First 22km run in 25 years

Distance 49.8km [total: minimalist 275.6km: Barefoot 2896.6km] Week 22

Wednesday, 30-May. 10km

A busy week kept me away from the until I managed to squeeze a run in this evening. Leaving work at 4pm and getting plenty of green lights on the way home meant I got to the beach at around 4.40pm, just over 30 minutes before sunset. It had been a warm late autumn day, 19C, they sky was clear and sunny always an inspiration to get out for a run. I ran along the road for most of the run and ran the last 3km along the beach where I did some interval sessions. I did 2 minutes slow and 2 minutes fast and managed to push my heart rate up to 150BPM. The sand was a little soft and well trodden to get any real speed up so I concentrated on leg speed. I need to do more of these type of workout to get my base speed up. I had a bit of a race with a runner on the outbound leg, he beat me but didn't gain much ground once he overtook, I think I would have wore him down over a longer distance.

Thursday, 31-May. 7km

A bit of shortened run as I was a bit later getting out today and so ran out of daylight. I still worked hard over the distance and was soaked in sweat by the time I got back to the car. My feet must be much tougher than they were a year ago as I don't seem to get any marks on them at all from running on the roads. I could feel a slight stiffness from the speed training yesterday but hardly noticeable. We have rain forecast from tomorrow through the weekend.

Saturday, 2nd-Jun. 22km + 6km

Well, I did it! for the first time in well over 20 years I ran over a half marathon distance and despite feeling a little tired after I was fine by the afternoon. The time was nothing spectacular at 2:07 but that included climbing over banks of sea weed and dodging around obstacles on the beach. I started to feel the chill breeze that picked up on the way back and was glad to get into the warmth of the car.
Later that day I had arranged to go and have some drinks with some ex work colleagues. I made it clear that I would be getting an early bus back and I wanted to be home before 10pm, but, as usual that never happened. After visiting 4 pubs and drinking 5-6 pints of beer I find that the time is 11.30pm, I've missed the last buses. I caught a taxi part way home, getting out where my friends got out. I don't think I had enough money for the full journey so I was going to have to run. I had 6km to get home, a heavy coat, jeans and feeling a bit the worst for wear due to the beer. But my feet didn't let me down and my barefoot style helped. I had my thin Vivo Barefoot shoes on and even though I couldn't stretch out due to wearing jeans I still managed a fast leg turnover. I'm not sure how long it took me to get home, it must have been over 30 minutes. My T-shirt was soaked in sweat when I got back, I had a quick shower then fell into bed.

Sunday, 3-Jun. 4.8km

The second meeting of the small barefoot running group, David and Jenny turned up at the meeting place at Semaphore. We ran a small part of my Saturday route which had a combination of surfaces such as bitumen, concrete, grass and sand. It was nice to take it easy and chat. I'd managed to shake off my tight head from too much alcohol the night before and reconnecting with the ground seemed to recharge me. I'll leave it up to David to pick the next running route for the first Sunday in July.

Neil