First thing’s first, I failed at my run streak. The intention was to run at least a mile every day but for a few reasons it never happened. I missed a run on the 14th due to my legs being plain tired and having the Silverstone Half the next day. The following week was also a write off due to being on holiday. I’d planned to run every evening on hols, but frankly a glass of wine and relaxing felt like the better option.
All that said, although it wasn’t a ‘streak’, it was the shot in the arm that my running needed. Although it’s not a huge amount of distance for some people, in March I clocked up 130.73km of running and managed to get out there 20 days out of 31. Not terrible. It was also a huge monthly increase in distance which was a gamble that fortunately paid off.
So my previous ‘best’ as it were was July with a whopping 45km or so in a month. So what’s that about the ‘10% / week’ rule?
So what have I managed to gain from it?
Firstly, I’ve not broken. That’s a massive for me. Last year I was plagued by knee pain, ITB pain and a weird sciatica that wouldn’t bugger off. This time round, fingers crossed it’s been fine. Other than just exhausted legs now and again I’ve had no pain at all. The Silverstone Half hurt a bit but mostly sore feet.
Secondly, it’s become way, way easier and I’ve become quicker. The 5km on the 10th March was a 5K PB, but a not insignificant 90 seconds (ish). Then 5 days later I beat my 1/2 Marathon PB (set this time last year) by 30 minutes. Oh, and the first 10K of the 21.1KM? A 10K PB by 3 whole minutes. An easy-ish pace is now 5:10/km, around a minute quicker than this time last year. If nothing else it’s a good boost in confidence.
Overall, it was well worth doing but as someone aiming for a full distance IM, trying to run every day was rather predictably restricting other training. When my legs were tired and I ‘had’ to fit another run in, bike and swim went out the window entirely. I might have another crack at it over winter though, it’s strangely addictive.
Code, Life and Learning 