I was putting off my first run of week 8 all day yesterday but finally managed to drag myself out the house. It was quite windy and cold and towards the end started raining which I didn't enjoy as much as I thought I might but definitely better than the sun!
After my success of W7R3 I knew I could maintain a good pace but having changed the beginning of my route, I started right at the bottom of a hill. I decided just to give it my all to get it over with and went up it at a good pace and covered it in around 1-2minutes but it certainly did tire me out and meant I had to steady my pace after to get my breath back. But the good news was I covered the first kilometre in 5mins22secs! Which is a pb by a whole 33 seconds. My second km also came in under 6 minutes but by the third km I was really getting tired - probably partly psychological as I knew I had run the first 2 kms much quicker than usual. Anyway I tried to keep a reasonable pace and was very pleased when endomondo told me I had covered 4km in 24minutes8secs! I found the last 3-4 minutes really tough and really didn't have much left in me to speed up at the end but I was absolutely thrilled to see at the end of the 28 minutes I had covered 4.64km!! I really feel like 5k in 30minutes is in reach now, even if it takes me a few extra runs after graduation to achieve it.
I was on an absolute high for the rest of the day and I'm now itching to get out for my next run. It was a really tough run as I definitely pushed myself harder than usual but it was 100% worth it and I will be very pleased to equal that distance again tomorrow.
Only 5 runs to go! Cannot believe how quickly these weeks have gone and really cannot give this programme enough praise. I'm already getting excited about what I will do post-c25k and am definitely going to buy some nice running gear as a reward for finishing.
Good luck to everyone!