Before I start - don't forget to stretch ALL your leg muscles after a run. I forgot to do my quads last time and MAN were they stiff as a board yesterday!
My legs this morning at 6.30am however, were in superb fettle. I put the rubbish out (as you do) then set Endomondo to "GO" mode and off I went. Decided to leave my water bottle at home this run, as I tend to get a bit of a stiff shoulder depending on which hand is holding the confounded thing. "Let's hope I don't need a swig half way round my route eh?" I thought......
It was particularly chilly this morning, but I felt great. I had a spring in my step and I thought to myself "Can I beat my own personal world record personal best time of 27'28sec?". I felt confident. Quietly confident. But I was still on my warm up walk so I hoped I could smash that mother of a time and go home strutting like a proud peacock on steroids!!.
First K was good. I had NO music, NO gardeners question time podcast, no weird science podcast - NADA. Just me, my senses and my legs grinding forward. Second K was good too. Third K also pretty damned fine. I didn't miss my water bottle at all, especially as I hardly EVER take a swig from it whilst running. It's more of a crutch really - just in case I fall to the ground helplessly, like some cowboy in a Western, walking across the desert gasping for a drink of cold water.......SORRY! I digress. Fourth K, I started to get a niggle in my right groin! "Oh nooooo!" I thought. "Last week it was my left groin that got strained, now it's my right." Should I stop? No, it wasn't THAT bad. I persevered and kept pushing on. Across the park now, and heading towards the Thames and Richmond Lock. I sneakily rubbed my tingly groin hoping that would alleviate some of the discomfort, and then got hideously embarrassed when a female jogger passed me and looked at me like I was some sort of pervert.
I reached Richmond Lock. Up the steps I went, feeling pretty tired now. Thought I'd give my groin a quick rub again but DAMN IT, someone was coming down the steps as I was going up. "Bloody hell!" I thought. I carried on. Down the other side of the Thames and headed for home along the Thames path. "Fifth K should be at the end of this bit" I said to myself. I reached the road and kept jogging, but pulled my phone out of my shorts to see how far I'd run......ONLY BLOODY 4.1K!!! "Damn" I said. "I've got to keep going. I wanna smash this personal world record best world record personal time of mine!"
I plodded on and kept looking at my phone. 4.3K......4.5K......4.8K....nearly there......5K! STOP RUNNING DAN! My new groin niggle had calmed down and I headed home around the block to make up a 5 minute walk. Got home and stretched accordingly. All niggles and pains vacated my body and I felt absolutely fine -Thank the Good Lord!
I had one last thing to do. Look at my time. Did I make it? Did I smash it? Did I just tear up my previous best time and smother it with a new shiny unbelievable PB??
No.
"Blast!" I said to myself. "Damn and blast!" However it wasn't all bad. I did it in 30'25sec. I figured if I hadn't had to wait for traffic to cross a road, had leapt up those steps at Richmond Lock, had flown down the other side, had not slowed down for groin reasons I would have got inside 30 minutes.
So, not all bad then..........
