My return to running is well and truly back on track. I’m still a fair way off where I was before the achilles issue but at least I’m moving in the right direction. I’ve now done three parkruns and consistently improved from the first one, 19:25, to 18:39, my first at Delamere and finally on Saturday to 18:12 on my return to Delamere. The significance of that 18:12 is not lost on me as it is exactly the same time I ran for my first ever 5k on 12 June 1989. Back then it was almost a year before my next 5k, where I improved to 16:39. It won’t be that long before I run my next 5k and I’m hopeful that I’ll be running quicker than 16:39 a lot sooner than a year’s time. It will take a while though, small steps.
This week I managed to run a more consistent pace, which gave my heart and lungs the best workout they’ve had in about 16 weeks. But I don’t know how much quicker I can get at Delamere whilst I’m still stiff, and in pain, around the achilles. It’s the start area that is hard for me, I’m slow to get going as my ankle joint is stiff, this causes me to run awkwardly and sends pains up my legs and lower back. The surface is also at it’s most uneven here so every time I twist the ankle I get painful reminders that I’m not 100% yet. Once I arrive at the relatively flat and more even mere path I can up the pace and shoot away but it’ll probably be a while before I can get the initial charge faster.
Mind you I’ve started working on that this week. Last week I began training with my faster clients and had a good workout with Ray, up until then I’d really been running at a steady pace and some times at a very slow pace, just to build up the mileage and put some strain on the achilles area. After successfully getting through a tough hour with Ray I’m starting to add some of my own quality workouts to my training. It’s not going to be a huge amount but I’m using a short sharp shock therapy to try to bring me on quicker. We’ll see what the result is very soon.
One of the things I’ve missed most is racing alongside my Salford colleagues but I’m hopeful that the day I wear my red and white singlet is not far away. Particularly as my mate Rob Tudor is making a name for himself in his own red and white singlet. I look forward to the day we can be racing in the same Salford team and making a difference.
The club were in action last weekend at the Welsh Castles relay, where they finished in 2nd place, taking the King of the Mountains award, there were some great runs by the team, most notably Joe Bailey and Tom Cornthwaite setting course records over their legs. This is an event I’ve never had the opportunity to take part in, it looks like fun, maybe next year.
Another busy week for me, a number of new clients have come along lately and I’m doing a lot of work with Lee Riley. Last week’s photo opportunity took a bit longer than usual, I was expecting to have a couple of snaps taken and was a bit taken aback when the photographer started unloading his gear. Two hours later and he’d taken numerous portrait and action shots, some of which should be consigned straight to delete. The article in Runners World, for which these pictures were required, should be out in August. Now it’s coming about it’s a bit scary to think that comments will be attributed to me, but I have no control over their context. Oh well, you can always get the true story here. All this busyness (see how I can play on words) has meant I’ve had to be creative with my training, thankfully, recovering from an injury, I’m not able to be as intensive as I used to be so I’m not climbing any walls, but soon, hopefully, I will need to take a look at my training regime and make it more regimented. For now I’m having fun running further and faster.
Speaking of Lee, he ran his first 1500m on the track last week. Typical of Lee, he asked me what time I ran for my 1500m. Now I had to go back some time, my first 1500m was run in 1990, I was at an open meeting at Ealing. I didn’t really know what to expect from a 1500m so put down a time of 4:30. This seemed to cause some consternation from a local rival who had also put down that time, he accused me of stealing his time. This accusation took me a bit by surprise, I was completely taken aback, I’d never heard of stealing people’s times but had I been into that I’d have thought it was more likely I might have picked a time under 4 minutes. Long story short, I ran a 100m as a warm up, finishing 3rd in 13.3 seconds, won my 1500m, easily, in 4:29.9 (pretty good guess in the first place, even if it was stolen) and finished off my night with 7th in the 3000m, 9:22.3. Needless to say, this Saturday, Lee ran 4:28, but at least he didn’t steal my time!
Other news I heard this week was that Donna Hartley has died. I remember her well from my childhood, had one of those childhood crushes on her, before I moved onto Debbie Harry. Such a shame at 58, still young.
Written by Roger Alsop
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