At the beginning of June 2020, I embarked on a project. A challenge to Run the Month. That is, to run 1km on the 1st of June adding 1km each day until reaching 30km on the 30th of June. Despite being a fairly seasoned runner, I was a little nervous as to how I would fare running every day to cover over 460km in just four weeks, and I wasn’t exactly rested before having notched up 100km in the last week of May.

The month began easily enough and for the first 10 days, it was somewhat of a challenge to stick to just the required distance. I even went over distance on the first three days, although I’m not sure I’d do this again! The middle of the month wasn’t so bad either, although as I’m used to one rest day per week, running every day was quite a lot. For me, the challenge didn’t really kick in until week 3, when I was running over 20km each and every day. Fitting in a 20+ km run after work every day was becoming pretty tough so I started to do double run days, for example a 10km run in the morning and a 15km run in the evening. Whilst easier from a time management perspective, this method halved my rest time and the shorter distances on each run encouraged me to run faster than I otherwise would have.

The real business end of the challenge came in the final four or five days. I found myself constantly hungry and in need of nap time, but otherwise surprisingly fine. My legs felt pretty fresh for each run, no real residual aching and no niggles either, which certainly upped my confidence for future long races. My final run, 30km after work on a Tuesday, was tough but also tinged with the pride of knowing I was about to achieve my goal. I spent three hours bimbling through local countryside, spotting deer, foxes and squirrels, and thinking not only about all the miles I’d covered over the last 30 days but also the rest that I was looking forward to!

Whilst I’m not sure I’ll be repeating it too soon, this was the perfect challenge for me at this time. It felt like it would be really great training for a long ultra or a multi-day event and I’d certainly encourage others to give it a go!