A spot of encouragement to peer at, and be grateful for.
After Saturday’s panting plod, that I did at least get through, I chanced my arm with 4½ miles or so along the canal yesterday. The sun had switched itself off by the time I got out, leaving nothing but that cold grey glow to warm my spirits. It wasn’t enough. After 2 miles I jettisoned the dream of a cheeky 7 or 8 miler, and settled for the towpath version of my round-the-block standard. In the final mile, I had to walk for a couple of minutes. It’s shocking how much fitness can be lost in so short a time. A week or two of minimal exercise I can deal with, but when it’s shot through with comfort eating and weekday alcohol, a kind of debilitating lethargy ambushes you and sucks dry the endorphin store.
Luckily, I’ve been doing this long enough to know that the zest isn’t destroyed; just hidden. It takes a little while to find it, but it’s there alright. Tonight I picked up a couple more clues in the hunt. A day of unprocessed food, water, and an energetic hour in the gym (including 20 minutes of hard treadmill intervals), helped to get me feeling that I am at least now pointing in the right direction.
I’ll be OK. The training schedule needs rethinking. The sort of rethinking that’s done with a sledgehammer. From here, it’s marathon training the pragmatic way. And let’s face it, it always is with me, where the unexpected and unscheduled is actually the norm, if only I’d accept that. No matter. It’s recoverable. I’ve entered the Finchley 20 mile race, and have 3 weeks and 6 days to get in shape for it. On Wednesday, after another cross-training day tomorrow, I’ll try again to snatch that cheeky 7 mile tempo run. Thursday I’m in Nottingham, so may as well write that off as a rest day. Depending how work goes, I may try to check off the long run on Friday. I work weekends at the moment in any case, so it doesn’t make much difference. Not sure what sort of distance I can reasonably aim for. Wednesday’s ‘sorta long’ run, as the great Hal Higdon would have it, will tell me what to aim at. Anything in double digits I’d grab. Then on Saturday morning, perhaps an hour in the gym, and an easy recovery run on Sunday. That would be the perfect running week for me. If I manage something similar to that, I’ll be sound.
