The running thread.

[garynortheast]

I ran on Saturday morning in Fridd Mathrafal, near Pontrobert, with Mabel, and my friend Karen and her dogs on a 3.14m route. I realised afterwards that the route is parkrun/barkrun length, so I registered it on Strava with Barklife. I may well make that a regular Saturday morning run now as it's only 20 minutes from where I live.

Headed out this afternoon for a 3.5 mile run with Mabel, and a mate who is just getting back into running. We ran about 3 weeks ago, and his pace has definitely improved since then, particularly given that this afternoon's course was much more demanding than the one we did back then.

[garynortheast]

Went out with Mabel, and a friend with her Husky, Max, for a 5¼ mile run. It was a lovely, sunny afternoon with a fantastic golden light on the trees, but it was bloody cold!

We got back in, and Mabel had her dinner and has been out for the count in her bed ever since. I'll be not far behind heading for mine!

[garynortheast]

We had our first proper Saturday morning BarkLife group run in Ffridd Mathrafal this morning. A great success with five of us taking part, and enjoyed by all of us. A hilly, and in places quite technical, 3.14 miles through the woods.

Not too muddy, and a bit warmer than the temperature readings on the car thermometer would have us believe.

In parts it's quite a difficult route on which to get any serious speed, but it feels like my more regular running routine is starting to pay off now. My pace is going up and this run gave me 9.21/mi. Given the terrain I'm fairly pleased with that, but the aim now has to be to get into the 8.00/mi range

[garynortheast]

Out with 9 other canicross runners for a 3.8 mile run on Llanforda estate, near Oswestry. A beautiful evening but very cold, although it was fine for running. Some pretty quick runners in the group, which made me push on a bit. Thought I might die on a couple of the hills!

I have (re)discovered that hills don't get any less painful to run up, you just get quicker.

Got a very gentle 3.5 mile run tomorrow, with a friend who is getting back into running, and then I'm leading a small group on a 4.5 mile run in the hills here on Thursday. A week full of running!

[garynortheast]

Not managed to get out and run since last week as snow and mud stopped play. Got out today though. I drove over to Ironbridge to do a recce run of my short leg of the Telford T50 Relay Challenge. Mabel and I are running it as part of the Shropshire Canicross team.

I did a quick warm up jog from the Wharfage Car park to my start point at the iron bridge, then the run from there to the Museum of Iron car park in Coalbrookdale. I managed to get lost when I missed one of the markers, and ended up adding about a mile to the leg, So I ran the route in reverse from the car park back to Ironbridge to check where I went wrong. Running it in reverse is a bloody sight easier than running it the right way, as I have to go up 230 very steep steps to the Rotunda on the way out!

Still, I now know where I'm going on my leg, so I'll see how I do on 2nd April.

[garynortheast]

Out for a short wet run with Mabel this afternoon. I should have been leading a group of four on a 5.4 mile run, but two dropped out at the last minute and one never showed up. I decided to make it just a short run and leave it at that for today.

[garynortheast]

Out for an evening run with 9 of the Shropshire Canicross gang today. Three and a bit miles in Candy Woods and the Old Racecourse near Oswestry.

[garynortheast]

Very nice late afternoon run in the hills with a couple of friends and our dogs. Perfect temperatures for running too.

For some reason Strava has decided that I was running for an extra half an hour and has nobbled my pace accordingly. The wonders of fitness tracking apps.

[garynortheast]

Out with Mabel, and a friend with her dogs for a BarkLife run this morning in Ffridd Mathrafal. It was a seriously muddy run, very slippery. I managed to put a hole in the sleeve of my eye wateringly expensive waterproof shell by catching it on a bramble.

Took me a while to clean the shoes off when I got back (once the water came back on!).



Got another 6 miles of muddy goodness at the Myddle Muddle 10k tomorrow morning.

[garynortheast]

A trip to run 10K at the Myddle Muddle mudfest. A brilliantly organised little event, put on to raise funds for Myddle primary school in Shropshire. The attention to detail and the care taken over every aspect of this annual event puts many larger organisations to shame.

It's a dog friendly event but runners with dogs start with everyone else, which is fine currently as there aren't huge numbers of runners with dogs. However, this year there were probably a dozen proper canicross runners, maybe more. The woman who is in charge of organising came to chat with a few of us after the race, to see what we thought of the course as runners with dogs. We were all happy with it, even with the two or three stiles (Mabel either jumps or climbs straight over them). I did suggest that if numbers of canicrossers increase she may want to consider a separate start for them in future. She was enthusiastic about the idea and would like to make the event properly canicross friendly, and promote that aspect through the local canicross groups. Good bit of PR I think.

Mabel is now stacked out (muddily) in her bed, and I think I might slump on the sofa!