Back on Track

Well, I'm happy to report that after last week's run down Struggle Street, things are back on track!

I put into practice all the things I learnt on my tough run and got back on the horse on Saturday afternoon.  We had the kids looked after and Dean & I set out together, aiming for 24km.  We mapped out the course roughly before we left so we had a fair idea of where we'd end up.

It was a beautiful run, basically from Twelfth Avenue at Brighton, down to the Shorncliffe Jetty, then right back to Decker Park, across the Hornibrook Bridge, to the Woody Point Jetty and back over the bridge to Twelfth Avenue and home.

Here's what I did differently to last week:
- ran at 4:30pm, finishing up around 6:45pm - soooo much better without direct sun!  And watching the sunset was just beautiful.
- put blister strips on my feet (still got small blisters, but was a massive improvement)
- went armed with chemist jellybeans and had about 8 of them at the 12km mark - energy levels were so much better!

We completed the 24km fairly easily in 2:12:57, with an average pace of 5:32 minutes/km.  We were both in a great mindset and found that we weren't really out of breath - but our legs/feet were starting to get sore.  I was really proud of us that we pushed it at the end too, and did the final km in 5:23.

The 3km stretch of the Hornibrook Bridge (I know that's not really the correct name but that's what I always call it!) is definitely a mental battle - it's just so long and straight and flat and BORING!  But I tried to distract myself and chat a lot while we ran it, and it wasn't as bad as usual :-)

It was definitely the run I needed after last week and it left me in a way more positive state of mind - and ready to tackle 26km this weekend!