The Sweet Spot

A fab run this morning, so I felt the need to blog it.

According to my (unwritten) schedule, I was to up the distance today to 0.8/0.9 miles, and this meant heading out towards the main road, away from the safety of the estate.  I was in a different mindset, that being "I want to do this, but I wish people wouldn't stare".  This is different to how I've felt before, when I've felt self conscious to the point of embarrassment, rather than annoyance.

Anyway, I set off, shouted a cheery good morning to the ex-policeman at the end of our road who was washing his car, and headed out.  My feet felt great.  Weather was a cool but sunny September morning.

At the start, I could feel my feet scuffing as they passed under my body (ie at the back), so I adjusted my form slightly, and that quickly disappeared.  Cadence felt good, not too fast but definitely close to 180 (if not faster).

The main road was fine - no encounters, and still my feet felt great as I turned back into the estate, just slowing a little over the very gravelly section by the bridge.  I ran past the old lady with the dog, who had shown great concern at my exploits several months back, and as I passed her I said "morning, it's the mad lady with the bare feet", and she said hello back and asked "aren't your feet cold this morning?".

Got back to the house feeling like I could easily have run further.  0.93 miles, with my fastest pace to date of 5.4mph (11.08min/mile).  I can only describe the pace here as finding the "sweet spot" where everything just seemed to click into place.  Lovely.