The Demons Return

Well I guess if this was on the telly we would now break into some sort of montage to music that would cover the next few weeks to show the daily slog that is now the reality.  I've just about sorted the wardrobe, I've picked a hat and no longer care what it looks like, for now the shoes are bought, I've discovered music and I can go a bit further than a lot of fun joggers.  I've learned that warming up is important, keeping your eye's open and facing forward is essential and of late 'Will' has been alongside me.  I'm over the running tights, I have bruises on my big toe nails so feel I've earned the right to wear them . . . there's not too much that's very funny that happens any more, it's all about trying to stay motivated and this week fit training around a cold (yes, I did get it) and an unexpected visit to the office which played havoc with my build up to today.

Rewind . . . . . . 

I wrote that a few days ago, but once again, just as I believed I was off and running a series of 'unfortunate events' culminated in a total disaster this morning.  After last Sunday I was really quite confident about today and had decided I was going to do 13 and a bit miles - I wanted to be at the half way stage.  Now, for the past couple of long runs I've done a big loop out into the wilderness but finished up doing the final and hardest couple of miles close to home but, from a head point of view it's really hard getting almost to the end of our track and having to turn around and go off again, so yesterday Andrew took the car out and measured 6 and a half miles out, this would take me to the outskirts of Kenninghall which sounded absolutely ridiculous.  Having not done too much this past week I decided I would do a bit of 'Nell' yesterday and was pleased that I got to the end of the dvd.  I then stuffed myself full of Pasta.  I got up early this morning in order to again stuff myself with Porridge and give it time to go down.  Mr Motivator took a rucksack today full of quite what I really didn't have a clue.  He looks more and more like the old coach in Rocky every time we go out.  The first 2 miles were hard but they always are.  Once I got out onto the open roads the wind cut across the fields and hit my square in the face so that I could hardly breathe, at times it was bringing me to a complete standstill and it blew my headphones out of my ears, I wear a hat to keep them in but the wind was lifting the edges of the hat so that in the end I had to put my hood up to keep my hat on to keep my headphones in!!!!!.   It seems my preparation is becoming longer each time I go out as I add another strapping to hold something else on, I strap up my big toes to keep the nails on, today I had a support on my knee because by the end of a long run it feels as though my leg will drop off from the knee, I could do with one on the other knee and I'm contemplating a pair of shorts to wear superman (woman) style, over my running tights in order to keep my legs connected at the hips because they also threaten to become detached after a while!.  Anyway, about 4 and a half miles in I discovered that in the rucksack Andrew had thought to bring some ibuprofen.  In a very tricky manoeuvre he managed to extract them from the bag and I attempted to take them, note to self - will need something to secure my teeth in place for when I attempt to drink whilst running - they didn't help, they had quite a choice of pains they could alleviate but chose none of them.  Now, it was at this point that the head games started.  I began to worry that if I got the whole 6 and a half miles out I wouldn't get back and 6 and a half miles is a very long way to walk, in tights!. I started trying to work out how many miles I had done and if I turned how many I would do, if I added a loop her or an extra turn there, how much would that add, all of these questions puts doubts in your head and once you start to question if you can do it the answer is invariably no, you can't.  I started to walk for periods and in the end turned around, I ran for a bit but my head had given up.  In the end Andrew speeded off to get the car, I did run for most of the time he was gone but was very pleased to see the car come round the corner.

We've now done the post run biopsy, we've blamed the cold I've had, the wind and the route but to be honest the failure was in my head.  Next week I have to get some miles in over the whole week ready for Sunday when I will finish the Reedham 10 mile race.  I'm not going to dwell on this failure, it's just a minor problem and this week coming is going to be a good one.