Nothing too exciting to report on the non-running front. Trying to get some projects moved forward and trying to kick off some new ones. Will be busy over the next couple of days, but that’s all good.

It got to about lunchtime today and I thought that it would be wise to get out before having some lunch which would then probably sit heavy on my stomach. It didn’t feel like that long since I’d had breakfast. The weather looked glorious too.

It turned out that the weather may have looked delightful, but it was blooming cold. It took a mile or so to warm up.

The route is one that I’d meant to try a week ago, around the back down Narrow Moss Lane, then back along Pippin Street and High Lane (the long mile). 

The route is ideal, comes in at just over 4 miles, so it should be fine for this point in the training schedule. The only problem is that it is essentially downhill for half the run and then uphill for the return. The decision being whether to have a gentle uphill run, or a steeper one. I chose the gentle, clockwise route.

The training plan said four miles easy. Given my recent times at that distance I thought that it would be in the 50-odd minute range. I was made up when I got to two miles at 22 minutes. The uphill half took its toll and it was 46 minutes in total, but I’m very happy with that. It didn’t seem to be too hard and I didn’t get out of breath which is my usual problem.

Onwards and upwards, I’d say.

The other surprise was that I seem to have lost 10lbs somewhere along the way. This is in the last week. Given my parmo and beer consumption over the weekend, this is a bit of a surprise. I weighed myself on three different occasions through the day and I’m confident that it’s right. Just a bit of a surprise. Probably a function of the longer runs and properly doing the weights. Half of that was put on over Christmas, so I’m in a better place than I was a month ago. This is good.