OK, not quite national television, but clearly visible training hard for this years forthcoming Toughguy challenge at the end of January.

See the gruelling pain I put myself through at my bi-weekly Body Attack class in this SwindonWeb Video

Remember – there is still time to sponsor me – it all goes to charity!

More about Body Attack: BODYATTACK™ is the sports-inspired cardio workout for building strength and stamina. This high-energy interval training class combines athletic aerobic movements with strength and stabilization exercises. Dynamic instructors and powerful music motivate everyone towards their fitness goals – from the weekend athlete to the hard-core competitor!

Body attack runs at the Swindon Link Centre on Mondays, Tuesdays and Thursdays, for more details click here.

As some of you may know, I usually spend twice a week down at the local gym exercising to the Les Mills Body Attack class for general fitness, but now the hard work starts!

Over the course of the next 3 months I’ll need to continue general fitness work plus add:

1. Mileage – both on and off road, dry and wet – up to 8 miles
2. Swimming – I underestimated how much time was spent in the water last time!
3. Cold weather (lots of nice ice-baths!)
4. Power – a bit of weight training to help with the SAS assault course!
5. Increase PAIN threshold

I’ve started on a couple of 4-5 mile runs already, mixed results as I’m just not built to run any distance over 400m – and even that was a struggle in my 400m Hurdle days!

After my successful year last year, I’ve decided that I would set a few of goals, first is to raise money, this year as well as raising for the nominate Toughguy charities, I’ll also be joint fund raising for the Prospect Hospice (Wiltshire) and Naomi House (Hampshire) one to finish in the top 300 and with a time of less than two hours (I’m trying for 1.5 hours, but recent training would show that this may be a little far-fetched!).

To help launch my sponsorship, North Hampshire Chamber of Commerce & Industry (NHCCI) have written a small piece in their great monthly newsletter (page 13), feel free to have a look, its a good read and I’m very grateful to the team for getting the sponsorship ball started.

After two weeks of training my legs already feel dead, so I’ll update you on my progress leading up to and at the event.

Darren