I decided quite deliberately to go with the 30-minute group tonight, and not the accidental-not-paying-attention mistakes of the past couple of weeks! On reflection I’m quite glad I did.
As I was walking up to the Leisure Centre I could feel a slight niggle in my left calf – only a little bit of burning but enough to cause concern – plus my foot strike didn’t seem to be flat, perhaps tilted a bit to the right.
That was enough for me not to want to risk committing to a longer run. It wasn’t an injury as such, just a mild irritation that I didn’t want to inflame.
The group was quite large tonight which was good because that also meant a range of abilities, I could go to the front if I felt like it or I could drop back for a breather if I needed one and at all times there’ll be company. Never underestimate the power of social running.
The route took us to the People’s Park via Granville Drive, Broughshane Street and the Demense. Once we got to the park we did a couple of loops of the climb up to the statute near the Devil’s Cup which was a nice challenging test. I had no interest in sprinting it tonight, so was perfectly content to take it at a steady pace. I’m starting to enjoy these climbs again, which can only benefit my running.
At this point my legs felt ok, albeit perhaps a little tight, although any time I went faster to loosen up that tightness disappeared.
However, on the way back into the town centre from the park I could feel the aforementioned foot strike problem re-emerging so as we got onto the Ballymoney Road I stopped briefly to readjust myself. It could well have been the slanted nature of the footpaths so I stuck to running on the road for the rest of the run for as much as possible – happily this seemed to correct the problem.
We had covered a decent enough distance for the 30-minute group – around 4km – so I decided to add to that with a run home. Initially I wanted to take the scenic route and go for another half-an-hour or so but as soon as I started the heavens opened so I opted to take the more direct route – no point in getting soaked this soon before Sunday.
In the end I covered 6km tonight which I was happy enough with. I’ll do one further, longer run later this week and that’ll do me until the half marathon. My confidence is still there, I just don’t want to overdo it.
HUFF, PUFF AND SHUFFLE 