"In Training" I proudly declared in the title of my last post. Seems a long way back now, November of last year.

Within the limitations of how far we're allowed to go, for what feels like an awful long time now here in Wales (we've been under current restrictions 3 weeks longer than our friends across the border) there is only really The Moss where we can get a nice run from our front door. Despite a nice narrow woodland trail that loops around the edge of the golf course, formed more from ball retrieval than being an actual path, there is only so much I can take of going over the same ground again and again and again. I ventured onto the roads for a bit of variety in my runs.

Mistake.

Should have known it would be. The will of the gods it seems is that as soon as I open my mouth to suggest anything resembling progress in my running, I will be brought to an abrupt halt by a flare up in my previous injuries, and so it came to pass.

A 2 mile run, then a 6 mile run on nasty tarmac, up flared the old achilles and everything ground to a stop. It had to.

April 17th (I think) is supposed to be the Shropshire Way 80k - I wasn't intending to go as far as that, but the marathon distance  "Mammothon" was supposed to be my first running challenge since COVID kicked all my previous plans into touch. I doubt very much there'll be any chance of doing that now. Who even knows if it will be able to legally go ahead by then?

I feel like I daren't even talk about other plans, other races, other possibilities right now, so all I can really say is perhaps I'll just write about it when it happens.

Motivation has been pretty much dead with the combination of having nowhere different to go, nothing to knowingly train for, no opportunity to enjoy the little races inbetween, nobody to properly socialise with, not being able to see my family - kids included - and having old injuries flaring up again, so even the restorative powers of Yoga haven't been explored as fully as might usually be the case.

Anyways, we managed to find our way to some lovely walks over the Christmas period, so not all of it's been bad, and in terms of "time on feet" at least, I'm not too far behind where I hoped that I would be - it's just all at walking pace, that's all.

I'm at a point now where I can thrash out half an hour on the bike before the achilles starts grumbling too much, that is something I can build on, just need to see how it goes from here.

Once I can get back amongst my mountains, everything will be fine.