Looking ahead.

My legs and joints were stiff as hell this morning after yesterdays hard speed session so on setting off for my long run today I was expecting nothing less than a hard long effort to make it round in an average sort of time. By three miles of steadyish running I was nearly two minutes slower than my best time but seeing as this was a steady run it didn't seem too bad, on reaching my first proper check point I had managed to hold the two minutes and by check point two I had lost another minute but yet again I was still going at a fast plod rather than the near all out effort when I had set my best time. For the last hour I upped my effort but didn't feel very springy and finished in two hours 36 minutes. As I have not been doing any hill work this year I was quite surprised I went so well over such an hilly course, what I was loosing in time going uphill I was gaining it back on the flat. Seeing as most marathons are flat I should fair slightly better this year I would say, I wouldn't imagine my fell running would be as good as other years and the Burn Valley Half Marathon will be even tougher than other years, if that's possible.
A rest day from running is planned for tomorrow which then leads into a quite an easy week seeing as next Sunday is race time once again. It might be an easyish week next week but the one after that I will be looking to get some hard training done with a 26 mile long run at a good pace on Good Friday to look forward to.