Test run

I went out this morning to see if the osteopath's attempts to straighten me out had done any good or not.

Laurence volunteered to come along with me as she had managed a long run of 30km yesterday and wanted to ease off the muscle aches with a cycling sesssion. This has been an amazing week for her as she's run 95km in the week and is showing no sign of excessive fatigue. We set off slowly from the house and headed up to the forest for the standard Sunday run path to the barrier and back.

I felt easier from the start with the run. The muscle pain in my right buttock was still there but it felt as though the cause of the pain had disappeared. Unfortunately, the path through the forest had been churned up considerably by vehicles that are laying a water network to the next village. This meant that I was very cautious picking my way through the ruts in order to avoid throwing my back out of joint again. Once this section was over, I picked up the pace and began to feel a lot more comfortable running around 4:30 - 4:40 per km.

Towards the end of the route, the pain began to return to my lower back area so I'd probably forced a little too much again but it was definitely bearable and I'm not in any discomfort now, writing this 5 hours later.

Nice to get out again and put some kilometres in, even despite the lack of pace. Laurence enjoyed the outing too, very easy accompanying somebody at this pace on the mountain bike ! I really believe that yesterday's treatment has done me some good and that the muscle pain will wear off more quickly now. The big question is whether or not I can run the semi in Rambouillet. I'll take that decision after this weeks training sessions.

12.5km all up in one hour exactly.