1000 race miles in 2016 update

By the time I finish Liverpool half on Sunday I’ll have raced 187 miles for MS so far this year.  It was meant to be more but I’ve had a couple of bad weeks.  I did three races in two days at the end of February (Preston parkrun, Stanley Park 10k and Oulton Park half) but I was too ill to be able to do Groundhog marathon.  I love running on the track and I’d been looking forward to the race for a long long time so I was pretty gutted not to be able to go and run but as much as I tried to fight it (and the husband) I had to admit defeat because when you can’t see, move or talk you can’t go and run 105.5 laps of a running track.  It’s probably the first major race I’ve missed out on because of my illness which just made a bad week even worse.  I was already pretty frustrated because I couldn’t go and meet my friend Suzie’s new baby and I had to give up my trying to go and see Goodnight Mr Tom (had a really great seat too).  I don’t really get depressed (I think I watch too much Disney or something) but last week I came pretty close I think.  Running is the only time that I feel like my old self so it’s pretty tough when I can’t do it.

Missing a race might have been a good thing for me though.  so far this year I’ve raced 165 miles but I’d only done 47 miles of non-race running which isn’t that great. I haven’t found how to get back into training runs after a race yet and I haven’t actually been enjoying training runs.  On Tuesday I was starting to feel well enough to run (I actually walked the dog, made my own lunch and used a fork which is a pretty good day for me) so I decided to go for a run.  I was just going to do a few miles but then I kept adding on and adding on.  I stopped for a shoe selfie at a very pretty spot that I always forget about even though it’s right near my house, went down two roads I’d never travelled before (one of which is a great hilly alternative to playing chicken with the cars on Red Lane) and ended up running 10 miles.   My longest training run this year and I really enjoyed it, especially since it’s still not dark at 6pm now.  I was running along the canal at 5pm just really happy that I could run along next to the canal at 5pm.  Even the thought of having to race 47 miles in a few weeks didn’t scare me (although it does a bit now).

Still to come: