33 x 3 + 33

It was all about the numbers... At the start of March I went back on my pre WHW race sabatical and gave up beer, wine and all things alcoholic.. I also thought I would get a bit of running in and put myself in some sort of shape for the efforts of the next few months.. And there was the little matter of unfinished business from the attempted Marcothon of December.. You know, the running every day (at least 3 miles ) for a month .. I gor to 22 in December when a combination of a couple of slight tumbles and some sort of attack of the frilly blouse stopped me in my tracks..

It is a lot easier in March, but even so, getting in 31 x 3 mile runs requires a little bit of focus .. But in the last 6 weeks I watched "Running the Sahara" about 3 blokes running 8000 miles across the Sahara (117 days, non stop), Eddy Izzard (a tubby British transvestite comedian ) doing 43 marathons the length of Britain in 7 weeks, or William Sichel running 1609 times around a 1k track in Athens in 13 days to come 2nd in the World 1000 mile race (not bad for a 53 y.o bloke ), so it was not really that much of an effort..

So anyway, 31 x 3 mile runs (minimum ) is what I did .. With a couple of decent ones in there as well. A nice 18 miler up in the Pentlands in the last of the snow (so we thought) with Norman and a cracking 36 miler from Balmaha to Beinglas and back again on a glorious March spring day which topped off a 75 mile week.. Then back to the grind of getting up at 6:15 to get in a run before work...

So some things that I learnt from running every day even for a month.. It is a good mental challenge but it does become a bit of a grind just to tick off a run for the sake of putting a 1 in a diary.. And even with just a short run, you need to give yourself a day off to let niggles go away and the body and mind to relax.. Well at least for me.. But the routine is great and it definitely has given me a good base for the next couple of months.

So I got to 28 , clocks have gone forward, ya beauty !! Easy street now, until winter had its last (???) stab ... Sleet, rain, torrential downpours, floods on the Water of Leith.. Went out on Tuesday with Adrian and made our way up the Water of Leith, except the W.O.L was coming down on us - knee deep and hoarsing it down the path.. And another nice dunping of snow on the Pentlands .. But made it to 31 so job done.. Until I worked out that another 2 would bring me up to 33, and I had a little matter of ther D33 on the day after.. So I did them too..

The D33side way (http://deesidewayultra.webnode.com/) is a cracker.. A tenner to enter, cake, beer, jam sandwiches and a choccy medal at the finish.. Great company and very very flat which is not really to my liking (I need hills to walk on and stretch my legs ) but a great day out.. I ran ok for me, 2:34 for the half way, finished in 5:18 so pretty happy with that .. Grant Jeans won it in a sensational 3:34... When he passed me (it is an out and back course ) he was going like someone doing a 5k.. Really impressive..

Today I had a day off, even though I worked out that another 19 runs would bring me to 53 runs in a row.. Which is a nice number before doing a little 53 miler in 20 days time.. Tomorrow some stretches, and I might not run as well...