SportsAid - Welcome to the future of British sport

London Marathon Blog 1 - by Georgie Harland

31 January 2012: As I sat on the sofa on October 28 last year, enjoying the open fire, eating chocolate and enjoying a glass of wine, I made my decision to email SportsAid to say that I would be interested in running the London Marathon in 2012. But it took me another month to realise that this actually meant I would run the 26.2 miles!

So why the marathon and why SportsAid? Two months before the Beijing Olympics I suffered a career ending injury when I ruptured my calf muscle while I was running. Four years later the Virgin London marathon will be the first challenge that I have set myself since that injury and it is only right that I aim to complete that challenge by running for SportsAid.

The reason for this is the significant impact the organisation had on my career in the early days and this is my way of thanking them and also showing support for athletes of the future. SportsAid were the first organisation to recognise me through financial support. The first time I received a grant was the first time I started believing that I could perhaps achieve my dream of winning an Olympic medal.

Until that point people had told me that I had talent but for someone to actually support that belief with a financial contribution really made me sit up and start believing in myself. SportsAid undoubtedly played a significant role in my career and the careers of many other athletes.

As a full time athlete, training for modern Pentathlon, my typical training week would include 5 sessions a day, 6 days a week. So you could say I was relatively fit and ready to take on any challenge.

However the injury I sustained in 2008 meant that that training was reduced to almost nothing as I dealt with the transition to life after being an international athlete. For the past 3 and a half years I have had to let my legs recover and this has meant I have done only a very small amount of biking and running. Without this rest I may not have been able to run again in the future. So when I dusted off my trainers and dug out my lycra from the back of my cupboard on December 1st it was with a little bit of apprehension as to what lay ahead. Would my legs stand up to running again?  People always assume that because of my background I must be fit but appearances can be very misleading!  

So off I went for my first 20 minute run/walk. 3 minutes into the run my lungs were burning, my breathing was loud and rasping and my legs were killing me!  Things were not looking good. But I dragged myself around the run with the promise that the first run is always the worst and in a few weeks I would be laughing at myself for the state I was in – how I hoped I was correct!  Three runs later things were still looking pretty grim and by this point I had plugged the music in to try and drown out the noise of my thudding feet.

It was about this time that I met Leon Taylor at an event we were both attending. Leon, as always, met me with a huge hug and beaming smile but then the questions came about the marathon – how was I doing? How far was I running? What time was I aiming for? etc etc. His jaw dropped when I proudly told him I was running about 35 minutes. He then proceeded to tell me that the day before he had been out for a two hour run!  He told me I needed goals, I needed to focus more and that essentially things were not looking good!  I left the event terrified but determined that this challenge would not beat me.

It is now the end of January and after a week off with illness over Christmas my training is going well. My aim of the marathon is to complete. I know that if I aim for a specific time then I will get carried away with training and push my body over the edge. My legs served me amazingly for ten years as an international athlete. They brought me Olympic medals and World and European titles but I now need to respect that they don’t enjoy being battered in the way that I used to train.

I am starting to really enjoy my time out on the roads and in the countryside around Bath. I am rediscovering old running routes and enjoying new ones now that I am running further than I ever needed to for the 3k of the Modern Pentathlon. Some cross training on my mountain bike is also helping to develop my fitness. Just less than 3 months to go and I really have caught the training bug again. I obviously don’t have the luxury of choosing when I will run during the week, as I used to do as an athlete, as work commitments now seem to get in the way!  But I have the philosophy that every training session is a bonus and staying injury free is a priority. Right now I seem to move between the feeling of terror and excitement as to the challenge that lies ahead. This evening as I recover from the 2 hour run I did in the crisp Sunday afternoon weather around Bath it is definitely excitement!

Georgie Harland, Olympic bronze medal winner, modern pentathlon, Athens 2004 Olympic Games