A training run on the RAW

On Saturday I did a 15 mile training run along the River Ayr Way (RAW) with a couple of club mates. This is relatively unusual for me, I usually do this run alone more through necessity than anything else so it was nice to have some company and someone to encourage me to push the pace a little bit, something I'm not very good at on my own.

Three of us set off from Failford with the cautionary words "Mind the path, it's awfa slippery" from a local lady. She wasn't lying either. Whilst the air temperature was above freezing it was clear that the ground temperature was lagging well behind and the footing was quite treacherous in bits. In addition, the storms of last Tuesday (our 5K night) had blown over quite a few trees across the path that we had to negotiate. Most of them were easy enough but one near Annbank was really quite awkward to get around. Fortunately, it doesn't block the official RAW, we were on the "unofficial" RAW at that point using a stretch of fishermans path.

It was interesting to see other runners approach to the hills on the route. I'm used to running every hill, making it a point of principal not to walk any of the slopes but one of my clubmates (a far stonger runner than me) was quite content to walk the hills and make up the time on the flat. That is what I would do for a longer run but I guess I probably have more endurance training under my belt just now and for me, attacking the hills feels right at the moment.

By far the worst stretch was the tarmac section (known locally as "Tomato Lane") which was covered in black ice. For much of it we had to run with one foot in the gutter & one foot on the verge. It was about the only way to get any grip. Even so we were nearly waltzing off the road into the hedges on more than one occasion.

Still, it all made for an interesting (and challenging) run that probably exercised more muscles than it would have had it not been icy and I was pleased with our overall pace which was definitely quicker than I would have run alone.

Looking forward to another run along there this weekend if possible.