Once again, the combination of busy-ness, poor weather and limited daylight hours meant that I only managed two runs this week.
Run 1 was the regular Thursday-night group run with the Plymouth Musketeers on Thursday evening. This week’s route was the Barne Barton route which I completed in the 9 minute/mile pace group. This is a pretty tough route which starts off fairly level but then descends quite steeply down to Saltash Passage on the Plymouth side of the Tamar Bridge before winding east, then back west towards the coast, the east again before commencing on the big climb up Bridwell Road. The route has two major climbs but Bridwell Road is the real killer, going on and on in one apparently un-ceasing section; and even when that climb is done there is still the regular climb back up to Kings Tamerton Social Club to finish off. Anyway, the run went well enough. I wouldn’t say I felt especially strong but I remained pretty comfortable all the way through and made it all the way up the Bridwell climb without slowing to a complete stop.
For Run 2, on Sunday morning, I took advantage of a rare window of relatively fine weather and ran long and slow all the way up and back the Plym Valley Trail from Coypool. I deliberately set off at quite a slow pace (10 minute/mile) and maintained this all the way up to the very end of the track (just about 6 miles). After turning round I allowed myself to run more quickly, but still focusing on comfort not on speed such that by the end of the run I had covered 12 miles, my longest distance yet, at an average pace of 9 minutes 36 seconds per mile with the last six miles all being under 9 minute 29 second pace and the final mile being at 8m39s pace. I was really pleased that I had managed to push my total distance up another notch and now feel totally confident about running half marathon distance (on a sensible course). It was particularly pleasing that I didn’t experience any real discomfort around my knees. What was quite amusing was that when I got home I just wanted to eat and eat and eat (and doze).
Tim O'Hare 