A week of birthday celebrations, culminating in a rather lovely dinner with great friends N&A at The Fox & Anchor last night. Today however, is back to running and diet reality. No sneaky chocolate, although I have about 2 kilos of birthday chocolate to demolish. No lunchtime tapas accompanied by wine. No evening meal habitually accompanied by wine and an after dinner snifter. Still it was fun whilst it lasted. and now it is less than 2 weeks ’til we return to Italy. So some pounds and kilometres to shift.
Heading East and I came across Frying Pan Alley and the interesting yellow building nearby – still no idea what it was. Today was all about getting to a number, a very specific number – 500 to be precise. I wanted to run 13km, so I could reach the 500km mark by end March, which would put me dead on target to meet the 2018 km in 2018.
Having tried and failed miserably to hit an 18km run during my Alhambra/Granada stay, I thought 13km would be more manageable and I can now start working my way up to half-marathon distance, gradually. After my East London mooch around, I headed out West and passed through the back of Tate Modern, where they still have adult sized swings – there are times when I wish I had company on a run – because it would have been fun to have had a go on the swing in tandem.
I continued on past the London Eye and headed northwards at Westminster. Full of crowds, so I turned off at the Embankment and headed towards home, where I came across another weirdly named alley – Tweezers Alley. Nearing St Pauls I’d hit the 13km mark – very luckily for me that signified the ‘beating’ of the 500km YTD target, I had set myself.
Run done – a shade over 15km. Fingers crossed that this run of good health and no injury continues. Oh and I have achieved the Under Armour Pavement Pounder Award for the 500km.
Next milestone – getting under 1500 kms to run for the rest of the year – I hope to do that before the end of March.
Playlist
Common People – Pulp
Rehab – Amy Winehouse
Breaking Us In Two – Joe Jackson
Get Dancin’ – Disco Tex and His Sex-O-Lettes
People Are People – Depeche Mode
I Won’t Let The Sun Go Down On Me (twice) – Nik Kershaw
Dreaming – OMD
The Look Of Love – ABC
Our House – Madness
Two Tribes (twice) – Frankie Goes To Hollywood
I Can’t Stand Up – Elvis Costello & The Attractions
Night Boat To Cairo – Madness
No More I Love Yous – The Lover Speaks
Love’s Unkind (twice) – Donna Summer
Gold – Spandau Ballet
I Am The Law – Human League
Temptation – Heaven 17
Enola Gay – Love’s Unkind
Oliver’s Army – Elvis Costello
Hungry Like The Wolf (twice) – Duran Duran
Night Fever – Bee Gees
The Sound Of The Crowd – Human League
New Moon On Monday – Duran Duran
Beat Crazy – Joe Jackson
Do You Really Want To Hurt Me – Culture Club
Stats
Distance 15.11km
Time 1:39:22
Average Pace (mins/km) 6:34
Elevation Gain 97 metres
Alzheimer’s Challenge
Kms done 502.2
Kms to do 1515.8