My first ‘long run’ day of the marathon programme calls for 6 miles. (Everything is relative. For a novice runner, 6 miles is a long run.) It’s not a good experience. I have a recurring problem with chest pains, and have to keep stopping to walk. “Chest pains?! My God! You’re mad!” is the usual sort of reaction I get when I mention this to people. But I don’t think it’s quite as dangerous as it sounds. It’s an ache that appears around the left hand side of my ribcage. It feels like a stitch, but in the wrong place. I’m beginning to think it might be related to alcohol. Certainly the last 3 times this has happened has followed an evening of beer and/or wine. It’s infuriating that I can’t find a definite pattern though. It ruins a run. There’s no continuity. It prevents a rhythm developing, and reduces the sense of achievement. I ran, on and off, for 80 minutes today. I should feel great about this, and about running for 6 miles, but the stop-start pattern makes it seem like not a ‘proper’ run. In that 80 minute period, I had to stop 10 times to walk off the pain.
The route I’d chosen took me along minor roads with little traffic. It should have been a perfect piece of therapy for urban man. A quiet, early Sunday morning run in the Cotswolds. No one about apart from a chap delivering newspapers by car, who kept popping up in front of me rather implausibly, like an apprentice undercover policeman on surveillance duty.
It’s cold again. As usual, the first few minutes are miserable and debilitating, but soon enough the life-saving warmth appears. It’s like waiting for some pain-killing drug to take effect.
A rest day tomorrow, then another 3 x 3 milers in the coming week. Looks like no alcohol for the time being, to see if that deals with the chest problem.
