Children and bin bags

I've just spent an hour trying to avoid both. Running at 'home time' is not a good idea. Small people are darting about like frightened rats, plus shopkeepers (because I live in the 1960s) are putting out their rubbish for the evening collection. I only hope all that dodging and diving is intensifying my work-out.

That aside, it was a very good run and I think I might have even achieved some sort of running nirvana...

I was sprinting down West End Lane and turned a corner to run up a steepish incline. Bizarrely, instead of running out of steam on the slope, I zoomed up it. The front foot landing motion I'd perfected going down was now helping me veritably fly uphill. My feet hardly touched the ground and, at one point, I felt quite detached, as if my legs and body could happily keep up this pace for miles and miles...

And then I hit the wall. Or should I say, a wall... of small children. They had formed a Maginot Line across the pavement and my only choice was to stop. With that, the moment was gone. And I came crashing and wheezing back to reality.

But that doesn't matter. Because for a few short minutes, I glimpsed how it must be for the sainted Haile Gebrselassie. Perhaps the high intensity training I've been doing (okay, that I've done twice) is paying off. I have a day of sports planned for tomorrow and there will be no backing out. Especially not now I've experienced the kind of high I'd usually only associate with shopping.

(Stats: 4.34 miles; 41.21 minutes; 9.29 minute/mile.)