Even though the title of today's blog is a bit long winded, it was actually cut down from:
'Run With Lostock / Over 50 Miles This Week / Uncle Duncle / Garmin and Strava Discrepancies / Missed Race / No Regrets / Knackered!'
So much going on!
All week I had been set on doing the Radcliffe 10k today because it's in the club championship. However, over the past couple of days I started to talk myself out of it and not because of my usual nerves this time but because I'm sick of running races feeling unfit and I really want to get some good training under my belt before tackling my next race so that I can give it my all and be strong. I don't want to just keep winning things in the club championship due to being the only lady at the race, but due to being a good runner with competition from other club members. I'm not going to pursue the championship this year and try to get myself really strong for the next cross country season and next year's championship.
I did the Radcliffe 10k two years ago and I'm pretty confident I could have got my time down had I done it today, but not down enough for me to be happy.
I set my 10k PB 18 months ago (49.21) and when I next do a 10k I hope to be able to do it much faster than this and today wasn't the day for trying as, for me, it's been a very hard week of training and I'm feeling pretty tired.
My decision on not racing today was fully made though when Duncan became an uncle for the first time yesterday! His sister had a baby girl so we're going to see them both in a bit. Does this make me an auntie or do we have to be married for that?
I must admit though, I did feel a bit guilty for not doing the race so I wanted to do another tough training session today to make up for it. I went along to bottom barn at 8am to meet up with the Lostock lot for their weekly 12 mile trail run. I sat waiting in my car and at about 8.03 I saw John Parker running by the front of the barn so I thought that maybe he hadn't known I was there and nobody else had turned up so he had set off on his own. I got out of my car and went to run after him but then a bloke looking like a runner pulled up in the car park. I asked whether he was here from Lostock AC and he said he was and his name was Brian. He said John would have just nipped to the loo and won't have set off on his own yet. He was right and along John came.
After a brief natter with Albert who was at his mum's for breakfast (he is so spoilt!) we set off around Anglezarke and into White Coppice. From White Coppice we ran into Brinscall which is somewhere I haven't run before so that was nice. After a big loop around we ended up back at White Coppice and went back round Anglezarke back towards Rivington .
I was being pulled along at a much faster pace than I'm used to on a long run. Strava stats don't show a particularly fast pace (overall 9.53 pace) but that's because we had a few moments of jogging when coming up to gates for catching up and also we jogged for a while whilst waiting for John who had gone back a bit to find his dropped gloves so these bits dragged average pace down but if you move along the line on Strava (if you're really bored and have nothing better to do) you can see that a lot of the pace was between 7.5 and 8.5 minute miling which is pretty nippy for me on a long run.
It was hard work but it's what I need if I ever want to get faster and I really enjoyed it. Will definitely be joining them again.
This is my third run into double figure mileage this week, putting my total weekly mileage at 51.7, the furthest I have ever run in a week (I usually run around 30 to 35 miles a week).
Definitely no regrets about missing the race today as I'm feeling great after my tough run. Thanks John and Brian, you have definitely done me some good!
Finally, I was discussing with Gary the other night the differences between Garmin and Strava stats which I find bizarre when they come from the same watch. As an example, I have set out below a couple of stats on today's run from both Garmin and Strava:
Strava Garmin
Elevation 913 791
Calories 1,504 1,249
Moving Time 2.10.06 2.14.54
Elapsed Time 2.15.35 2.15.44
Total distance - 13.2 miles
https://www.strava.com/activities/283777183/overview
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