Triumph and Disaster

61 Days to Go

The end of a pleasant week off, and I'm currently sat in my front room trying to drag out the last few hours before my return to the house of fun. All in all, it's been a good week with doing as little as possible being just what was required. Some good news on Friday with the release of the first year Uni grades where I just scrapped a first! Maybe the latest University tables, where Birmingham has dropped a few places are onto something.

Of course, you don't want to know about that - you want the latest instalment of the running adventures... 

Two solid training runs, and thanks to some spectacularly bad planning, two races (on consecutive days) were on the agenda. Friday evening brought my favourite race of the year - the Blakedown Bolt, 10k of multiterrain around the Clent Hills. It's a small race, but there was a good turnout from the club and thanks to the recent good weather conditions were almost bone dry underfoot so it was on for a good time. 

In the end I was about 90 seconds quicker than last year, probably buoyed by a combination of the enhanced training and being chased down by a particularly quick ginger chap (if nothing else, I am determined that I should be the fastest ginger runner in any race!) who is one of those annoying people who seems naturally fast without any training. As usual, I enjoyed it - even the ridiculous hill and stile combination at mile five.

With less than 24 hours rest, I then had to tackle the final Fourmidables Event, which necessitated another drive into the wilds of Shropshire - again the heavy rain. With the results of previous races meaning that, barring a catastrophe, I was guaranteed to finish second senior male - I could ease off a bit. We started in driving rain and annoyingly my Garmin decided not pick up a signal for the first half mile so I couldn't really pace myself properly.

Over the first two miles, I passed a steady stream of runners before the course went defiantly off road for the next section. The heavy rain meant that it was extremely slippy underfoot but I managed to stay ahead of the chasing pack - even lucking out when I crossed a field just in advance of a herd of cows, forcing those behind me to stop and wait. 

After a short climb, the rest of the course was pretty much steady or downhill but nevertheless I felt it in the legs after the day before and was glad to cross the finish line at the Gnosall Carnival to a smattering of applause. I have to say that I was impressed with the old-school nature of it - there was even a coconut shy and a tug of war competition. 

Impressively, I managed to get slightly lost on the quarter mile walk back to the car park which meant that went I finally got home, a well-earned rest was on the cards.

Today should have been a long run, but erring on the side of caution after two straight days of hard running, decided that it would almost certainly be an invitation to an injury so took to DIY instead. Despite my recent triumphs, I was brought back to earth with a bump after arriving back on Saturday to discover that my washing machine had decided to break. My rudimentary skills couldn't do anything so it looks like a repair bill is coming my way...

Sadly, although I may have improved the running in recent months, it's not by enough that a professional career beckons. Looks like I still need the day job to bring the money in. Speaking of which, sleep beckons before my triumphant return to the workplace. It could be a long day.