7km and a new routine

[mancrunner1]

My running has remained a steady three times a week but I’ve been pretty unstructured with distance recently and I’ve been missing some kind of programme. With a very heavy workload, a recent bereavement and ever diminishing hours of daylight, my weekday runs, always previously 4km on a Monday and 5km on a Wednesday, have dropped to 3km both times and my long runs have varied from 5 to 10km in recent weeks. I’ve decided I can live with the weekday 3kms, it’s what works for life at the moment and I don’t struggle to motivate myself to do them, so I’m not going to fight it and hopefully as the days start to lengthen I’ll have a bit more time to play with in the working week.

My long run really was crying out for some structure though so I’ve decided to try a monthly-ish pattern of 5km, 7km, 8km and 10km and see how that goes. Last week was the 5km (run with my husband who, three months post-Covid, is back on form and so I ended up with 8 Strava medals and a new 5km PB as a result!). We ran together for the 7km yesterday too, a beautifully crisp and sunny morning in Manchester.

It’s a while since I’ve run that individual distance and, as my husband was with me, I was able to do the much prettier but much quieter canal towpath rather than sticking to main roads. We took it steady so that I finished with something in the tank (I was fairly shattered at the end of last week’s 5km!) and competed in just over 48 minutes, about a minute faster than when I’d last run 7km in late September. Negative splits too which always feels good. Hope everyone had a great weekend of running!

[Jools2020 Graduate10]

Sorry to hear about your recent bereavement .

Well done for that 7K and improving your time by a whole minute! Negative splits, too!

You’re right about what works for life for you, though and those long hours of darkness, but it sounds like you have a great plan to keep getting out there when you can! 👍😊

[mancrunner1 Graduate10 in reply to Jools2020]

Thanks Jools, never an easy time. Hope all is well with you and you’re in your new house soon!

[Jools2020 Graduate10 in reply to mancrunner1]

Thanks - I was hoping for Christmas but that’s probably overly optimistic!

[cheekychipmunks Graduate10]

We all need to compromise when life gets in the way (I’m in that situation at the moment), and those 3k runs during the week will more than suffice for as long as you need them too. Good idea to structure your weekend longer runs though.

Well done on your 7k and precious negative splits. 👏👏👏

[nowster Graduate10]

Well done! I didn't know you could get off the Ashton Canal at Hulme Hall Lane. That'll be useful to know for when I go back to the office (just off Piccadilly).

[mancrunner1 Graduate10 in reply to nowster]

I didn’t either! Just before the entrance to Philips Park, it was a good route