Monday 30 May 2011

Getting back into the swing...

though still getting blown away by gales!!
Saturday was really stormy again so my first run since the marathon was 5km in the gym, I just couldn't face the thought of battling the winds again. It was much better than I thought it might have been, reasonably "easy" and comfortable. Sunday morning was the Race for Life here at Stirling University and some of the girls from Bootcamp were doing it for their first ever race and I wanted to go along and support them. This meant that my planned long run had to be done earlyish but I was up at 7am without needing an alarm so we had breakfast and got ready. We parked the car at the university which is actually in Bridge of Allan not Stirling proper, this was a good move as later on it was absolutely chock a block!
I ran with John for the first mile and he turned off to go up onto Sherriffmuir and the back road to Dunblane, I kept on the main road and we met each other at the start of Dunblane, it was nice to say "hello and see you back at the car" :-)
Once into Dunblane I had a couple of options, into the town itself then back the way I'd come or to reverse John's route back to Bridge of Allan, I chose the latter and I am so glad I did! It had taken me the first hour to feel that my legs had shaken off the residual tiredness and stiffness from last weekend's efforts but the second half of the run was fantastic, the sun was out and I ran down through woods at the side of a gorge, you can hear the Allan Water tumbling way down at the bottom of the gorge, and the sun dappling through the leaves was really pretty.
Once I came out of the woods, the wind hit me full in the face again - weird as it had been in my face on the way up the road so should by rights have been behind me on the way back... Sod's law I am just fated to battle the winds this weather :-) Still I got a good 14km into my legs.
I made it back to the car with about 10min to spare before the start of the race so we watched the start then got a well earned coffee while we waited for them to get back to the finish.
The sun shone for most of the time, just starting to rain again as it was drawing to a close and we got home before it blew in too badly.
Well done to Trish, Debbie and Cheryl for their efforts yesterday!
I went to the gym at lunch time today for a wee half hour session but had wakened this morning with really tight stiff calf muscles so didn't push them too hard, I did 1mile on the elliptical trainer then 3 tough miles on the bike.
Am off to apply the Stick now! It hurts but it does help...

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