STILL RUNNING........ by Firefly123

..... I managed to squeeze in a long run last Friday - the snow that arrived on Saturday night would have made running on Sunday quite a challenge. Even on Monday morning it was very difficult - some bits of pavement were ice-free but others were still covered with packed snow and Ealing Common had pockets of freezing standing water.  So a very slow 5 miles was done with very wet and cold feet at the end.

But I'm getting ahead of myself!

Last week started with 4 miles of tempo running with a mile warm-up and cool down either end.  I worked hard and managed my temp runs at around 9 minute miling, whichi is good for me.  Then there was a fartlek session at the track in the evening.  All in all, a good days work.  The rest of the week consisted of easy running until Friday's long one which should have been 16 but turned into 20, albeit very slow miles. One in the bag.

I've been leading the Run England group on a Saturday for the last few weeks, so I planned an easy 3 mile circular route and was joined by Bernie and Anne.

No running club on Monday, as the track didn't pass it's safety inspection, so I took the opportunity of reasonably fresh legs, to chalk up another long run on Tuesday.  

Locals to West London, and those of you who I see on FB, will know that we have the inaugural Ealing Half Marathon in September.  I know the route very well, as it comprises routes around Ealing that I've run on for years.  However, I felt it my duty to run the route, as set and report back.

I jogged the 1.5 miles to Lammas Park, where it's due to start, re-set the Garmin and off I trotted.  The route starts with a very gentle upwards incline (so gentle that if you weren't familiar with the roads, you wouldn't know it was there).  On to the Uxbridge Road and then up past the Town Hall on Longfield Road (slightly more of an incline) and onto Casltebar Hill. Up the hill and then down past St Bendicts than slightly up again before a left turn by Montpelier School.  Down a bit then up again back to the top of Caslebar Hill then a lovely down hill stretch to Greenford Avnue, which is a tough hill to climb. A brief down hill bit until a steady upwards incline to Highview Road and then another short hill - but at least you get to go down the other side...........only to turn to a parallel road and run up again! The route then loops around the roads around where I live before a steep climb to the top of the Corfton Road, that's tough at mile 10!  Finally, other than a slight incline up Mount Park Road, the remainder of the route inclines downwards back to Lammas Park, with a brief loop into Walpole Park.  

For the record, I covered the distance in 2:15:22.  It's certainly not a PB course, but I hope lots of people run it anyway and you can all come back to my house for tea and cake afterwards!

So what with the jog at the start and a few miles at the end - another 20  miles done.

The track was back open last night, so we did an ORegon Circuit run (250mtrs run followed by an exercise of some description).  It was bitterly cold, but the legs didn't feel too bad.  

Day off today though - I thought I'd have a rest!