On the 5th of September I decided to jump back on the 7.11 train heading West to Cardiff. This time I would head to Bath Spa and navigate myself to Brickfields parkrun. The surroundings and route looked familiar as I jogged along the side of the river. I couldn’t quite work out why though.
I found the parkrun with very little time to spare and no time for some strides or quick sprints, so I just did a few stretches and took a gel as I hadn’t eaten anything yet. I put my rucksack on the grass and gathered for the briefing. It wasn’t long before we were off and running around a field. The grass was a bit wet and slippery in the pro 4’s on some of the corners but after running 2 loops of the field, we were running downhill into a wooded area.
Soon would come a lovely concrete path and over a bridge we went. I had looked at the times here and they were quite fast. Lots of speedies.
Then came the hill.. and boy did it go on.. and on..
6.46 for that mile and a turn around point around a cone at the top. The second mile felt so hard and I didn’t really realise how much of a hill there actually was until I got to run back down it. This was the best bit obviously. I got to overtake a few people and make sure I was into the top 10 finishers.
I was confused for a while though as I thought I had read that this was a 2 lap course, but it clearly wasn’t. We had another tough climb up towards the finish. What a brutal course! The marshals made up for it though with their enthusiam and cheery encouragement. We had to do an out and back section on the starting field again too. 6.14 for my last mile and P8. Official time of 19.45.
I got chatting to a local runner and asked him how muddy this field got in the winter. He said they would change the finish and that you would have to carry on up the finishing hill to an alternative finish line. More hill? No thanks..lol. Really friendly people though and a nice course but quite tough. This was to be my 116th different parkrun location.
Then, on the jog back into Bath, I recognised a random road and it hit me. I had cycled and run this route before on my “Two Tunnels” adventures. It’s a great route if you haven’t done it. I highly recommend you do it. Just be mindful of those gutters in the tunnels if you are running without a headtorch.
I jogged to Plant.Eat.Licious which is a Vegan cafe where I had a Tofu Topple. The food there is so good and well worth the visit. This time is was much easier to find as I had been there previously.
The following day, I went skateboarding for the first time in a whole year! It was actually ok. I skated on my own for a good 90 minutes. Getting some confidence back on the board and relearning a few tricks. The rest of the week, my spine was in agony though and I had aged by 30 years!
My 52nd birthday was coming up and I had planned to run the Worcester half marathon, but it didn’t seem worth the money for travel and hotels as I wasn’t that fit to run a half in a good time for me.
Then I had planned to run at Sandhurst Memorial parkrun with Clare but Clare’s mum, June was ill in hospital. I had a long weekend off, so went skating again on the Friday with a couple of friends. Dan and Sam. We met up at the Artisan cafe in Southampton at the guildhall and skated the concrete park at Hoglands park. It was a fun session but I was soon tired.
I was feeling burnt out. I had been doing quite a bit of overtime and running on empty. I didn’t realise how exhausted I had become. I had been like it for months too. Weird how we just get on with it and ignore it or it becomes the norm.
It didn’t stop me from heading to Southampton parkrun on my birthday of September the 12th though. The aim was to run a sub 19. I ran an 18.50 flat out. I was short of breath and very snotty afterwards. Still not 100%, so a pretty good achievement considering. I had a nice catch up with my mate Cos at the Cowherds for coffee afterwards too. Clare cheered me up with all the presents she got me. She is so thoughtful and lovely. Thank you CC. Xx
Sadly, a couple of days later, Clare’s mum, June had passed away in the hospital at the age of 92. Clare was there Night and day looking after her and has dedicated the last 3 years of her own life to care for her. We will really miss June as she was living with us and I got to know her very well. She was very knowledgeable on many things and such a great character to be around. R.I.P June. xx
A cute photo of our kitty "Bee" taken by Clare
On Saturday the 26th. Guess what? I headed West again on the train. This time, only to Salisbury to meet up with Di and Mike Mattingly. My old Lordshill running buddies who had skipped counties into Wiltshire and moved to West Winterslow. They were now running for Salisbury running club. It was a lovely morning and so nice to catch up. Di was time keeping and I was hoping for another sub 19, as Salisbury is quite a fast course despite being 4 laps.
It wasn’t to be though with a time of 19.02. I was still full of snot and very sweaty. Happy enough with that as we sat in the warm sunshine and chatted away.
My makeshift Gym is starting to take shape now too. Thanks to June who bought me some interlocking rubber mats for the garage. Clare got me a wobble board too. I have my weights and parallettes there too.
No excuses not to do that strength and balance training now!
We are settling into our house and neighbourhood very well now. It's a lovely place with lovely, kind and friendly people.
I can’t think of anything else but I look forward to the Autumn and getting back into some training for Stubbington 10k in January. That is the only target race I have for now as the fitness and base still needs building again. More speedy parkruns and speed sessions incoming!
Thanks for reading. Happy Autumn :)
