Winding down

Much less mileage this week - partly intentionally in preparation for next Sunday's half marathon, but partly due to work getting in the way. Just one midweek outing to Hyde Park for a speedy 4 mile lap at 8m:40 mile pace, and a leisurely 9 mile run round Inverleith in Edinburgh yesterday during a visit back home for my Mum's birthday.

So the 85 miles I ran during February brings me to a total for the year of 163.6 miles.

This week the plan is for some shorter, more gentle runs on Tuesday-Thursday and then rest until race day.

A marathon week

A new record distance at Greenwich yesterday - my plan said 11 miles, I set out to do 12 (6 full laps) but I felt strong at the end so added another small lap to complete 13 miles for the first time, in 2 hours 5 minutes. I was running pretty slowly by the end but to run the race distance two weeks before the real event is a great boost. And a pretty good time too - averaging 9:37 minute miles. On an allegedly fast and flat course in Milton Keynes I might come close to beating 2 hours.

Today a very gentle and stiff-legged 3 mile jog around Dulwich, which, added to a couple of speedy 5 mile lunchtime runs in Hyde Park brings my total for the week to a nice round 26 miles.

Total for the year is now 150.6 miles - well ahead of schedule. In fact at my current rate of progress I'll pass 1000 miles for the year!

Hertfordshire

In Hertfordshire this weekend visiting Sophie's parents for New Year. Yesterday we went for what turned out to be a 10.5 mile run around the nearby villages on a mixture of muddy footpaths, minor roads and occasional main roads.

We made a lot of stops - for various reasons - so not all of the miles count under the "rules" of the challenge, but it was still a good workout, with some small hills and the conditions underfoot making it "interesting" in places, and we were running for about 2 hours 11 minutes in total.

Today we did a part of the same route for a 4 mile round trip.

Earlier in the week I had a couple of runs in Hyde Park - a nice fast 5 miles on Tuesday at just under 9 minute mile pace, and an intervals run on Wednesday where I planned to do 9 x 400m but only managed 6 in the end. Thursday I was feeling pretty knackered so I decided to give myself an extra rest day.

So my total for the week was just under 19 miles, bringing me up to 124.5 for the year so far.

100 miles+

Another good week - 27 miles in total:

Tuesday: 4.5 miles in Hyde Park;
Wednesday: a 40 minute tempo run in Hyde Park for another 4.5 miles;
Thursday: an easy 3 miles in Hyde Park;
Saturday: 5 laps of Greenwich for 10 miles;
Today: 5 laps of Dulwich for 5 miles.

Encouragingly for my chances of beating 2 hours for the half marathon on 7th March I managed the 10 miles at hilly Greenwich in under 100 minutes, and averaged just over 9 minutes per mile for the 5 miles at Dulwich, and both my times my last lap was my fastest.

Total for the year now: 106 miles.