Taking a break

So, I usually blog after a running event and haven't blogged for over three weeks. Yup - I just had two whole weekends without a race in them. And I didn't run very much either, but enjoyed taking a break to let my legs recover from putting in a fair few miles this year. We went camping in St Ives for the half term week. It was fantastically relaxing. Lots of eating, sleeping and drinking, a couple of beautiful coastal walks, lots of wandering along the beach watching the surf and moseying around the town. We visited our favourite cafe (the Yellow Canary on Fore Street) and pub (the Sloop) every day. And ok, I did go running a bit while we were there too, as well as doing lots of, er, other exercise for cross training too.

This weekend I had to go to college for Open Day on Saturday (very odd for a teacher to be working on a Saturday, but it's only once a year). Then I took the train up to Norwich for the Marriotts Way Ultra on Sunday. It's a fairly low key trail run, which goes out of Norwich for 18 miles on a disused railway line, then we can refill water at the turnaround point before heading back the way we came. The trail has seats at mile intervals, each made from bits of old railway track. I thoroughly enjoyed it, spending a lot of time chatting with various people on the way out and lost in my own thoughts on the way back. Surprisingly, the reason for the lone return was that I was in the lead (out of everyone, not just the ladies) and was actually the first to finish. Not fast at 5:42, but a really pleasant day. It felt good to run all of it without taking any walk breaks, but a bit sad that it's the last ultra for me this year - no more now till January. Fortunately there are plenty of marathons to keep me out of trouble in the meantime.