My first virtual event! Thanks to Sarah and Jon for a day of adventures! The event was - start running at 08:00, and run for as much as you wanted to until 20:00. You could run on your own or as a team, and there was a Scavenger List published at 07:00 of all the things that you must collect along the way....
So we all set off at 08:00 from our respective houses, to meet about half way between us, at Putney Bridge. I ran down to St Paul's, and all along the river, about 11 miles on an old, and somewhat forgotten of late, favourite route.
How good it was to see Sarah and Jon again! Oh, the event also had a woodland theme, Jon was a wicked weasel, Sarah a sultry (or princess) squirrel, and I was a feisty fox (my fancy dress didn't make it much further than a manicure).
From Putney, we set off on a route that we made up as we went along, thinking of where we could scavenge our treasures. The route remains a mystery, until Garmin is back up and running and can show us the map, but included, not necessarily in any order either here, or even when doing it: the Beverly Brook, Richmond Park (a few times), The River Thames (more than a few times), Hampton Court, Bushy Park..... lots of other places, I'm not quite sure, I can't wait to see the map when it uploads!
Our scavenger hunt finds included....
A "nice" hill
A unicorn (at Hampton Court)
A cow
A fox
A beverage of choice
A (real life) dinosaur
Although not on the list Bushy Park had deer AND ice creams, so I felt should get bonus points of it's own.
We made our own Love Station
And our finishing photo
By the end of the 12 hours, I did just over 50 miles. By that point, I was still only in Battersea Park, which isn't where I live. Inspired not to get on a bus because of 1) Covid, but mostly 2) because of spending the day with Sarah and Jon who always inspire me to do very long runs (because of all their extreme and successful events and adventures they do), I decided on running home, which was another 6 miles. Which I'm really glad I did, as it was starting to get dark, and I ran along the river with all the lights twinkling, past Parliament and Whitehall, back to the river, by St Paul's and London Wall. Three miles of it was in an absolute downpour, with rain bouncing back up off the ground in my face and the roads all flooding. I loved it - cold, wet, dark, feeling tired at the end of a long run - I've missed this feeling. So I did 56 miles altogether, which I think is the 5th longest run that I've ever run. Thanks Sarah and Jon for such an awesome day!
And then, as I realise my Lockdown Diary has been lacking of late, photos the last three weekends running as well.....
18.07.2020 - Winter Tanners 30 miles
Back to Surrey for a run with Tara, on my favourite lockdown Surrey Hills route. For the first time, there was coffee on the way...
And grapes on the vines!
There has always been a Bus Stop Book Swap on the route - it used to be quite small, but over the weeks it's become more official and now has as almost as many books as a library, and it seems to have branched out into another bus stop a few miles further along as well...
It includes some quite obscure yet interesting titles, such as "The Dictionary of Dreams" which comes in useful for many a running conversation, and maybe also applies to ultra run induced hallucinations?
And, ominously for only 8 miles in, "If You're Reading This It's Too Late"...
12.07.2020: Olympic Park half marathon
Uni weekend, so shorter run. Didn't feel much like it at all after a weekend of virtual uni, but once I got going, it was great to be over in the Olympic Park and Hackney Marshes; much more spacious there than the other parks, and felt much less crowded.
04.07.2020 Milton Keynes 31.5 miles
A nice run around the countryside with Alan, Tom and Andrew. Today was the day that hairdressers opened - on the drive there, there were queues outside the barbers already, at 08:30! The weather wasn't so good, but on the plus side, that meant there was no queue at the cafe at 20 miles.....which meant coffee AND ice cream!
