A Day At Home

am: Easy 75 mins on the golf course and canal
pm: Drills
10.5mi

So the plan was to sleep in as late as I could. I went to bed about 2230 and was woken up by my Dad at 0930; that's a pretty long sleep. I felt ok, a lot more refreshed than when I've been stumbling around the house, tripping over dogs and knocking over vases for the last week. I got some breakfast and tried to work out if there was a way of recording the Daegu grand prix but there wasn't as it was online/red-button. I was planning on absolutely shuffling this morning so running with Phil & 'Mad' Martin Sanders was good. We were out of the door at 1115 and I was not looking forward to negotiating 75 mins (I've moved my training around a little this week due to a Sunday race). I felt terrible immediately today, just pretty tired. I got going after a mile or so and then felt ok just moving along at an easy pace. I had a long discussion with Martin about marathon running as he wants to get back to 100mi a week and have a good go at running 2.25-2.30 next April; fair play to him. I split off after 30 mins or so and headed for the canal. After about 40 mins I made the commitment to do at least 70 mins by going out to the far bridge near Methley. When I got to the apex of the hill just before it I felt very tired and the rest of the run I had to concentrate on running slowly enough to keep my HR down as it was harder to control than usual. It was pretty windy today and quite hot and humid so I think that is why my HR was a little higher. Phil was unconcerned by it so I am too. Didn’t do strides as I had to eke out the last 5 mins as it was; strides would have been worthless! I watched some athletics and did a bit of stretching over lunch as I had to wait for the plumber to come and go. Once he'd left I ran a hot bath and set up my laptop so I could watch '1968: Black Power Salute' on iplayer. I didn't know half the stuff that was on the documentary so it was a really interesting watch. I watched a couple of old One Tree Hill episodes, put dinner on and then went to do drills. The plan was to jog down or walk down to the canal with the dogs, let them off so they could run around a bit, do my drills session for half an hour or so and jog/walk home. It didn't quite turn out that way. The dogs were very excited when I asked if they wanted to go out but this lasted just a minute or so. Alfie, my King Charles Spaniel, decided after 30 secs of jogging that he wanted to go home so he dug his claws in to the ground and coughed like he was being choked. Embarrassingly this was in front of someone I knew, their helpful input was 'I don't think he wants to go!' I kept trying and for a brief period of 15 seconds Alfie started sprinting down the hill, only to slam the brakes on and begin yelping. I carried him for a bit and tried again but he got worse! I gave up. When both dogs realised we were going towards home they sprinted flat out for the entire 3 mins, so proving that it was pure laziness that caused their behaviour. I did the same drills session from Font Romeu on the drive in my back garden instead. I felt pretty good doing these and had expected to be a bit tired from this morning’s run but I was ok and think I did them pretty well. I had a beef dinner and then watched a new show on Sky One called 'Strike Back' and was very impressed. Writing this blog I have realised that essentially, all I did today was train and watch TV; it was a good day. I went to bed for 1030 to try and get back into a sleeping pattern.