My first open water swim - Bosphorus 2014

Marathon, Bosporus, Half-Ironman. - This chain of events has to happen this summer, and it's all right so far. Second goal achieved, although with some mistakes, but more on this later.

Pre-history

Let's go back to the beginning. Summer 2013. Triathlon: Swimming, Cycling, Running - absolute zero experience in all those elements :). I was fully aware that it is impossible to get Ironman quickly. I thought that it would be nice to participate in several cycling, running, and swimming races. All of them had to take place next summer (2014) in order to have time for the preparation, and have enough time for recovery. Eventually, I had the marathon in June, Bosporus swim  - July and Half Ironman - August. Right, I know, there is no cycling in this list--I couldn’t fit everything in just three summer months --autumn was planned for another thing.

White Nights - my first marathon!

Marathon, Bosphorus, Half Iron Man - this is the chain of events I planned for the summer of 2014 at the end of the summer of 2013, when my ambitions prevailed over my laziness and I decided that it was time to change. Did I believe then that I could do it - NOT AT ALL, but as you know - If you can dream it, you can do it.

Marathon

Marathon is not something you can plan today for tomorrow. It takes time. In my case it was one year of continuous preparation. During this time I managed to run around 1000кm, preparing myself for this event.

Plan

I realized that it was not enough to just run every day in order to make it happen, I needed a Plan. There were several options to choose from: I could find a trainer, elaborate a plan by myself or use one of thousands existing in the Internet.