Running On Empty

As the summer heat continues (albeit only 18C today), my running buddy and I headed back to Seaton Sluice to have another go at the 7.5K loop taking in the clifftops to St Mary's island as well as some waggonways and part of Holywell Dene. All of my photos were of the wildlife on this run, it seems 🤷‍♂️ Aaaaand... given this was weeks ago now (ignore the publish date), I've forgotten pretty much everything about the run except that we ended early as my running buddy was just shattered. Fair play. It was still a lovely morning.

Three full weeks since my last run and I only go and try a parkrun at a course with a killer of a hill in it. And, ultimately, this became only the second ever parkrun that I've had to walk part of. Disappointing, but this time it was down to a persistent injury rather than a dodgy gut. Things were going ok for most of the run — I'd at least made it up the hill without needing to walk, even if I was taking very short strides — but at about 4km, I started to feel the knee. I had maybe another half kilometre to go before the steep downhill to return to the start/finish area, but even over the course of that, I could tell it was going to be problematic. The 5 or so metres of downhill as I made the final turn by the duckpond just confirmed it. And as soon as I rounded the corner to descend properly, it took only a few yards to concede that finishing after a bit of walking was better than not finishing at all. Not me, for the record. I just 'borrowed' the image from the Park...