Well things had been progressing quite nicely although i am short of the old longer reps at race pace. SOme of this has been down to the track repeatedly closed due to meetings or bank holidays.  Still I have been confident that things would be fine and slowly take shape.  Last week though I ran in the pouring rain and my achilles flared up a bit.  Now anybody who knows me, understands that I have had on off achilles trouble for the best part of ten years.  Some seasons it has been so bad that every time I run it hurts, to the point where I limp for the first few minutes of every run.  Now I suppose that I could have had surgery but I was never prepared to take that risk , so in light of that decision I have soldiered on.  The good news is I saw the 'yellow pages' guy Ron Holder from South Africa (long story) who was great and I came away having been in lots of pain, to be running virtually pain free for a good year or so now.  So now my achilles has been hurting again, I have been doing more miles also which probably doesn't help, but I need the strength to get through the summer.  I ran easy on it on Wednesday and did a session on the track on Thursday where it was painful and getting more so as the session went on, although I finished (don't forget I know the level of pain I can take on this thing as had it so long) So although hurting not overly worried.  I then did hills on Saturday and strangely enough it didn't hurt despite the incline, although I was in flats.  Monday however was a different story.  I went to the track to do 3 x 800 off 5 mins.  Now I wanted to run 1.56's and although it was very windy I thought I could still hit somewhere inside 2 mins.  I was all alone and the foot was hurting before I started which was not good.  Not sure if it was the pain in the leg, but it doesn't help with motivation, and although you tell yourself to crack on it just didn't happen.  The first rep was a ridiculous 2.04.  Ok I was in a bit of pain, but thought I would warm up and things would be ok as per usual.  2nd Rep slower!  At that point you have to be sensible, because it could be your body saying your really tired, although everything else has been fine.  I decided to drop to 400's and salvage something from the session, but 300 in and I felt something twinge, which is the first in all these years, so at that point I stopped and limped off.  

The main reason I am unhappy is my opening race is this weekend in Germany.  I have been looking forward to it, and now my prep has been disrupted massively.  I am now back on anti-inflams with no training leading up to the race.  Obviously I have thought about if to go or not, but hopefully I will be ok, and unfortunately I do not have the luxury that some do with chopping and changing race plans.  WIthout this race I will struggle to get into other good ones, and besides although it is a long season if you get things right, it is a very short one if you don't, and things can be over by the trials, and after that horrible session I need to get used to the pain of racing and quickly!

So for now it is a fingers crossed and hope for the best scenario.  We shall see.

Sp8y