Tapering

No time to write my blog anymore, let alone go for runs. Anyway, since I've started tapering, I have less to write about anyway.

Last week:

Stockholm, Sweden - Tuesday morning saw me pounding the treadmill of the hotel I was staying in. I'm thinking about writing a book on running treadmills around the world. Could be onto a bestseller here. 10km in 47 minutes. Felt pretty awful. Don't know if this was due to the 1% slope I put on the machine or an excess of beers and schnapps from the previous night. Either way, it was uphill all the way.

Stockhom, Sweden - Wednesday morning. Another workout on the treadmill. Only 7km this morning but in 30 minutes as I set the machine to 14.2 km/h. Highlight this morning was some company in the fitness room (a young lady on the nordic ski machine) and the fact that the TV was working. View was a darn sight better than staring at the diving photo stuck on the wall in front of me for 40 minutes. Still hard work and still uphill - it just lasted shorter though.

Friday morning. Back home at last and able to run in the real world again. How pleasant to feel the air in your face and to see the road beneath your feet. Real running. Set off slowly and then got carried away by how good I was feeling (fewer beers and less uphill). By the end I was running at 3:44 pace. 10.15 km in 43:29 or 4:18 per km.

Saturday morning - back to Cora with the lads. Nick and Andy can't compete with a Swedish lady in her workout gear but they were far better company. Nice to see Andy again who actually admitted being in bed last weekend when we called by. His shame knows no boundaries. Nick and I both decided to punish him severely and dropped him after Cora up the hill. He arrived back home looking far easier than he has in a while and at a good pace too. Perhaps a Saturday in bed did him so good. Anyway, this weekend he'll be training alone while we're in La Rochelle. 75 km this week in total so a 25% reduction on the previous week. Good tapering.

6 days to go before the race. All the worries are there. Am I fit enough ? Can I stay the distance ? Am I too ambitious ? What should I wear ? Will it be windy ? Do I take gels or not ? Etc., etc. Too late now.