After weeks of micro-training (if we can agree to call it that for ease?) I finally got out for a run with Daren this morning.
It almost didn’t happen, because one of us had a moment of reluctance yesterday! This could have easily been either of us, but fortunately the other one had been looking forward to the run sufficiently to be able to tip the balance of the decision.
We decided not to do the loop, but rather to simply go from the Windmills to Ditchling Beacon (and on to the bottom of the next hill), and back… walking the ups and only running the downs.
Our accompanying conversation typically has the essence of a game about it, which reminds me of squash. In squash it’s important to dominate the T, in the centre of the court, in order to make your opponent (actually, it always used to be me) run round more and tire themselves out, while you’re able to serenely pick your shots and think about what’s going on. In our conversational game there is no opponent, but a well-timed open question means that you get to be pulled up the hill by the other’s answer, rather than gasping for breath and cognitive bandwidth yourself.
There was a slight disagreement about the distance. Daren’s watch claimed 4.5 miles, whereas Strava reckoned it was 4.99 miles, and dropping pins onto Google maps suggests maybe 4.8 miles. Whatever the number, we were moving for 84 minutes… so we’re well into the super-slow category in either case, which suggests that we need to do more running!
While I’m on the subject of running more, whilst the conversation only had two participants, we did actually have a third compatriot with us…. little Lyra. She ran circles around us the whole way (easily twice our distance), and looked like she was ready to go again when we returned!
