It’s back into the training in earnest. No festive holidays as an excuse. Right back into it.
Wednesday’s training was Fartlek training. It was hard. I don’t like having to speed up. I did the whole mind-game of “oh, I’m not gonna go in to training today”. Then I thought “hey, what you talkin’ bout, get your butt to training. And I did. The first half was hard. Second half was fun, and I felt fantastic. Also went on a very nice date with a gentleman that night 😀
Then I did a run on Thurs, about 5 km all up.
Today was my first long-run back after Christmas. We met at the Brighton Sea Baths. As per usual, I was on my own. Luckily, I had made up a “20km” playlist on my iPhone, so that kept me company.
It took a good 5-6km to get into the rhythm. Then, after that, it began to rain. Then heavily.
At about the 8km mark, I was on a bit of a downhill section. One of my favourite Gotye songs come on. Though raining, the sky was bright. I felt good. It was the high point of my week.
No worries up to 10km – I had a little breather/stretch/drink at Rickett’s point.
At about 12km, it was a bit of a struggle, so I walked a little way.
At about 15km, I met Brian for a quick guzzle of some drink. I felt good, so picked up the pace (to a blistering 7:10) for that km.
After about 17km it all got rather painful. Not pain, per se, but heaviness, tightness. The grunts turned into swearing (Andrew will be familiar with this). I was soaked through from the downpour and started to get chilly.
This was where I had to talk calmly to myself: “You have only just started training, this is the longest run you have done in a long time, it will get easier” etc. A few little walk breaks were taken. The long run can be a real emotional roller-coaster.
After the run, I could feel my blood sugar plunge, felt sick. I was immensely grateful for the banana I had packed (anyone know what this is all about?)
Rather than going to a cafe, I took my drowned-rat self to the supermarket to get some bits and bobs, and cooked some bacon and eggs for myself. Best thing I have had in a while. Yum.
Then I had a little snooze. Am off out tonight, to a Hungarian restaurant. More protein.
ooh, here is the workout. The pace was 3 sec per km faster than my 18 km run the week before. Yah!
Happy New Year! I’m so proud of you knocking out a 20km run, you my friend are moving forward in so many ways.
Yeah I remember that 🙂 But swearing whilst running on your own? People will think you have Tourette’s 🙂