I’m almost certainly being too harsh on myself given that Run #43 was the first run for almost three weeks, but it certainly felt like I was going backward rather than forward.
It was an enforced absence caused by general rundown-ness, cold and lethargy. I set off not quite sure how far I’d go. I planned to run down past the prison, and then up to the Gallops, along the top of the Neville and then decide whether to head home or go for five miles up to Blackcap.
The first mile went relatively well, and so I carried straight on past the back of Houndean Rise rather than heading straight-up to the Gallops. I got to the path that leads to the back of the Gallops and decided on a whim to go straight on and go up to the Kingston Ridge. At that point I felt good enough to convince myself that I’d be able to run all the way via Springbarn Farm.
I decided to push myself for mile the third half-mile and (it being a shallow downhill) I managed to up my pace – all was going well; this was going to be a fantastic run.
I’d forgotten the steep 200-300m climb in the field just over the A27, that did it for me. From that moment each half-mile took longer and longer, the last mile saw me basically crawling along at a snails pace. The further I went, the slower I got; all I could think about was that far from pushing myself to do fast segments of the run as I’d planned, I was basically going backwards. Depressingly (and judging myself very harshly) the full five miles took me 56:38. It is a harsh judgement and I need to remind myself that it was the first run for three weeks, I managed five miles and have something to build on.
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