Getting out and about

The start of the week was a write off after waking up Monday morning with a stonking cold! All hopes of an early week run were scuppered as scheduled lempsipping and resting took over! Three days rest saw no improvement in the cold so I decided to try and kill the bugs with an early morning run!

So at 6.30am I was up, ready and whizzing down Nacton Road to meet Claire and Steve. It was particularly cold this morning and frost was everywhere underfoot. This made our overall run slightly slower than usual - especially when going down hill! I had some fears that I would end up sliding down on my bum.

Our route is what we call our ' Run for Coffee Route'. It is a weekly run that starts at Claire's house and goes via Nacton Road to pick me up. It then moves down Derby Road to eventually hit Valley Road where we follow the ring road all the way round, picking up fellow runners to eventually end up at Staples carpark. This is where kate's coffee van is situated. The number of people we pick up on route depends on people's availability, but having people to meet makes the journey exciting and encourages us to continue to get up at crazy times in the morning!

The good news is that post run - the cold had gone - success!

The running adventures continued on Friday as our friend David came down to visit. I was lucky enough to already have the day booked off work! Clare had planned a route which would take us just over 10km.

The weather was in our favour and the winter sun was beaming down as we started off on our adventure. The route is absolutely stunning as it took us past the golf course, through trails, countryside and woods. We had to keep our feet up however to prevent us from tripping up on any of the leaves or tree routes. It was a very relaxed run and we spent lots of the time discussing plans for the Christmas RFYL party that was due to take place that evening.

We finished our run at what we call in Ipswich the ' Sugar Cubes'. It is the entry to the Heath and lots of trails to whizz around. Lots of people use these as a starting point for group runs.

Finally the weekend saw myself and Clare getting out early on a Sunday morning to complete a 7 mile run. We decided to not plan where we were going - which is always slightly exciting as it means we can make it up as we go along.

We started off by heading towards Holywells Park. As you can see below not a soul in sight! We did a lap here and then headed off towards the docks, through town, up via Christchurch park, round Vally road and home. It was a tough run and the legs were a little tired, but I enjoyed getting out early on a new route. All in all it has been a fun filled few days of running and catching up with running friends.

#Running #All