It's been another month since my last post. What have I been up to? Well I've done a couple of 20 mile runs with the Bickley Station Harriers (a little sub group of Petts Wood Runners that go out on Sundays). It felt good to get that distance under my belt. I didn't do them with basketballs but it still feels good to get familiar with a relatively fast paced 20. I've been up at the school gym practicing ball skills and I ran the Tunbridge Wells half marathon last Sunday. I had a tiny twang in my right hamstring at track the Thursday before where I still ran but at no more than 80%. I didn't realise there was a term for it but I'm suffering terribly from Maranoia (mental anxiety found in marathon runners, characterised by the irrational belief that last-minute disaster is imminent). Basically I'm terrified I'm going to injure myself. So having had this little twinge and knowing I had a race on the Sunday I booked my legs in for a sports massage. After having a chat with our club coach (and sports masseur) Mike, I decided not to 'race' the Tunbridge Wells half but just to run it at a comfortable pace. It's a very hilly course and not one for attempting PBs anyway. I was enjoying the scenery and running comfortable sub 8 minute miles when I began to notice my hamstring tightening. Then, just before 10 miles, another 'ping!'. Not a terrible pain but enough to make me walk the last three miles. I had my legs carefully massaged again at the finish and saw my Physio on the Monday night. Sparing you the details, I was taped, bandaged and given exercises to do and was able to run again on the Wednesday night. I have to moderate how many miles I'm doing but it's not as big a problem as I was worried it might be.
I ran 4 miles on Wednesday, another 6 on Thursday and on Saturday I took the balls out for 6.69 miles which I did in 57:49 averaging 08:39 per mile. All back to normal next week I think.
In other news I went to Bluewater shopping centre last weekend to walk a lap and see if my Garmin would work indoors - it did! But it turns out that a lap is only just over a quarter of a mile and not the half mile I was lead to believe it was. This means I'm going to have to do in the region of 80 laps to cover 20 miles. And I'm probably going to have to stay on the upper floor if I want my Garmin to work - I can't imagine it's going to work on the lower floor (I forgot to test that). Whilst I was there though, I popped in to the management suite to see if my contact in Security was there. Fortunately he was so I was able to introduce myself. He's happy for me to do the 20 miles on 2nd April as long as I start at 05:30! And miraculously I've found three people so far that have expressed an interest in getting up at silly o'clock to come and run with me. This will be a great confidence boosting run just before I begin to taper. I want to take advantage of the perfect conditions to run 9 minute miles.
I have the Silverstone half marathon with balls on 12 March so I'll probably run a half marathon with balls round the park next weekend. I want to get a balls PB at Silverstone which means going sub 01:56:39. I want to get below 01:55:00 and as close to 01:50:00 as I can.
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| 80 laps of Bluewater Shopping Centre coming up - 02/04/17 |
