Excuses

or are they?

I am still not feeling particularly well. The cold that has been threatening for a while now has still not materialised, but the feeling that it will at any second has not left.  Generally feeling a bit run down and rubbish the war in my head over whether or not I should run today was raging when I got up this morning.

In the 'no' camp there are a whole host of reasons - my left leg hurts, my right shin is a mess, it's cold outside, I feel cold, my calf muscles are starting to scream at me... this is far from a conclusive list!

The 'yes' camp is far less prolific - you have a training plan, get on with it.

Not able to run this evening and with my days getting increasingly busy as I try to cram my last minute Christmas prep into the week that is left, the only option available to me is to run between dropping the boys off at school and the post office opening.  A four mile route starting and finishing at the supermarket car park was mapped whilst still in my pyjamas, and the decision about whether to go or not wasn't taken until I went to get dressed and found myself in my running kit.

I struggled with the first three miles but felt a bit more in my stride by the fourth, and have started to wonder recently if there has been a slight shift from that of '3 mile' to 'slightly longer distance' runner. At times I dare to believe it's the latter! But what is becoming less clear to me is whether or not I am making excuses for not running or really should be paying greater heed to my aliments!

My injured shin following Sunday night's run in with the wall still hurts, but started to feel a little lame (ha! ha!) as a reason not to run. I'm not sure a bruise and a bit of missing skin constitutes a good enough excuse, but as I found out to my detriment it really depends on where the skin is missing from.

In my determination just to get on with it, get out there and run, I overlooked the patch of skin that I had managed to rub raw on Saturday, convincing myself that it had healed. It hadn't. We've been here before and a mixture of modesty and my son reading this stops me short of describing it's location again, but it's not in a place he'll ever have to worry about!

By the time Al comes home and announces that he's not running because he doesn't feel well, full stop.  I am beginning to wish that I had taken the same approach, just decided that I wasn't going and not tried to justify it with reasons, that I then decided were excuses. Undoubtedly some of them were but I wish I had been slightly more discerning as to whether any of the physical reasons were legitimate before I bundled them up and wrote them all off as mental! The learning curve continues!

M - 511
Brighton Half - 68
Glasgow Half - 292
Distance covered                    4 miles  
Total Distance covered      430.5 miles