Realism and Hope...

Well, I've withdrawn from the Fellsman - that glorious 60 miles of insanity that has driven me to some insane things the last couple of years.  I just know that given how crap my training for a half marathon has been, picking it up and adding in hills by the end of April just won't be enough to make me feel comfortable in pushing the envelope that far...

This is one of those times where I will not regret not doing something, partly because I know the pain I could cause myself, and more importantly taking on that course in less than 100% confidence that I can give it a good go is a risk not just to me but to the excellent (and volunteer) organisers and safety teams.  I never want to be the muppet who gets into trouble due to bravado and arrogance and ends up drawing a team off from someone who needs more help.

So, the dynamic duo of me and my walking mate will not be doing the hard work that weekend, but the thoughts are turning to training, some proper long walks and hopefully an injury and flu free year.

Which brings me to hope, a week of gentle walking in North Wales didn't bring on a relapse, a week in London with little time to run did involve some longish walks to blow the cobwebs away from my gently melting brain (two days on a course on horizon scanning and futures... anyone's mind would've melted). 

Long walks yesterday, followed by a proper run - a real live run, taking in one of Run England's new routes - all I will say is that in 13km I managed to get 170m of height gain in, not great height gain for one of my fell jogs but for an urban jog on tarmac as prep for the Cambridge Half???? (That's 8 miles, and 500ft, and for those who don't know the Cambridge Half has no hills, it has two small bridges).

I've had false dawns in this weird series of misadventures which seem to stretch back to the middle of last year... Let's hope that this is the real one, apart from anything else I should be getting my exercise test through shortly.

TTFN

Paul

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