After last week’s 26+ miles, this week was all about doing much of the same. It ended up looking like this:

• Monday – easy run at the woods with the dog
• Tuesday – gentle run with Helen and the dog at the woods 
• Wednesday – at the gym on the treadmill – fast
• Thursday – rest day
• Friday – at the gym on the treadmill
• Saturday – steady Parkrun and a couple of extra miles
• Sunday – easy run at the woods with the dog

Happy with the week – my legs are slowly starting to feel a bit stronger. In fact, Saturday’s Parkrun, which was my first one for a month or so, was good – did a reasonable 24min – but felt like I could have gone faster. 

Not sure what this week is going to bring – got a fair bit of marking I’ve got to get stuck into, plus an open evening on Wednesday. On top of that, I’ve started watching Fortitude again. Began watching it ages ago, but for one reason or another I stopped. And I’m loving it. 

Cushty. 

Rewind back to the start of 2017 and I had this plan to take on the #run1000miles challenge. It seemed doable, it worked out 2.7 miles a day. 

After about 6 months I was indeed pretty much on target; halfway through the year I had 500 miles done. 

However, in July I had the bright idea to experiment with a bit of barefoot running and got myself a pair of Vibram Fivefingers. Which has been great, it has invigorated my running and all is good. The only downside has been the slow transition that is needed. I was aware that my mileage would drop off, but had every intention to pick up the mile in the last third of the year when my feet were more accustomed to the Fivefingers. And that is exactly where we are now. I’m now running in the Fivefingers pretty much all the time (except when I’m on the treadmill at the gym).

I’m at the point where if I want to do the 1000 miles this year I’ve got to up the mileage. So the plan was to put in 25+ miles this week – the weekly mileage needed to achieve the 1000 miles – and see how I’m feeling about the whole thing. 

This week’s mileage:

It’s been a good week on the running front, managed a run every day and feeling good, so I’ve made the decision: I’m going for it. 

There are 112 days left of the year and I’m currently on 638 miles, meaning – prepare for a stat attack – I need to run an average of 3.23 miles per day or 22.6 miles a week. 

Wish me luck.

Today’s run was interesting. 

After Helen and I got lost on our last run on the trials and footpaths, I was intent on not having that problem again. 

I got one of these:

Problem solved. 

So, today’s run, although I wasn’t sure of the length of it, I was definitely sure on the route. It was easy. I’d checked on the map. Just follow the green dots. Green dots are public footpaths. 

This was the route:

• Run out of Bourne
• Turn left onto a public footpath and follow it along for a bit
• Turn left onto The MacMillan Way and follow it along for a bit
• Turn left along a little road until you reach South Fen Road
• Follow it until you get back to Bourne. 

Easy. Or so you would think. 

It began well, partly because I knew where I was going, I often walk the dog on some of the footpaths. I’d been following the footpath for about a mile, until we reached the village of Thurlby. At this point the footpath directed me through a churchyard, I followed the only clear route through the churchyard without running across graves and found myself at the far end of the graveyard with no clear indication of what way to go. So I did what I do best, that is to make a poor decision, and ran to the far corner, squeezed through a gap in the hedge and found myself on the edge of a field. Clearly not a footpath. But unperturbed I carried on down the edge of the field desperately looking for the actual footpath. 

Just as I was contemplating turning round and retracing my steps, I noticed what looked like the actual footpath, parallel to were I was running, but the other side of a ditch. Cue some sort of ridiculous scrambling through said ditch avoiding brambles and stinging nettles, as well as the manky contents at the bottom of the ditch. Job done. I was back on track.

The map suggested that this footpath would continue on and meet up with The Macmillan Way, on the map the green dots just met. What the map failed to show was the barbed wire fence and gate I had to clamber over. Now, I’m sure I must have gone wrong somewhere, but for the life of me, I couldn’t work it out. 

So I found myself on The Macmillan Way. 

The Macmillan Way is a 290 mile long public footpath that goes from coast to coast, starts in Boston and finishes in Dorset. There’s a challenge there somewhere, but that’s maybe for another day. 

Now,  I found myself on the wrong ‘side’ of the river/dyke, the ground underfoot was difficult to run on with loads of cow pats that required a lot of concentration to avoid. Remembering I had the Fivefingers on and didn’t fancy the cow shit squishing through the toes. I crossed the river/dyke at the first available point.

