On Friday, and today, I ran for 40 minutes. Non stop. I managed 7.6 km and 7.8 km respectively but the pace wasn't important in the slightest.
The important thing was that that 40 minutes was the longest time I've been able to run since last September. Although 24 hours is a bit longer than 40 minutes.
Feeling good at the moment though. And next there's 50 minutes on Tuesday and Thursday and then 60 minutes on Saturday - which will incorporate a 5k race.
And now I can also begin strength training with the legs. Very small weights at first though, but it is progress.
The UK team for the European Championships 100km has recently been announced and I was amazed to find that no men have been selected. Four women but no men. After thinking about this for a few days perhaps the reasons are:
- the Anglo Celtic Plate 100km is only weeks before the European Championships
- qualifying times are not easy to come by, especially as there are very few 100k races in this country
- few races partly because of the increased difficulty in staging road races (stringent licencing requirements, etc)
- few races also because ultra trail races seem to be ever more popular, more people enjoy those apparently
- many runners capable of achieving the required standard would rather run an enjoyable ultra trail race in the UK than a long road race abroad
I'm not sure what can be done to reverse this trend but I do believe we should be represented (men and women) in all championship events. Congratulations to Emma Gooderham, Susan Harrison, Karen Rushton and Helen Taranowski.
1 comment:
I'm surprised at that...seems like the UK would be bustling with ultra runners who could qualify and would prefer the roads over the trails.
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