Short and sweet but so good to be back out there!

[SarahP0003]

My summer of running has not been entirely successful. At the start of the summer I had got up to 7k and I was hoping to be regularly running 10k by now but I've been having problems with my back - back spasms which lock my entire lower back for anything up to a few days. They are incredibly painful and then (presumably due to really bad posture when trying to cope with the spasm) they leave me with tight muscle knots around my back which are also painful. They have been happening for the last few months now so my attempts to do B210K have been somwewhat thwarted. The worst was when it happened on holiday in Spain. My running gear was the first thing to go into my suitcase and I had one lovely early morning run as the sun was coming up. We were staying up in the mountains so running was going to be incredibly hard with the hills and the heat but I was really looking forward to some hill work and also to swimming in the pool as a form of cross training. However, a spasm on day three meant a painful holiday and certainly no running or swimming.

I started running again after our holiday and was back to doing 5k when it happened again. I still have a couple of muscle knots now but they are bearable so I've just been out for my first run in a couple of weeks. I only managed 3k and took a couple of walk breaks (I'm a bit apprehensive about setting off another painful spasm) but it was so good to be back out there (in the rain)!

I've started going to a yoga class as I think I need to build up my core muscles - I think this is the root cause of my probelms - so hopefully this will help. I'm hoping to build back up to 5k again at the weekend and then start again on gradually building up to 10k - I'd like to think I could do it by the end of the year at least.

Thanks to everyone who posts on here - it's so good to hear about how well everyone is doing and a real inspiration to see what we can all achieve. I know from reading about all of you that I will get to 10K!

Happy running everyone!