Who Is gonna make it, we’ll find out in the long run. We can handle a big distance if our will is a strong one.

Who’s scared, we ain’t shakin’, my kness are bent, I think they’re breakin’
It was a long run, yeah yeah, yeah, it was a long run.
Apologies to The Eagles for ruining a really good song.

[image source – my wife’s phone]

I managed to get the site that has to be completed by tomorrow nearly finished. There are just a few mundane things left to do, that I’ll get sorted after I write this post.

Since I managed to get things done by about 5pm I decided to reward myself and go for a long run.

There is something wrong in that sentence, but I can’t quite figure it out.

I’ve been watching a few videos on how to prepare for a marathon, the different training methods, distances etc, and most of them seem to suggest going for a long run in the weekend.

I found that quite amusing since for me 10km is a long run. And that’s what I was doing during the week.

So I decided I would go for a long run. It needed to be longer than 10km, and that’s about it.

So I set myself a goal of running more than 10km. I didn’t set a target distance, I would just run a circuit that I wanted to test and see how long it was. The plan was to run until I couldn’t run anymore and walk the rest.

The run was setting a benchmark for time and distance for me to aim to better next time, so I had no preconceived plan to do X distance in X time.

I also wanted to try something different with my shoes. Last time my laces kept coming undone and when I did them back up the top of my foot always hurt from then on for about 2km. Not fun.

So I tried a different way of lacing them that outs the knot further down my foot. That left the top of the shoe a bit looser and allowed the shoe to shift on my foot more than I was used to. Oh, well I can always stop and put the laces back the way they were if doesn’t work out.

So off I went into the evening. It was a lovely day here in Wellington and I had plenty of water so I didn’t dehydrate. That wasn’t going to be a problem it seemed. I had the other problem.

I drink when I’m stressed (tea), and I must have been drinking a lot today because my run ended up taking me to every public toilet in Wellington. I basically ran from one loo to the next.

While I was running I had another little old man insight. My shoes were a bit looser than normal so there was movement on my foot. But I wasn’t getting blisters. I almost never get blisters. Why not?

Blisters are caused by something rubbing against you skin, and if you wear socks, it’s** your socks ** that rub against your ski and give you blisters. I don’t get blisters because I wear tight socks. They don’t move on my feet so there is actually no rubbing on my skin.

Try it yourself. Get a pair of socks (probably new) that are nice and tight on your feet and wear looser shoes for a long walk or run and see what happens. (results may vary. If symptoms persist see your doctor)

So I trotted from toilet to toilet around the city and eventually got the notification from Runkeeper that I had covered 10km. Runkeeper is behaving now by the way. As soon as I got out the door it acquired a satellite and informed me it was good to go.
Everything from now on made this a long run.

So I kept going around the south coast which was actually quite lovely, until kilometre 15. That’s when I should have stopped. It was hurting now and not fun at all. But I had to push through that and convince my body that it had more left in it, that it could keep going.

My body was unconvinced but gave me the benefit of the doubt, and carried on.

It hurt.

A lot.

I thought, ok I’ll get to the park at Island Bay and have a wee rest and a stretch. From there it is only about 3.5km to home. I’ll see what the distance is and call that my run.

It was 18km at the park. That meant if I ran all the way home I would have completed a half marathon distance today.

That’s something to aim for, so I set off running along the flat. Just as I got to the bus stop at the bottom of the hill Runkeeper piped up in a cheery voice telling me I had reached the 20km mark.

Ok. So now I just have to run a bit more to take into account the bits that I walked and I can call the whole running distance as 20km.

I tried. I really did. But it hurt like hell. My left leg refused to bend, I had to hop over the kerb because I couldn’t lift my left leg high enough to step up over it.

But I soldiered on manfully, for about four more paces and then said sod it and walked the rest of the way.

I’m calling it 20km, and that’s good enough for me.

So not a bad run at all really in the end. I now have a 20km circuit and a time to aim to beat.

It will be some time before I run that distance again, but at least now I know it is achievable. The next goal is to do it without walking.

All things considered I think my training is going well so far. Six days ago I ran my first 10km, and today I ran 20km.

I think I’ve done enough for a Mellowpuff. (kiwi tv advert reference)

Runkeeper stats

• Time: 3:17
• Distance: 21.96km
• Average page: 8.58 min/ km - including loo breaks
• Level of agony: 7

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