It was my birthday last week and I got a new Garmin watch. Ok so it wasn’t a diamond but it was better! A diamond is not going to tell me how fast I’m running (or not running), how far I have run, what my fastest km was, how long I have been running or […]

Am not sure if this happens to everyone in winter, but as the mornings get colder and colder the effort to get out the door and exercise with a positive frame of mind gets harder and harder. I am very fortunate enough to be a part of an inspiring group of women who have entered […]

Hard to believe that I’m at the end of my first four weeks of the training plan and four weeks closer to racing the amazing Taraweras. Flights and accommodation have been booked, so it really is official, race entry wasn’t quite enough commitment! It’s amazing how quickly the training plan workouts just became part of […]

I haven’t always been a runner – about five years ago I set myself a goal and decided to complete a half marathon (21.1km). It was on my list of things I would love to do one day. When I set this goal I was about half way through my Weight Watchers journey of losing […]

So why do I need a coach this time? There are millions of marathon plans on the internet, in books or I could have copied my Queenstown Marathon plan from last year. I could have been coached by my husband (Mike) as he has run the Gold Coast Marathon twice but we all know that would never work […]

After a nice restful weekend in Hanmer Springs, I was feeling set for week 1 of the training programme which started on Monday. This is the foundation phase of the training. The first few weeks are about laying down the ground work for whats to come in the next few months. I’m currently scheduled to […]

Firstly I will apologise in advance for this blog being mostly about my coaching with Richard – for those of you who read this and have never had a running coaching session before – do it! Not only has it made me re think how I run it has also shown me that I can improve even at […]

Hi my name is Jennifer McBride and I am recently new to the world of running. I am a mum to a 7 year old boy and a full time step mum to two boys aged 11 and 13. I work part-time, study and am currently doing the catch fitness 20 week challenge. I understand what it […]

I don’t like running. I never thought I would run 10k let alone a marathon, but here I am training for my second marathon in two years. Even reading back that last sentence sounds like a lie but it’s all true. So what happened? Well it all started about eight years ago when my husband started running. I […]

I’m Emma from Ireland and living and working in Christchurch. I have always been keen on sports doing the odd 5km or 10km charity run but never took myself too seriously. I started rowing in University and that’s when things started to get serious. I was hooked and training 12-14 times a week seemed fine […]