So, I've been doing a little riding around as well as my running. I was away for a week, learning a few things, got some great rides and runs in. It was a wet week, to be fair, but it's kick started fresh growth and on the running side of things the paths are now growing over with unforgiving nettles to burn your knees and hidden ruts to test glass ankles. But now the fields have been cut back, and curiously, like a revelation from an episode of Time Team, the paths have revealed themselves.
A luminous strip of bright green that's both quite impressive, but also makes it feel like you're running on an actual map or following that line on your sat-nav. Suddenly the joys and adventure of trail running seems a little tame. Most of my running in recent weeks has been early morning, very early morning. But it is without doubt the best part of the day...even in the rain. I had a great run yesterday, a quiet Sunday morning, I was 12 miles in and bumped in to James who was just setting off. Win, I couldn't help thinking.
I'm not entirely sure how I capitalised on this, making use of my time other than to squander it with idle chatter in the coffee shop or stand at the fridge door grazing in the name of breakfast. I was peckish for sure. It's the first run I've done in a while where I've been on road and really put a proper effort in. No photos or phantom shoe lace maintenance, I ran all the way! It sounds so pathetic when I say that, but it's a level of dedication and commitment that's been a bit absent from my running recently.
It's just that I like to look around, see the sights, take in the smells and listen to life as I pass it by. Or resting, would be another way to put it! I ran to work last week, however, and must admit there wasn't much I liked the look of or certainly the smell, the closer I got to Stockport. There was something both a little overly enveloping and unpleasant as I ran alongside a bus and the heat from it's engine smothered me in this cloud of...'city'. Still, navigating my way across the A6 is far more tricky than following a fluorescent green line in a field.
