June

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I allowed myself to have a few alcoholic drinks during June, but nothing to excess. Unfortunately, I did let some other areas slip. One of these was my daily stretching routine. This has led to some stiff hips and may have contributed to the pain I’m experiencing in my feet.

My diet still could be better. I am a strict pescatarian and have built a habit of drinking plenty of water. However, I have also developed a less healthy habit of eating large bars of chocolate every evening. Good for energy, bad for my teeth! I’m trying to find something suitable to replace it with.

Achievements

200 miles run
Clifftop Challenge Marathon completed. 6/12 for the year.

Goals for July

North Downs Marathon 7/12
Replace chocolate
Daily yoga stretches
Continue drinking and eating well.

Highlight

It is a tie this month. I expected it to be the Clifftop Challenge which I loved. Running with John and Kevin along the canal and above the cliffs from Appledore to Dover was as much fun as I expected. But I also had the opportunity to go to Scotland and the early morning run in the Trossachs was right up there for a different reason. The beauty of nature and the solitude made it a run to remember.

Best run

There is one run that stands out not for the scenery or the company but the mental challenge. I’ve decided to try and Run Folkestone. Basically I will run every road, street and lane within the borders of the town. The borders are arbitrary ones I have set, but still.

I have been using my runs since the start of June but last Thursday made a concerted effort to cover a particular area. In total I ran 20 miles and it made for an interesting Strava map. The hard bit was running up roads and then turning around and running back down them again multiple times. It also involves doubling up parts to reach roads I missed.

The runs themselves go against my love of trail running and the sheer enjoyment of the moment on a run, but it provides an opportunity to see places I would never have otherwise known existed and gives a positive sense of achievement when you tick off the places.

Lessons learned

Rather than heading into the hills every time we run, John and I have been doing loops around the cricket pitch. It is about 400m per lap and we often complete between 10 and 20 at a time. I have found this to be a therapeutic experience.

After a while you enter into a trance-like state where all you see is a white line and the brain can either switch off or focus on other things – the opposite to Running Folkestone where I spend most of the time following a map on Strava!

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