The past few days has brought some great weather so I felt I had to take the opportunity to get out as much as sensibly possible and get some training in.  I am having a rest day today as my legs feel slightly tired and ache a bit.  Last week I kept up my normal safe run which is about 4 miles and makes me feel good and allows me depending on the day to either push hard or just go with the flow and enjoy the run.  I think it is important to have a route like this that you can turn to especially on days when your tired or not up for it.  It motivates me but still makes me feel I have done something worthwhile.  Following these few short runs, whilst staying at my parents who live on the Yorkshire Wolds I ventured out with the map and headed off on a trail run.  This was great fun and the weather was perfect. Heading out of their village and up the hill, veering away more and more which left me feeling slightly apprehensive but I continued and trusted my map reading skills ( not to be done lightly ha ha!)  With a few little up's and downs the route brought me beautifully back to there house with the 'wiff' of my mothers cooking drifting through the village.

Saturday and Sunday brought good training days with a decent 8 miler on Saturday afternoon after work so tired legs then a good 11 miler Sunday morning with even more tired limbs!  This is important training for a few reasons really as it prepares yours legs for feeling tired and continuing, its good strength training as you have to dig in and motor on, and more importantly than any other its good mental strength training. If your not used to it being hard and tough going how are you going to cope on the day.  You need to learn coping strategies, I have talked about this before.  You need knowledge or experience of how it feels then you need coping methods to get you through it.



Mental strength is now what it is about, physical preparation is a must over the next few weeks but my coping mechanisms is what I will be concentrating the most on.