Friday 23 November 2007

Frozen Friday

I'm the first to admit, I have been getting a bit cocky about running of late. Some might say obsessed. But it's the first time I've ever been inclined, let alone focused, on improving my speed. After this morning's performance, I've definitely been grounded.

As I'm off to London for the weekend, I thought it would be a good idea to squeeze in a long (ish) run before work. OK, it was only 11 miles, but I thought it was better than nothing. I thought wrong. As my dear old friend Kas would say, I ran like a bag of spanners. Now, in my defence there were various factors against me: I was pretty gubbed after three hard training sessions on a trot, I had to get up just after 5am, I didn't have much for dinner last night and completely avoided breakfast. Excuses, excuses. But the main reason was it was BALTIC this morning. -4 when I started. I just could not heat up. My muscles felt really cold and stringy the whole time. The pavements were sheets of ice, so I spent most of my time tinkering round them. Even the rabbits were looking at my funny.

I would have thrown in the towel, but I decided than a tough run on empty would be good training for the WHW. I even managed to convince myself of this when I passed the tube station.

By the time I got to the office, my eyeballs were frozen, I had icicles hanging from my nose and my skin felt sunburned.

The route from Bowling to the office is exactly 11 miles. I'm not even looking at the time or pace. The salty tears might sting my weather-beaten face. Next time, I'm taking a recovery day. Aye, right.

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