running, reading, nonsense.
Back in 2019 I was feeling aimless so, in a grasp for purpose, I decided to go whole hog on running. The sport has been in my life for a long time but I had never really given it full commitment. It had always been a passing, but familiar, acquaintance. I imagine quite a few… Continue reading The Half Marathon and I
I firmly believe that most of the time during training your body should feel good. You do not have to be smashing it all of the time to make progress. Space and time to recover is just as important as the sessions themselves and, a lot of the time, you want to be going into… Continue reading The Well, The Water.
I followed up the blissful smoothness of my last long run with a low volume day of run/biking, and then had an absolutely storming track session. It was one of my best, ever. I felt in full control of my stride, was able to hold something in reserve on the longer efforts, and then push… Continue reading Present Sense
I started out in the drizzle. The light grey skies were not burdened with the weight of heavy rain, just a constant, mist like, precipitation. It was a bit like running constantly through one of those fan/spray contraptions they put out in theme park queues on intensely hot days. The route was new to me,… Continue reading Back to the Long Run
The pine trees at Thetford Forest stand soldier stiff, and stifle the sounds of the outside world. They provide a green peace, an overwhelming sense of tranquility. They also seem to capture the moisture of the air and generate a great amount of humidity, as one might suppose a forest does, but I discovered that… Continue reading Relaxed Racing
and then when that thing changes, you immediately start complaining about the new status-quo. That describes the British and the weather. In fairness, we aren’t naturally blessed. April and May provided a grey and gloomy canvas, and then things flipped like a switch over the recent bank holiday. This, of course, was welcomed with righteous… Continue reading You spend all year complaining about one thing,
Photo by Jose Fontano on Unsplash I’m sure on that grim day there were thousands of runners who laced up and went out, but in the moment there was no denying the immense self satisfaction that came to me from running at an unsensible hour, in unsensible conditions. In that sodden moment I was the… Continue reading 6am, pouring rain.
Spring has sprung and a race has been run. It did not, to move quickly to the point, go exactly how I wanted it to. I did not run the time I imagined that I would. In fact, the pace that I did run (37:09, I was hoping to at least come close to breaking… Continue reading Small hills get bigger as the race goes on.
This time hopefully it is here to stay. Hopefully, alongside the hairdressers and the pubs and the restaurants, alongside our good health and lower infection rates, hopefully. About two weeks out from a race is when I have my doubts, and after such a long time without racing they have been more pronounced. I know… Continue reading and so racing is back, again.
This last week I’ve had plenty of time. I should have been away on holiday, but no one is going away anywhere so I’m just not at work. At first I was a little worried about having 2 weeks to do nothing, but there hasn’t been a whole lot of nothing going on. It’s April,… Continue reading Time Trail.
run into words 