15 May – Beating The Bitch

 

There is a saying that the camera never lies; this is patently untrue, as the picture above neither conveys the incline nor the pain I went through running up the Bitch of a Pitch , it looks so benign – a gentle curve, and another and a bit of a slope. The piece you can see took me three goes.

After having some quite successful runs in London, mainly I think to an excess of naughty foodstuffs, cooler weather and more distractions, I had my doubts as to how well I would do today.  Mr JCR was all happy and sunny, like an overactive bunny at the thought of going out on his bike for a recovery ride after his 2 day London Revolution ride. I however, was duvet monitoring and putting off the inevitable. I’d decided to do about 10km – my usual three village loop, stopping off for my breakfast and then facing the 4.5km walk back up the bitch.

It went much better than I could have hoped, my quicker pace hadn’t entirely deserted me although it’s warmer here and I managed a 5 minutes 14 second kilometre, followed by a 5 minutes 42, which is amazingly quick for me. Not sustainable at all, but it did prove that the sprints had had a positive effect. The cooler weather seemed to keep everyone at home, I didn’t see any cyclists or runners, and no major safety incidents to report. I stopped off for my usual coffee and pastry, and on the spur of the moment thought that instead of walking up the bitch, I’d run her instead. And so, that is exactly what I did.

Now before, there are any thoughts of what this running actually entailed, I must be very honest. Running up a 200 metre elevation gain, in just over 3kms, is not something I can do without taking a breather. My method is therefore to do as many steps as I possibly can and then take a rest, and restart the process. Sometimes it was 100 paces, others 25. At my breakfast pause I was hitting an average pace of under 6 minutes 30 per km. And it had taken about 55 minutes to get there. It then took me about 40 minutes to do 4kms, so I am not sure that the ‘running’ was much better than just walking up the hill. But as the elevation graph shows, it is a ‘bitch’ even though the camera doesn’t really do it justice.

Nonetheless the good news is I’ve beaten her for the first time. So the next time on a long run day – weather permitting – I hope to do better. Otherwise in penance I may have to listen to Elton John and The Bitch Is Back – not one of my favourite tracks of his. But that’s my commitment if I can’t do better at beating the bitch next time, then Elton J you and I have a date.

 

Playlist

Girls and Boys – Blur

Get Here – Oleta Adams

Don’t Need The Sunshine – Catatonia

Say My Name – Destiny’s Child

Lose Yourself – Eminem

Love Is All Around – The Wets

Barbie Girl – Aqua

Baby One More Time – Britney Spears

Wannabe – Spice Girls

Killing Me Softly With His Song – The Fugees

Never Ever – All Saints

The Power – SNAP

Ebeneezer Goode – The Shamen

Move Any Mountain – Ditto

Rhythm Is A Dancer – SNAP

I See You Baby – Groove Armada

Groove Is In The Heart – Deee-Lite

(I Wanna Give You ) Devotion – Nomad

Everybody’s Free – Rozalla

Personal Jesus – Depeche Mode

One and Only – Adele

Wild Boys – Duran Duran

I’m A Believer – The Monkees

Please Don’t Go – Madness

You Love Us – The Manics

People Are People – Depeche Mode

The Jean Genie – David Bowie

Stats

Distance 13.41 km

Duration 1:41:27

Average Pace 7:33

Elevation Gain – 222 metres

Alzheimer’s Challenge

Kms Done 844.26

Kms to Run 1173.74