Started well this week, ran a 10km run on the Monday which, although no off roading involved was enjoyable. Tuesday was a 7km run but was feeling a little bit ropey, nose was starting to get blocked and breathing was a little ragged. Woke up on Wednesday with the intention to run to the gym, but was in no condition to do so so had a lay in instead. This continued to Friday where guilt for not running or going to the gym was taking over, so a run to and from and a quick workout was in order.

Saturday is the usual day for my long runs, and despite a nose that seemed to have an infinate amount of snot i decided to carry on. Was a great day for it, and i wanted to test my new OMM I-Gamy for my backpack as well. Usual route taken, from Croydon to Addington hills, then down to Addington and up Featherbed lane, picking up a trail that takes me up the hill to Warlingham. Generally this route is all up hill on the way out, and when heading back home it tends to be downhill. Still using the 5:1 method, basically run for an hour then switch to 5 mins run 1 min walk, finding a good technique as the 1 min walk encourages you to take on fluid and nutrition (a must for an Ultra). In the end it was about 25km, slowly increasing the distance. I will carry on at the 25km distance for a couple more sessions then increase it to 30km.

Sundays run was excellent fun. Got up nice and early to go an meet Gareth, then headed to Boxhill for a training run that he had mapped. Started well, nice gentle decent, then slight ascent which was all fine. Then, the longest downhill which seemed to go on forever (and was not gentle). Eventually we arrived at the stepping stones at the base of Box Hill, with the intention of going on around then back up, but we picked up a trail, ran for a bit and the trail promptly ended. Rather than go back there was a scramble up the hill (no trail to follow) which was a full feet and hands job.

We found our way back to a clear bridleway and headed back to the car, what was supposed to be a 10km run ended up being 15km, however it was great fun and i would do the same route again (minus the scramble).

Total Distance Run: 65.45km. Total Time: 7hr 3mins. Total Calories: 5450