Racing (Running)

Wednesday 20 May 2009 02:11PM

Life’s been a bit hectic for the last month or so. I had a load of work on, which coincided with some Msc work and moving into a new house in the Peak District. But that last fact, bringing an end to my nomadicism, promises a bit less stress in the future.

One thing that I found about being constantly on the move was that I got ill a lot. I seemed to be in an endless cycle – I would start a training programme full of enthusiasm for how well I was going to run and climb in the summer, then two weeks later I’d have to have another week or two off with a cold. I guess the combination of sleeping on sofas, not eating properly and constantly exposing myself to unfamiliar germ populations, on top of trying to train hard, was a bit too much. So I’ve enjoyed being able to put in two good weeks of running training since moving in, and my running seems to be improving with it. First up was the second British fell running champs race at Stuc a ‘Chroin near Strathyre (I’d missed the first race in Ireland), where I had a funny run, most of the early part of the race I felt dreadful but then got a decent “second wind” near the summit of Stuc itself and pulled through to 13th overall on the descent. I finished 11 minutes after the winner and was reasonably pleased with this as a first race back. The following weekend I was at a friend’s wedding in Preston, and it seemed a good idea the next morning to go and do the Buttermere Sailbeck race. Again I spent a good chunk of the race feeling dreadful (copious amounts of wedding punch no doubt contributed to this) but again got a decent second wind and pulled through from about 10th at halfway to finish 4th. Some pics from the race here.

It seems that fitness for me manifests itself as an increasing proportion of the race that I feel like I’m actually racing, rather than just surviving, so the last two races have been heartening. Saturday at Fairfield I had only a short “grim” section, before descending well to finish 5th behind a very impressive performance from Rob Jebb, who got within a minute of the course record in cold and windy weather. Then yesterday in a short local race I felt good pretty much the whole way, having a good tussle with my landlord Jon Morgan but managing to drop him near the end to finish second.

Once I’m up to feeling like I’m racing the whole race, the next step is to make the racing faster…

I’m still trying to work out what running challenges to focus on for the summer, whether to try and complete the British champs, or do the Lake District classic series instead, and trying to decide between a handfull of “bigger” ideas.

Oh, and there’s lots of climbing to be done in the peak district too, if it ever stops raining!