Weekend of Long Runs

My plan for this weekend was to run two long runs of about 20 miles.  On Saturday I opted to run the loop that takes me east out of Cambridge and through the villages of Bottisham, Swaffham Bulbeck and Swaffham Prior, then towards the river Cam and following that back to Cambridge.  I plodded along at a nice comfortable pace and hardly passed another person.  It was quite a nice morning, reasonably warm for October with no wind, it seemed strange that others weren't out to take advantage of such a nice day.  Once I was within 4 miles of Cambridge and on the tow path alongside the Cam I encountered a couple of other runners, a few cyclists and there was a number of boat crews warming up for some race that was about to start.  I arrived home feeling quite happy with how the run had gone.  My average pace worked out at 7 minutes 25 seconds per mile, which wasn't bad for a route that was half off road.

Today, by contrast, I felt awful.  It was the only time I've had the opportunity to do two long runs, so it shouldn't have been any surprise to discover that it was going to be tough.  As soon as I set off my legs seemed to be complaining, and willed me to turn around and spend the morning on the sofa.  But I ploughed on.  I told myself that after 20 to 30 minutes I'd be feeling fine, and sure enough my legs did start to loosen up as I pressed on.  My destination this time was the Roman Road that heads south-east out of Cambridge.

It was a beautiful morning.  I was practically running straight towards the rising sun with clear blue skies in front of me.  When I got to about 5 miles from home I felt a few spots of rain.  It didn't seem likely that the rain would turn heavy as it was still a lovely autumn morning, with bright sunshine bearing down on me.  But a short time later the heavens opened and I was soaked by a deluge of rain.  I looked over my shoulder and behind me the sky was as black as night, whilst ahead was still blue sky and sunshine.  I had clearly been running just ahead of a weather front which was now overtaking me.  One minute I was feeling blessed by the great weather, the next I was cursing myself for not checking the weather forecast.  I continued on my way but as I got more and more soaked I started to negotiate with myself for an earlier turnaround point from the one I had planned.  So rather than running to 10 miles from home, I continued until I reached the highest point on the Roman Road and turned back from there, just over 8 miles from home.

On the return run parts of the track had turned into small rivers.  I couldn't remember a time when I'd been on a training run in such bad weather.  I'm sure there must have been, but it must have been a long time ago.  The return leg of the run turned into a long hard trudge, and a battle of wills.  My legs felt terrible and it took a huge amount of will power to keep them turning over at what felt like a slow run.  There was no way of bailing out of the run, but if there had been one I might well have taken it.  I arrived back home feeling knackered, soaked through and cold.  I had run 16.5 miles, and my pace was about 1 minute per mile slower than the previous day. For some reason I felt quite demoralized by this.

Thankfully, we were meeting friends for a Sunday lunch time feast in a village pub, so I didn't spend much time dwelling on my feelings of defeat.  The 89 mile Druid Challenge is now just three weeks away.  I can't really do anymore significant training between now and then, so I will have to just hope that I have done enough to get me through.

Great Eastern And A Wee Run To Ely

Ahh, it felt good to be doing some proper running again.  I've been feeling a little broken over the last two weeks and as a consequence haven't done much running.  But I feel almost on the mend thanks to the healing hands of Mike Power at Cambridge Sports Massage and some diligent foam rolling and foot massage with firm and spiky massage balls.

In four weeks time I hope to run the Druid Challenge along the Ridgeway footpath.  This will involve covering 89 miles in 3 days, so roughly 30 miles a day.  For me to believe I could do this I really needed to do some long runs this weekend to test how my foot/leg was feeling.

Today I ran in the Great Eastern Half Marathon, which turned out to be cold, windy and wet, but I was happy to finish in a time of 1 hour 26 minutes.  I knew many people taking part in the Great Eastern, so it was quite a social occasion. One friend, Viona, had even bought some large chocolate gold coins to award some of us at the finish, which was a nice treat.  Here's a few photos:

About 1 mile from the finish

Me and Jo with our medals

Chris, me, Jo and Sonia with our 'Gold' medals.

Any normal person would rest for at least one day before running a half marathon.  But as I said, I have a multi-day ultra coming up, so I needed to do at least two longish runs this weekend.  So on Saturday I ran just short of 18 miles from home to Ely, mostly following the river Cam.  I'd normally run along the north bank of the river, but decided to stick to the south side for a change.  I discovered that the conditions are a little more rough to the south, as the path is obviously not as well used, so at times the going was quite tough.  I had to plough through sections over grown with nettles and thorns and, even though I had long running trousers on, I now have a slight rash to my legs as a result. Hurmph!

I decided it might be interesting to take a photo at each mile on the route. This slowed me down slightly, but that wasn't necessarily a bad thing.  I only have photos from mile 2 onwards, as I hadn't come up with this idea at the one mile point.  So here is what every mile on the route to Ely looks like from mile 2 onwards:

Mile 2 - Stourbridge Common

Mile 3 - Fen Ditton

Mile 3 again - view from the King's Head in Fen Ditton

Mile 4 (just after) - Bates Bite Lock, Milton

Mile 5 - 1 mile north of Milton

Mile 6 - approaching the bridge near Waterbeach

Mile 7 - approaching Bottisham Lock

Mile 8 - amongst the long grass

Mile 9 - literally, the middle of nowhere

Mile 10 - yes, it's the Fens!

Mile 11 - a field near Upware - no river to be seen.

Mile 12 - grass track approaching Dimmock's Cote

Mile 13 - the river is definitely to the left somewhere

Mile 14 - there's the river again - Marina near Stretham

Mile 15 - first glimpse of Ely Cathedral. Can you see it?

Mile 16 - and the Cathedral is a little larger

Mile 17 - Cathedral amongst the trees - just less than 1 mile to go

Once I reached Ely I headed straight to the train station where I had a slice of fruit cake and a hot chocolate whilst I waited for the train to Cambridge.  Then I had a final 1.5 miles to run back to my house, which was the hardest 1.5 miles of the weekend.  My legs had completely seized up on the train.

I am certainly feeling the mileage right now, but on the whole I'm feeling pretty good.  I will be aiming to do two longer runs next weekend.

I have one final thing to report for those who aren't too squeamish.  My battered and blood blistered toenail that turned black after the Swiss Mountainman Ultra has finally fallen off, 57 days after the event.  You probably didn't want to know that, but it is part of being an ultra runner so I felt compelled to share it with you.  Be thankful I haven't uploaded a photo.