Speed work is not my favourite. I’m not feeling it at the mo. I look back on January and having enjoyed the running  – at least in hindsight. In February I’m a bit ‘can’t be bothered’. I’m running because I need to. But speed work, really?

I managed to programme my Garmin to do the 8 x 30 seconds sprints with 90 seconds recovery. I added a mile warm up and a mile cool down either side. It took me a long time to persuade myself off the sofa. I kept doing just one more thing. But eventually I pulled my rain jacket and my rather lovely road shoes on and headed out. I slowly jogged down towards the canal – about 13 minutes per mile pace. Then I started the sprints. Well when I say sprints what I really mean is ‘going slightly faster than usual’. I did my 8 sprints and walked in between to recover. I tried but my heart wasn’t really in it and I didn’t even find having to hurdle some ducks funny.

I did have one spectator though and it felt like having my own little cheer squad of one. A cheer swan. Once sprint 8 was done I decided to stop being grumpy and enjoy my cool down mile by walking along the canal, spending some time with the ducks I had been grumpy about and saying hello to some more of the swans.

There is something sort of bleakly beautiful about the canal on a grey rainy day. It cheered me up and by the time I got home I was ready to have another go at my inbox.

So another 3.2 miles added to the total. 32.6 miles for February and slowly closing in on the first 100 miles.

Just keep running