On Friday, I decided I needed to force myself to get out running again. Strength training is great, but I want to be able to just go for a long run in the morning/evening.

Suffice to say I was a lot more unfit than I thought and couldn’t even run for a full ten minutes. Still, as my mum tells me, I’m lapping everyone on the couch. Now I’ve made that first step to get out and run, I know how much better I felt for it, and I hope that it will continue.

I’ve posted about Lepe a number of times. Most recently, here!  I didn’t really know where to run, I just knew I wanted to run where as few people would see me as possible, plus work had been crazy and I needed some sea air in my lungs! I googled and found a nice cycle route. Or so I thought…

The run started well, and with good intentions. I power walked as far as the end of the seafront and then sped up to a slow jog. Carried on to the first bend and a deer jumped out. Pretty amazing. I bimbled on up the lane (a mix of jogging and walking) and then turned off (the top of the loop) on to a bridleway. Half way along this I stopped to admire the view, have a water stop and take a selfie. Obviously.

The path slowly turned from mud track to bog. I got past the first section, sped to another jog and a bug managed to wedge itself between my eyeball and eyelid. Cue me pouring most of my water on to my face to dislodge it!

Undeterred, I carried on and came to more bog, I managed to get around most of it with only minor mud damage to my trainers, by holding on to barbed wire fence and tree branches.

This slowed my average pace on Strava to a 13 minute mile. I carried on and eventually made it back to the road. Phew! I was on the home stretch to the car.

Then, a bug managed to fly right in to my mouth, causing me to cough until I was sick. Pretty gross, probably too much information, but maybe this is why people say exercise is bad for you.

Anyway, after A Bugs Life 2, I managed to make it back to the car in time to watch the sun go down, headed home and fell asleep almost instantly.

Kilimanjaro Training Run 1 down. Eventful, but complete.