The beauty of wearing the Fivefingers is that you can simply run across rivers without any worries. 

Now I was back on track things went well for all of ten minutes, before the amount of cow pats drastically increased and I spotted a massive herd of cows up ahead. I was left in a quandary, do I face the cows, do I turn back, or do I cross back over the river? 

Well, I was never going to face the cows alone. Never. Cows are evil. Turn back? Face the barbed wire again? Nope. Which left the prospect of crossing the river again. Only this time there was no obvious crossing point. So I just went for it. Negotiated the bank down, the knee high rushing river and up the opposite bank. I was safe once more. 

The cows just watched and mooed, although I could hear distinct giggling as I continued on my way. 

Now I found myself on the wrong ‘side’ of the river/dyke again. So decided to get off The Macmillan Way and turn back towards home. Cue some more scrambling down banks, over fences and avoiding stinging nettles. 

The last couple of miles was spent on trails/fields/roads, with horrible stoney ground, traversing my way across to the South Fen Road and the relative safety of Bourne. 

The Fivefingers took a battering today.

Now for the numbers: 

Total mileage = 9

Barbed wire injuries = 2

Cow pats negotiated = 1000s

Massive herds of cows avoided = 1

Feet wet = 2

Lovely jubblies = 1

Sleaford Summer 10k.

I’ve been wearing the Fivefingers now for 5 weeks or so. In fact, I’ve got to the point now that when I go running I always run in them. 

The Sleaford 10k last Friday was my first actual race in them, and also the longest run to date. I was slightly concerned about running in them considering the blister I got when I was running on the treadmill at the gym, but I pushed that to the back of mind and had a go. 

I shouldn’t have been worried.

The whole blister shenanigans must have been something to do with the treadmill because the race went without any incident. I’m at the stage now that when I run in them I don’t really think about it too much, I no longer have to worry about form and foot landing, I just relax and run. 

As for the race, it is promoted as the Sleaford ‘Summer’ 10k – it was not Summer on Friday. It started raining about halfway into the race and didn’t stop all evening. 

Although on a plus point you are supplied with plenty of cake and coffee at the end. 

I finished in 53mins – which was pretty much the plan – roughly 9min/mile pace. Didn’t want to go crazy fast. So all is good in the Fivefinger transition world. 

Almost forgot…my reward was a rather fetching piece of bling…

Great event, run by a local running club, Sleaford Striders. Definitely worth adding to the running calendar. 

My first run in the Vibram Fivefingers was 5th July – just over a month ago. Since then I’ve been slowly and steadily increasing speed and mileage. 

Today I headed to the gym for a run on the treadmill, in fact my first treadmill run in the Fivefingers. On top of the first treadmill run, it was the longest to date: 5.4 miles. 

Struggled a bit this afternoon, I was expecting the barefoot running on the treadmill to feel quite good, it didn’t. My feet felt a bit uncomfortable, the lovely soft bouncy surface I was expecting was quite hard. It felt worse than running on the pavement. Also, came away with a bit of a blister on the bottom of my big toe! What’s that all about? 

It’s the Sleaford 10k on Friday night and I was planning to run in the Fivefingers – that might need a rethink. 

It has been three weeks since I began this whole barefoot running thing. During that time, as I’ve been advised, I’ve been careful to have a slow transition. 

This morning was my longest run to date: 5 miles. I’m also going a bit faster than I have been lately. Everything seems to be going well, no adverse effects, calves can still be a bit sore after a run, but that might just be my age as well. 

I took Billy boy with me this morning, which meant, considering I was on the trails, that I was stuck behind him most of the way. He likes to run in front, but he struggles to keep the pace going…

We run for about 3 miles before I have to occasionally stop and let him catch-up. He’s an old git.

I’m still struggling a bit with the stoney surface on the paths at the woods. It can be quite painful if you don’t pay attention to where your feet are landing. Downhill is especially tricky when the surface is stoney.

Overall, everything is going fine. I’m slightly dropping behind my scheduled weekly mileage for the #run1000miles challenge but I’m hoping to catch-up towards the end of the year.