Ebb and Flow

96 Days to Go

I mentioned in the last post that this week would likely make or break me - the overall verdict appears to be somewhere inbetween.

My midweek long run went well, just shy of 14 miles and almost pleasant in the sun and with a slight breeze. Casting my mind back to my first marathon, and the training that appeared to take place entirely in driving wind and rain, I realise that so far I've been fortunate with the conditions that I've been running in. I also realise that by writing this I have cursed this for the next few months.

On Thursday I went down to the club and decided to take part in the rep session, but trying to maintain a slower pace. The session was one of the favourites - Kenyan Hills down at Cotteridge Park (the hilly part appeals to the sadist in me). I stuck with Simon Newman, who is running ridiculously well after all his training for the Manchester Marathon a few weeks back, it really helped and was a good steady session - although I have to take issue with Strava which claimed that he was faster than me despite us running side by side for the entire time!

Come Friday I was looking forward to a good run after work - if for no other reason that to work out the frustration over the latest high farce at work. Sadly, disaster struck - I noticed through the day that my foot was getting increasingly tight and by the time I drove home it was pretty noticeable. Cursing my luck, I knew a run was out of the question and sat inside to stew.

All kinds of thoughts run through my mind - injury? overtraining? I wasn't planning to run on Saturday anyway but a rational mind would just have a few days off and see how it went. However, as a runner I am anything but rational so I strapped the offending appendage for the rest of the day and resolved to test the waters on Sunday.

As it went, on Sunday morning I felt ok so gingerly set out for a long run. Things got better as they went on - for the first time I probably did the run as intended with a slow start and then speeding up as it went on. Several hours later, sat watching Match of the Day, I don't feel any ill effects so we will see what tomorrow brings.

Certainly the last few days leaves me in a bit of a quandary. Friday could be a bit of a blip or the start of something more serious. Consulting 'The Plan' it seems that currently I fall between two stools - quicker than one plan, but maybe not fit enough for the next step up. I may try sticking to the intensity of the current plan, but reduce the mileage slightly. This will require some mental effort on my part which I'm not happy about.

On an unrelated note, I went to see this on Saturday. It was bloody great.

On a second unrelated note, this much?! For a League Two Playoff?!