Other than the time when I danced until 3am in ridiculously high heels that crippled my feet at my best friend’s wedding, fueled by Jaggermeister just a weeks before the Edinburgh Marathon then went sub-4 for the first time – this generally doesn’t work out.
Last week was my birthday and I was being taken for a weekend away to a mystery location. Nice as this sounds it meant planning a 17 mile run for the Saturday was proving tricky. It’s difficult to map out a route when you don’t know where it might start from. So instead I thought it would be a good idea to get all marathon training done and dusted before the weekend commenced at 2pm on Friday.
What happens when you try and cram a week’s worth of training into five days? Well, very little else. Domestic chores, foraging at the local supermarket, talking in full sentences – all things that were off limits last week.
The week culminated in waking up on my actual birthday with a 17 mile run to do in the snow before catching the 2pm train to the weekend. It was freezing outside, snowing and 17 miles was not top of my agenda. But a whole weekend of feeling smug about myself and not having to run was more enticing than any medal – so I headed out there.
My reward was a run full of spectacles to entertain me. Despite the freezing conditions I saw a camel and a tiger as I ran past the fence of London Zoo; in Hyde Park the Household Cavalry were out training their horses to do some dancing; and just yards from my front door I saw a kid walk into a tree.
With very tired legs after five days of back-to-back training I was done. The short sprint through Paddington station to make the train was something I could have done without – but the bottle of Champagne and the run-free weekend in Bath (including leg-revitalising trip to the spa) were very much worth it.
Sounds like the perfect birthday weekend to me. Glad you had a good one! I have yet to run on my actual bday, but I’m determined to do it one day, even if only for a quick 3-miler.
haha this sounds so familiar, I also have yet to find out how to balance my social life with running and my training for the full marathon has yet to begin!
Glad you had a good run on your bday 🙂
A belated happy birthday – hip hip !