Do You Like It Long and Slow?

"Congratulations, that was your longest training session to date," Paula Radcliffe told me after I finished my long v-e-r-y s-l-o-o-o-w run this afternoon. She also let me know I'd burned 2,023 calories.

Bring on the cheeseburgers.

Marathon training. It's all about the long slow training runs. I'm in between two training schedules these days ... the "get you around the course" and the 4.5 hour finish. I doubt I'll hit 4:30, but I want to do a little better than barely finish. So I'm trying to do at least what the GYATC schedule says, with a goal of reaching the 4:30 schedule (even if I'm a little slower than their prescripted times.

So, today I should have run either 3.5 hours (run 5 mins, walk 1 min) or done a half-marathon and tried to come in around 2:30. I ended up doing 3.5 hours and covering 14.5 miles. Very slow and I walked more than I'd have liked, but I survived. And I'm not crippled. Yet. Ask me again in the morning.

But oh my, what a nice day for a long run. Everybody's out and about ... perhaps too many people around the London Eye, but I say that every time I run along the south bank. The parks are filled with athletes and loungers (I being the quasi-athlete longing for a lounge chair). It's quite a different view along the Thames than Sig. Canaletto painted two and a half centuries ago, but lovely nonetheless. We ambled through Hyde Park, down through Chelsea, hit the river just east of Battersea. I lost Larry at Vauxahall Bridge. He said he was having hip flexor issues and would take the bus home. I figured he'd end up at RVT, but no, he was here when I arrived a couple hours later.

I continued on, crossing the river at Horseferry Rd (is that the Lambeth Bridge?) and then headed along the Thames, crossing back over at London Bridge. Hobbled along the embankment back to Westminster and then made my way through St. James Park, Green Park and back into Hyde Park which brought me right home.

Two thousand calories later, I think I'm ready for a snack, and maybe a trip to the pub. I bet Soho's looking rather fetching on such a nice day.