I won’t say I bounced at the door for my run this morning, because that would be a moderately ginormous lie. I did however, bounce back in the house again afterwards as much as my tired legs would allow as my run, when I finally got out, went really really well.
It is currently very windy around our house at the moment, and it shrieks like a banshee round the corner of our house right above the bedroom window. Restful night’s sleep? No thank you, I’d love to be tossing and turning for hours! That’s just what I need after a week at work! Needless to say, I woke up a little tetchy…and then while trying to chuck my running gadgets on charge for a short time before going out, a technology tantrum started brewing. Could I get my ipod shuffle to charge? Could I hell! It froze my computer, which then took ages to restart, then wouldn’t register at all either on my pc, my laptop or a wall-charger. Fortunately I got it reset and it behaved itself after that but my slightly frayed nerves were getting increasingly angsty about it!
Then, I couldn’t decide where to go. My original plan from earlier in the week had been to go down to Wylam and do the loop down to Newburn and back, and see if I could run the last 1km back to the car rather than walking it as I usually do. 20 mins each way in the car minimum? Today? When it’s already about 1.5 hours later than I was intending to leave as I’ve frittered and fussed about so much? No thanks! Eventually I settled for somewhere a bit more local that I haven’t been to before but some of the guys at work were saying was worth a walk (so must be worth a run right?!). The Derwent Walk is just down the hill from us, but I couldn’t face the thought of having to run or walk back up that hill afterwards – it’s steep even in a car, so I took the car to the carpark instead.
The path follows the old Consett to Blaydon railway line which was decommissioned in the 1960’s. There’s no sign of the railway anymore, but the pathways are all tarmac and excellently maintained. I was intending to go between 5.5 and 6km down it from the Ebchester railway station carpark (the station itself is no more!) and actually ended up going 6.25km before turning round and heading back! I had a reasonable walking break at about the 6.5km mark to get a drink and shove some fruit yoyos in my face – filling your face is an important part of long runs!
The stretch of the Derwent walk I did today is flat for the most part – a few big-ish dips down to roads and back up again (that typically do not show in the elevation data at the bottom) but all in all a very runner friendly route, so I didn’t die too much. It stretches from Consett all the way to Newcastle I believe so I can go in either direction pretty much as long as I like!
This run was a personal record breaker for me in several ways and I’m really pleased with how it went – especially as I had to drag myself out the door to go for it!
Previous longest run: 10km (11km if you count the Bamburgh run, but I didn’t run the last 1km!)
Distance run today: 12.5km
Previous best 5km time: 32 min 46 sec
5k time today: 29 min 58 sec (mapmyrun is showing 29:40 for some reason but my watch was definitely 29:58)
Previous best 10km time: 1 hr 11 min
10k time today: 1 hr 7 min (mapmyrun 1:06:28)
This means that today, I increased my distance by 25%, beat my best 5k time – which was only set 5 days ago – by 2 min 48 sec and also got my first ever sub-30 min 5k time, and beat my best 10k time by 4 min!!!
Clearly the workouts and the running club are paying off! I was saying only on Tues when I set my last pb 5k time that my goals were <30 mins for a 5k and <1h5m for a 10k – which was actually within my reach today. I’d deliberately not pushed myself on the second half of the run knowing I’d gone faster than ever on the first 5k, and that I was going further than I’d been before, and I wanted to finish without dragging myself across the carpark to flop jelly-like into the car seat.
I’m really pleased – and feeling more positive about the 10 miler in 2 weeks. I’m expecting those extra few km’s to be tough, but I’m feeling a bit better about actually getting round them. There’s a couple of things I’m wanting to look into before then – I’ve noticed the last few longer runs that my shoes start to rub the insides of the balls of my feet after about 8km – I thought it was just the wet on the Bamburgh run but it happened again today, and I didn’t get my feet wet and was wearing different trainers. I may need to change my socks type, it’s probably something to do with my lovely sweaty feet! The other thing I’ll be reading up on is if there’s anything I can do to prevent the old runners-special of losing toenails…my second toe on my right foot was looking slightly yellow after Bamburgh, and the same today…I really would prefer not to lose it! I was reading something earlier in the week about different ways you can tie your shoes to change the pressures around your foot and there was something about toes…I shall find it!
I picked up my foam roller and docking station from the post office depot today – I’m looking forward to trying the roller out this afternoon! I went for my old standby of lots of stretching and a hot bath when I got home today, but I’m feeling I’d benefit from a foot rub and that probably means my legs could use some attention to. Will see how I find it! P’s already had a go on his back and said it seemed to work for him, so it looks like I’m sharing it!
Blue Runnings 
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