Personal best

Get me - I'm being all marathon runner now! Carb loading last night (always used to be known as eating pasta and making enough for seconds, now has a posh name) and this morning I prepared for my latest long Sunday run. The plan was to retrace my steps from last Sunday and ultimately see if I could run the full 14 mile distance.

If I can't run the full distance I did have other targets:
a) Run further in one go than last time (previously 11 miles - 13 would be nice!)
b) Run more overall than last time (previously 12.5 miles - 13 would be nice!)
c) Beat the overall time (previously about 2:25 - 2:30)

The weather forecast was for sunshine at 9am, heavy sleet at noon, and sunshine again at 3pm. So I set off just after 9am. Once again the first half mile or so is a killer - I got a bit of stitch right away, then again at a couple of miles. I'm just glad now I can run through this if it comes early, and once again the middle phase goes a lot more smoothly.

Running on the roads, I only hit a busy road when I cover 2 miles of the B4100, about 7 miles in. Until then I only passed three oncoming cars in the first seven miles. Big thank you to the cars heading from Bicester to the A43 - almost all give me a very wide birth and are rewarded with a tired friendly acknowledgement. Only 2 or 3 cars didn't follow this rule, and got a strategic two finger salute along the drinks bottle for their efforts!

So how did I do against my targets? I ran on to Bucknell and past the point where I stopped to walk last week. On to the ring road, I ran further but did stop just before the Banbury Road roundabout. So I ran a little under 12.5 miles off the bat. Target (a) hit but unfortunately not the full marathon distance or 14 mile distance of the route.

I struggled a little to start again after walking, but did run a little less than a mile again in a couple of stints when I restarted. So I think I ran about 13 miles in total, walking one male. Target (b) hit. The time was about the same as last time - I'm not sure why, but I'm not really that bothered about times apart from as a guide. I think my walking was quite slow as I seemed to have a little less left in my tank when I stopped, but am still on target for sub 5 hours if I can keep this up.

Best of all, I beat the weather. As I crawled upstairs and ran a hot bath I heard very stormy winds lashing rain and sleet against the windows. Half of me wouldn't have minded running in the rain as I haven't done that yet - would not want to try it for the first time at Silverstone in one week's time ...