Hello blog readers.
As I said yesterday, today I was taking Smarty Pants through the woods, to show her what running in His great creation is all about! The weather couldn't have been more perfect! It was dry, and not too hot at 10 this morning. The ground I knew was going to be nice and dry. Smarty Pants was looking forward it, even as much as sending me texts about it, the day before!
We side skipped and knee jerked our way into the woods to warm up, much to the amusement of the poodle dog walker, and then we started our ascent up the hill. I didn't tell her that we would be running up hill first off, well I didn't want her to get all worried about it. We even stopped off to look at the stone erected by National trust, (Can you believe people wanted to build houses on these woods) Well, why not take in all that these gorgeous woods have to offer.
We were running quite well, not breaking any speeding records, we were both concentrating on our breathing techniques to help us get up the hills, although Smarty Pants hadn't a clue what hills I had planned! We Turned left at the top of the uphill path, and we ran on the level for a while. I could hear Smarty Pants behind me, she was doing really well, especially after coming up the hill. "The breathing is good" she said to me. I had told her about an article I had read on breathing, breathing in for two steps and out for two, which is the technique I was using, Smarty pants was doing 3:3 and she was feeling pretty good. The down hill bit before the next up hill and we just kept on running and running. I still didn't quite make it up to the top, but I can always think to my self I am saving myself for Goss Hill.
When we popped out of the path that runs along Coopers an army type just over took us and headed down Botony Bay with a rather heavy looking back pack on. "That will be us soon" I joked with Smarty Pants. From this point though I gave her the choices of routes. Four different routes from here,
1. The same route that me and the Old Boy did yesterday,
2. Run down Goss Hill and the through Jubilee, over the three bridges,
3. Down Goss hill and then back along the brook and up to the railway, or
4. Straight down Botony Bay to the railway and then back to the beginning.
Smarty Pants decided that number 4 would be just what she needed right now, she was feeling every step, but after having over a year off from running, and having a baby, I said to her that it was perfectly fine, and that she was doing well so far. Its hard getting back into something after you have stopped doing it for a while. It's so easy to lose all the fitness that you had gained before, but such a struggle to get it all back again! I know, from personal experience, which is how I have pushed myself so hard to keep going, even through the winter months, and joining a brilliant club to keep my motivation going. It feels good to be able to get Smarty Pants motivation kicked started again, and to encourage her.
Running up pass the railway lines, and pointing out that the bridge that we were passing now would have been the third of the bridges. I can hear her breathing, and she is doing very well. It has been a lovely run. A nice relaxed pace for me, and a lovely introduction to trail running for Smarty pants. A little further on the army dude passed us again. He was forced to take out his earphones and say "I'm sure I passed you two earlier, you must know a short cut" he said bemused. Now I could have said, "Nah, we were just faster than you" But I did confess in the end, that in fact we did take a short cut.
Also a little further on, towards the end of the run we bumped into 'The Whippet' Those of you who have followed my blogs will recall that me and The whippet went running earlier on in the year, in the cold, and she just totally blew me away, she was fast!, running ahead and then back to me, and the ahead and back to me. It was good to catch up again, even only for those few short minutes that we said hi.
A great, lovely, easy paced run today. I'm sure I have converted her to the whole 'running through nature at its best' running!
Geeky stats,
No comments:
Post a Comment