Saturday routine

Since we're back from holiday, it only made sense to call Nick to see if he was available for a Saturday morning run along to Cora and back. Great news - he was. Not so great - he was overloaded with running training during the week and wanted to take it easy (please take note Andy and Paul - things are getting serious for the Yvelines marathon relay).

This suited me fine, since I felt like toaking it easy too after Friday's run in the heat. Saturday was going to be a scorcher so I put my cap on and met up with Nick for our run at 8:30. We took it easily into the forest to begin with, catching up on each other's news and how the holidays had gone. Looks like both of us had been training regularly over the break and it was nice to run together again.

It wasn't long before we were running at our usual rhythm of 4:35 per km. This is just the pace that we are both most comfortable at (well I speak for myself here but I didn't hear Nick complaining !) and despite all the talk about easy runs etc., we always tend to end up at this pace. Today was going to be exceptional however. We were just cruising towards the Cora pond when we cvaught up with a female runner in her early 50s heading in our direction. She was worried about a dog on the path: well an overgrown puppy would be more accurate; and asked if she could run with us for a while. We felt slightly suspicious about the chat up line but being polite gentlemen we said that that wouldn't be a problem. The pace slowed to 4:50 for the next 3 kilometres and it was a relief when she said that she didn't want to hold us up any more. Having said all of this, it's true that for a female runner in her 50s, this pace was already an achievement and she was a very good runner. She explained that she regularly finished on the podium for her category in the races.

Anyway, we left her going up the hill towards Chateau de la Muette and after the uphill at 4:45 pace, we settled back into our 4:35 - 4:40 rhythm to finish.

15 km all up in 1:10 or an average of 4:45 per km. Nice run on a hot day.