Six days to go until the Brighton Half, and I was feeling pretty good all things considered. The fact that the Brighton Half has a sensible cut off (3.5 hours – you could walk half of it and still be well within the limit) and that I didn’t need to worry about being followed through the streets by a man in a car shouting “get out the road, slowcoach” in Spanish. I was planning to just enjoy the race as a training run and try to improve on that non-spectactular time from Barcelona.
And then it happened. 2.5km into today’s medium length run, I felt a sharp pain in the back of my calf on my “good leg” and pulled up immediately. I did some stretches and walked about a bit, then tried to start running again. Twice. No good. Something had gone. I walked 2.5km home in the drizzle.
A quick session with Dr Google (who, after the whole stress fracture affair, I trust about as much as any doctor) says that it’s probably my soleus and that I need to rest for anything between two days and three weeks. I’ve had similar before, and it’s usually better within a couple of days, but I’ve not put it to the test by doing a half marathon either. It’s really bad timing and feels extremely unfair.
7:07 