As you know, this week is the biggie......42 miles are required..............will wearing the much awaited t-shirts help us through?
As personal trainer's hubby was due to leave home for the football at 10am this morning, the pressure was on us to leave for our walk in good time, especially if we wanted to do a good distance.
SO, after a lovely evening with friends last night, I got to bed at 1.45 (yes it's true) & before I knew it, the alarm was going off just before 6.........how mad am I? We normally start our Sunday walks about 7.30, so, hey, what's an hour earlier really??!!! Ha ha ha, yes we started at 6.30.....
For once, the sun was rising as we set off but knowing how unlucky we have been with our previous walks, we decided to keep our rain coats on. As usual, the old banger took a little while to warm up but before I knew it, I was taking my coat off as it was so warm....what a change for us!
In fact, the weather just got better & even warmer so we left our coats by my front door as we passed my house. We both ended up tying our jackets round our waist & walking with our t-shirts on full view for all to see. We certainly got lots of smiles & waves today so hopefully the t-shirt is now self explanatory.....I'm sure that people must have previously thought we were a pair of nutters, especially when we were walking in the snow!! I felt very proud wearing the t-shirt......
There are so many titles I could have given this blog but this one stuck in my mind........
We were almost at the 11 mile marker & I have to admit that I was starting to struggle a little, nowhere near "the wall", just a time when I had to dig that bit deeper. Tracey happened to turn round & saw that my head was down (literally!) & shouted "head up Bella!" She is such a star, she often says just the right thing to push me on & she was right once again. Power walking with your head up, looking straight ahead DOES help & also, I was able to see the smiles & waves & this gave me the encouragement I needed. Imagine, this is just round Felixstowe, how fantastic will it be in London with so many people supporting us??!!
We realised that we would be able to walk 15 miles as we were walking very well & keeping to a very good pace (as it turns out, we could have done the 16 & still have been home in time) & had completed our half marathon in 2 hours 42...don't just double this time & think we can do the full moon in 5 hours 24....if only it were that easy! The farthest we have walked is 16 & we just don't know how we are going to feel walking the full distance & whether we will be able to keep the same pace up.....it's a journey into the unknown...
But, today was great. I'm sure walking in the warm sun helped us & it did feel great to do a "good" distance. I felt tired during the 14th but when Tracey told me we'd done it in just under 3 hours (2hrs 58) my face broke into a huge grin & I felt revived for the final mile which we did in 12 minutes. So the 15 miles took us 3 hours 10. Keeping track of our distances & times is really helping me as I can see how we are improving & that in itself is helping my mental battles. On March 16th, we did our first 14 miler in 3 hours 12, so we managed to do the 15 today in two minutes less than this.....
The training is working then & this really does make all the hard times, pain, aches, tiredness & lack of lay-ins etc seem worthwhile.
Just look at the smiles............what a fantastic feeling finishing today........
XX
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