Today was a long, long day! Was up early again to cycle into work – it was
a nice, but chilly morning (it would get colder by evening though!). I cycle down an old, disused railway track
for about half the journey, which is really nice (when it’s light – there’s no
streetlamps) and it’s very popular with runners, walkers, cyclists etc. It’s also one of my main running routes as it
links St Albans and Hatfield for about 6 or 7 miles. Was chatting to Ray as I stopped for a quick
swig from the water bottle and he said they are planning to re-develop the arable
land in the area and build houses on it.
Was quite shocked and saddened by this as it will probably mean the end
of this lovely track and the fields around it.
I signed the online petition/comments section on the council website
(they made it very difficult to find the plans!).
Went for a swim at lunchtime and worked
on my front crawl. I found out that the
Uni triathlon club train there on Wednesday lunchtimes and Tri-Force members
could also come along, which is really good.
So I can get an extra coaches session in during the day now as well –
although I’d only be able to do about 30 minutes before having to head back to
work!
After work I went out for a medium-distance
run of 9 miles. It was nice to have
clear roads again and no snow or ice. A
1.5 mile slow warm up, followed by a 6 mile tempo run, and another 1.5 warm
down jog. It was a nice temperature but
the wind was incredibly strong, which made running very hard work! Part of the route was running about a half
mile up parallel to the dual carriage way and then doing a 180 and turning back
and running in the opposite direction.
The outbound way was fine and the wind was behind me, but turning back
was really difficult! The plus point was
that I saw Matt after about 2 miles running in the opposite direction so we
waved each other on. I saw another
runner later as well, always cheers me up.
I like friendly runners and cyclists who say hello or even words of
encouragement!
My average time for the 6 mile leg
was about 10:20 min/miles which was a bit slower than what I hoped to do but
then again I was not expecting the 20+ mph winds.
Cycled home – I was totally knackered
by this point! As I rode the last half
mile home, which is uphill, several cyclists overtook me – there was a time
trial going on that evening and they were doing several laps of that road,
turning back at the roundabouts at each end.
I’m not sure which club it was, probably Verulam Cycling club, but they
often use this route and are at it all through the winter. A couple of them say hi, which was quite
encouraging after such a long day! It
was nice to finally get home and relax!
Total training
Bike ride to/from work (8 miles)
30 minutes swimming
9 mile run
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