I've just got back from the Ed Prickett relays in Nottingham where I used this as a training session. Nick was training yesterday in preparation for the Euro Indoors and Lewis hasn't been running these last 10 days so I would have been on my own doing a session so the coaches ok'd it for me to use this as a training session of 2x2mile off 10mins recovery.

I didn't really prepare for this as a race, I didn't ease down or do my usual morning run when I got up, I just used it as a normal training day. I ran the 1st leg and the 3rd leg in 2 separate teams to avoid being disqualified. On the first leg I went off with the intention of going off very hard and hanging on. With it being a downhil start my first mile was probably a little too quick... 4:21, oops. Although I felt good until I hit the long hills. After just under a mile and half there's about 600m worth of hills strung together which really caught me out. My breathing went very uncomfortable and I struggled up them then found my leg speed again to finish fairly strong in 9:25, a new course record.

I jogged around for 10 minutes while I waited for James, one of the Loughborough boys to run his leg and I took over on my 2nd team in 8th position and this time ran what I thought was a much more conservative first mile of 4:30. I was expecting a massive amount of lactic to begin with but it didn't come on. I then started to motor along the lake before I reached the long hills. This time the hills really caught me out and Morrow one of my training partners actually pulled 20 meters on me on the hills! I really wanted to get passed him but I felt like I was jogging up the hills and really struggled but again off the top I felt fine and worked hard into the finish. I thought my time would be very slow in comparison to my 1st leg but it wasn't too bad, I was only 15 seconds down in 9:41. This was good enough for =6th overall on the day, with the 2nd fastest being 9:38 so it was pretty close around the 9:40 mark with 8 lads within 4 seconds of each other. The two teams I ran for, the first won and the second finished in 3rd position, so well done to the lads in the teams I ran in.

In the end I got a really good workout out of it and it felt good to get my legs turning quickly again. Now time for a few hard days before I back off for the Inter counties next weekend.