I was tempted by a pre-run post today. Probably because I have got a big pile of proof reading and editing on my desk. Anything but that! So here are my pre-run thoughts:

Today is the first maintenance run following the 9 miles at the weekend. My knees are still a bit creaky but I feel ok. As we are both working at home Kath suggested a lunchtime run. We haven’t done that before so now I’m worrying about it being different but actually I quite like the idea (that might also have something to do with the pile of proofing and editing!). I keep telling myself it is only 45 minutes. Far less than half of what I did at the weekend! It’s a nice day out and I don’t think it is too warm so it should be a lovely run. I want it to be. You see, there I go putting pressure on myself again. It’s obvious I don’t want it to be a horrible run but I need to stop insisting on every run being brilliant. I build it up in my head and it becomes this big thing and then I’m disappointed at the end because it wasn’t a PB or it wasn’t a strong positive run or whatever. I also get nervous and scared about running then (I’m starting to get a bit panicky about today now) and that can’t be good. I wrote the other day that there is no pressure on me and that I decide and that’s absolutely true – I just need to remember it!

Then I got side-tracked and actually did some proof reading as well as a bit of paper and book moving about (my usual pre-writing ritual, also known as procrastination) and now I am just back from that run. It was fantastic. No, for once I am not being sarcastic. I really enjoyed it. We went along the canal towards Bingley. There wasn’t much of note to see  -well actually there was, there were ducks and dog walkers (and dogs) and walkers and cyclists, a couple of other runners, some geese.. the usual canal-y sort of stuff. But the run wasn’t fantastic because of scenery or being out or any of that. It was fantastic because I felt good doing it. It was physically hard but not an effort if that makes sense. For the first time we hit 4 miles in the 45 minutes and even though I didn’t know that until we’d finished I really enjoyed just pushing that little bit harder physically to maintain what I thought might be a pretty even and acceptable pace. Well it turned out to be a very even pace and our fastest over the distance but that hardly matters (except somewhere in my head it does), what matters is that I enjoyed just running, not the things I saw while out or anything like that , just running. Happy.