5 July 2010: Feeling good again and my Garmin has drowned!

Mileage 12.5 miles



AM: 3.75 miles; PM: 8.75 miles (appx)


I had a horrendous night’s sleep, so getting up this morning was close to agonising. My eyes were almost half closed as I slid on my kit, pulled on my rucksack and tried to start my Garmin. My Garmin, however, seemed to be just as tired as me, as no matter how hard it tried it couldn’t find a satellite signal. Yesterday it had struggled in the rain and had even stopped working for a while. I think some of the rain got inside and sure enough when I looked at it more closely I could see condensation behind the screen. I am pretty gutted, as I love my Garmin and I have only just got it back working again after replacing the battery charger for it. I love knowing the amount of miles I have done and how fast I have done each mile in. So I had to set off, tired and grumpy with no working Garmin. Thankfully I know how far it is to my work.


After work, despite feeling very tired I had a really strong urge for an extended run home. My Garmin still wasn’t working, so I took a route where I know the length was roughly 9 miles. The wind was quite blustery, but it was really nice running along by the canal. My run took me 2.5 miles along the canal towards Slateford where I joined the path along the Water of Leith for a mile and a half as far as Murrayfield before hitting the cycle path which led me on to Ferry Road area of town and the Ainsley Park Sports Centre where I nipped in for some core strengthening work. For the first four miles of my run I really cut lose and let my legs fly and zipped along at pace. I did start to feel a little tight and niggly after that, so I slowed down, but I did have convince myself that this was the right thing to do, as I was really enjoying my run and I do love running fast.


Today was another day where I felt that little bit fitter and faster. I have now been back in training for 14 days and during that time have run exactly 170 miles. It’s quite a lot, but I do love the miles and feel better for it. I just need to lose a little more weight (4kg) and find a bit more speed and I will be ready to race again. Now I just need to pray to the gods of running that my Garmin will dry and be back to normal tomorrow morning, so can continue to log all those miles for me!