Topsy turvy month

29^th December 2017

Since my last post of the lovely run down on the coast, we have had to spend a night at Briarsfields campsite in Cheltenham to look after the grandchildren once again, sadly this coincided with William having an horrendous cold with sneeze and snot going everywhere, the result of which both me and Mrs IanB have spent the last week with the cold from hell, both now suffering from an endless cough!!! We were able to visit my eldest son in Wimborne on a pre - Christmas visit to deliver pressies etc . before welcoming our daughter home for Christmas day, we sniffed and coughed our way through the day, it was very pleasant and very quiet, the weather was horrible so no after lunch amble outside!

Boxing day was a day in Gloucester with Grandchildren, so an early drive up the M5 to deliver presents and spend the day eating and playing with them, it was really nice made extra niice with a wonderful walk down to Barnwood Park to feed the ducks, G and W both walking there and back, G accompanied by his teddy!!! The drive home was grim with heavy rain; however, we missed the snowfall which appeared to come later in the night.

The weather seems to have settled into a pattern of one reasonable day and one wet and windy day, same with temperatures one minute freezing, next day back to ten degrees again.

This month the cycling and running mileages have taken a hit, with nasty weather and horrible colds [ my second in a month despite the flu jab] only 34 run and 154 cycled compared to 45 run and 427 cycled last month. I did manage 4.5 mile run round town yesterday [28/12/17] but finished with a very sore throat and lots of coughing, it was hard work and to make matters worse my Plantar Faciitis seems to have returned with my foot feeling quite painful last night so disappointing, I had hoped to see the back of that. I did roll it and wore the splint for a short time, hope this helps!

The year cycling and running has been interesting with 574 miles run in the last twelve months and 4602 miles cycled compared to 862 miles run and 3019 miles cycled last year, I think this reflects the emphasis of my French Manche to Med ride, the preparation mileage and the actual mileage. Running wise I have lost a lot of miles due to the PF I didn’t run for two months !!

The Grizzly is fast approaching and only 12 weeks away, which seems a long way but I know it will soon go, so I need to start building my mileage, I think I will see how I go in January and how the PF goes , if PF persists I may pull out of Grizzly early, to save the pain of training and perhaps try once again to get rid of it, seeing a specialist, exercise, etc, and try to get more miles on the bike, I must say the winter cycling is made extra difficult with the filthy roads, I seem constantly to be washing my bike down, which is a pain in the backside!

My plan will be to build up to 10 -12 miles by the end of January, then up to 16-18 by the end of February, leaving the last couple of weeks to maybe do 19-20 in preparation for the event, I still believe the miles and time on your feet is crucial, to success. My running partner up the lane I have no doubt will run twice round the block before the event and then have a fantastic race!!! [ well done Rachel if you read this!! I don’t know how you do it!]

The other issue is our house is up for sale, so this may cause distractions should we actually sell it and have to look for other property to buy.