each year.  Last year I swam the distance of the English Channel in a 25m swimming pool, which tested not only my physical strength and endurance but also my mental endurance.  Psychologically it was very testing, when having swum 704 lengths, realising I was only halfway and having to count another 704 lengths was a real test let alone having to swim them. 

So, this year, what is my challenge? 

Well, before I decide I would like to firstly know what your challenges are?  Please send me a message telling me your goals and challenges for the upcoming year.  That way we can be accountable to each other.   

And secondly I would like you to perhaps come up with some ideas for my Charity Challenge for 2013.  What pain would you like me to be put through?