The third challenge by michael_h

It's been 3 weeks since I last posted but all in all it's been a very good 3 weeks. My recovery from the calf injury I picked up at the last Yateley 10K was textbook stuff. RICE regularly in the first two days, wait until the pain and swelling had gone, gentle stretches to start, slowly building up the strength and then ... wait another few days before running. And that last bit is maybe the key for me.

So, much more quickly than expected, just 2 weeks and 6 days after picking up the injury, I was back out for a gentle 2-mile jog. Since then 5 more runs have been completed, 7.5 miles in my first week back, 9 miles in the second, not at any great pace - until today ... but more of that later - but I'm really pleased to have got back so quickly and especially so given that I don't appear to have lost too much fitness.

Todays run, however, does need some explanation. It was planned as a 4 mile LSR and my normal routine for this length of run on a Sunday sees me rise at 7am, have a quick bowl of porridge, use the facilities, and then I'm out at 9am. I was very late to bed Friday night - it was the early hours of Saturday morning by the time I made it to bed - so with very little sleep that night I overslept on Sunday morning. Consequently, I was in a bit of a rush this morning and missed one vital part of my normal routine ... the use of facilities.

The run was going as planned with 11:20 for the first mile and 11:12 for the second when I realised that I really needed to use the said facilities. It was at this point that the LSR became a tempo run as I became more and more desperate and the third mile was completed in 9:43. By this stage, I really was VERY desperate to go. Now, I don't know how many of you have tried running with clenched buttocks but I can assure you it's not a natural running style ... especially when you're sprinting ... as my tempo run had now become a speedwork session. I so nearly gave in and wandered off down a couple of public footpaths and I can't tell how tempting the bus shelter shelter looked ... we're talking REALLY desperate.

I normally leave a third of a mile at the end of a run to warm down with a gentle walk home ... not this time. I just kept sprinting straight past my warm-down point .... straight up my garden path pausing only briefly to open my front door ... before sprinting to the loo past my startled (but later very amused) wife. I'm never been so relieved. I completed that last mile in 8:32 but what really tells the story is my maximum recorded heart rate is now 3 beats higher than previously recorded, now standing at 190!

Having restarted my running so well, I'm definitely now aiming to be ready to run a sub-60 minute time at the Fleet 10K toward the end of October.

In other news, much to my amusement I retained my title of King of the Carrots by winning first prize at the Village Produce show and was joined by my wife as Queen of the Peppers. My son achieved the A-Level results he needed to read Politics at Royal Holloway, Univeristy of London ... well he can't do any worse than the current bunch of politicians ... and my daughter (hope you're reading this, Cara) has done really well in a tough market to find a couple of good part-time jobs in the legal profession ... I'm sure that training contract will follow soon!

Enjoy you're running!