Marathon Training

Thursday 13^th June 2019

Thursdays was a 7 mile recovery run. I plotted my route using the RunGo app, I have used this in the past and it’s always worked reasonably well for me.

I did the run in the morning after working a night shift, This is not something I do often, I prefer to run after a sleep but needs must – I did find I got tired quicker though.

It was beautiful route due to a huge chunk of the run being off road, I was really enjoying myself thinking how perfect the route was, that was until around mile 4!

I was back running on the pavement again and when I looked up my jaw dropped – The mother of all hills, I had totally forgot about this hill, it was huge, I was knackered when I got to the top.

Between mile 5 and 6 I felt my energy levels drop but I knew I did not have far to go so I carried on but I was pleased when I finished 🙂

Distance 7.02 mi
Pace 10:08 /mi
Time 1h 11m

No stinging nettles on this route but loads of bushes spraying rain water on my legs, I will take that any day to getting stung 🙂

Time to get back to work, Night all

Tuesday I was supposed to run for 40 minute at a steady pace. This did not quite go to plan although I still managed to have a really good workout.

I started Tuesday evening off by donating blood, Last time I went was just after my last Marathon and I got rejected as my iron level was too low. I was really pleased this time everything was back to normal so I got to donate and for my troubles I got a lovely cup of coffee and some biscuits before walking home.

So I purposefully waited a bit before going for my run just to recover, I drove to Warlingham as I had seen these lovely routes that I wanted to run through. I have driven along these roads in my car and on my motorcycle (not at the same time) and they looked so nice compared to my usual pavement routes.

So I park up, put all my gear on, complete my warm-up routine and off I go.

The route was lovely at first, a narrow path through bushes with nothing but green either side, wonderful I thought. It did not take long for the narrow path to narrow even more and more until you are kicking through the bushes to continue – I got stung like mad on my poor legs by nettles.

I had to walk through several sections and even go onto the road a few times to go around the nettles although I got off the road quick as it was national speed limit and night time.

My aim was to run for 20 minutes, turn round and run the 20 minutes back but due to the walking and road running I ran further out to compensate, This turned out to be a total mistake as I landed up running for a hour to get back to near the car.

Even with the obstacles and possibly because of them I still had such a fun time, Yes I got stung several times (and my legs are still tingling) and yes I made no records with my running but it was so nice to run a different route and I did not feel too bad about stopping to take some photos along the way.