There was a (young) lady who swallowed a fly

If you're wondering why she swallowed that fly...

...it's because that fly decided to fly into her mouth while she was running today.

Mark (as I spat it out on horror): You'll have to get used to that. That happens a lot while you're running. Just swallow 'em down: it's all protein.

Me: Bleurghhh!!!

Happy as I am that Spring (or, hey, we could even call it Summer at the moment) has arrived, it brings with it certain conditions that are making running training a bit more difficult. The first, as I discovered this morning to my cost, is the sudden appearance of buzzing hoards of flies who seem to want to set up residence in my mouth. The second is the heat. Running in hot, bright sunlight is not fun for solar-phobes like me. I like shade! Shade!!

Still, with much encouragement from Mark, I managed to drag myself out in it this morning. It wasn't easy. My health still isn't really 100% and there were a few moments where I felt like I couldn't go on. Luckily for me, I had Mark there to chivvy me along and offer words of advice and encouragement where necessary.

I felt quite down on myself during the run and a little despairing that I will ever be able to make the 8.5 miles of the Great Midlands Fun Run without stopping (especially as there are now only a few weeks to go). However, despite all this negativity and hopelessness, I actually managed to run just over 7K and in a pretty good time as well.

I think I may need to step up my training a bit over the next few weeks if I want to fulfil my goal of running the whole 8.5 miles without stopping to walk. Happily, though, that goal doesn't seem quite as unattainable as it did earlier today. I think I just need to try and build up some momentum.

Anyway, stats for this run:

Distance: 7.25K
Time: 1 hour 3 minutes and 24 seconds
Average K pace: 8 minutes 44 seconds

One step at a time

Things seemed to have stalled a little these past few weeks.

I think this is because I'd sort of lost my confidence after my last training run. So much so in fact, that it has taken me until today - 20 whole days - to attempt another one.

I haven't been being *completely* lazy in all that time and have done a bit of cross-training to try and 'keep my hand in' (for want of a better phrase) but I have felt quite guilty that I have effectively been neglecting my training. Especially since so many lovely, kind people have gone to the trouble and expense of sponsoring me.

There has been the odd opportunity to go out and run but I have kept finding reasons - it's raining, I think I'm coming down with a cold, it'll be getting dark soon (to name but a few) - to talk myself out of going.

Today, however, I figured that enough was enough. My lovely boys had gone off to watch the football, leaving me a few hours alone and providing me with an excellent opportunity to take myself off for a 'getting-myself-back-into-the-swing-of-things' training run.

If I'm honest, I wasn't feeling hugely enthusiastic or confident and I set off with a bit of an anxious feeling in the pit of my stomach. I think I was worried a) that I would feel ill again and be forced to stop *again* and b) that I would feel stupid/embarrassed running on my own without Mark  and that the whole experience would just be an exercise in public humiliation*.

In the end, it wasn't bad at all. I don't know how far I went, as I didn't take Mark's magic stop-watch with me, but I would guess it was around the 3K mark. I was back home within half an hour and, apart from my face going bright red and my head feeling like it was full of fast-flowing lava, I don't seem to have suffered any ill effects.

True, this sort of distance is hardly making the same sort of headway as my 5-miler a few weeks back but that wasn't really the point. I did this run as a way of getting over my anxiety and lack of confidence and proving to myself that I could carry on even when things get tough.

Happily, I think it might have worked :-).

*Yes, I can be pretty melodramatic about these things sometimes!