Long Run - 25km (water, water everywhere...)

dannewton just finished a 25.48km run, that lasted for 172 minutes.
This run helped dannewton burn 1961.0 calories.

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Description from Strava: Once again it is Saturday, which is of course 'long run' day. I've said it before and I'll say it again, these weeks are flying by! The last couple of long runs have both been 30km, and I wasn't sure if I fancied another run the same distance today, or whether it was worth easing it back a little

I reasoned to go for the loop around Lincoln, which works out as a respectable 22km, and then if I felt ok then I would add some distance on at the end. I've not done the route recently either, and so it was worth doing again for that reason too, just to see if there was anything new occurring the city.

I set off a little later than planned at 10am, and heading down the hill into town. The weather was very grey, with a very light mist. Temperatures were quite cool to begin with so I started with a thin jacket. It only lasted 20 minutes before I started over heating, so I took it off and stuffed it into my pack. It was dry, which was a good thing as we've had so much rain in the past week or so...

The River Witham looking very full at the moment

The heaviest rains were 8 days ago where some parts of the country received 2 months of rainfall in just 24 hours. There's been damage caused by the floods, but I was surprised to see that over a week later the water was still has high as this....

In town the mist had cleared a little, so only the tops of the Lincoln Cathedral were hidden from view... and as I looked across...

....I saw just how high the water levels were at the Bayford Pool... it doesn't usually look this brown by the way, presumably the high levels of rainfall has increased the amount of sediment and mud picked up by the river.

I'll be honest, although I had heard stories of flooding in the general area, I hadn't actually seen any images of it. The Village I live in is on a hill, so we avoided the worst of it, and I very rarely watch the news these days, as its always so miserable.

I was going to be shocked again regarding the water later on...

For now however, I slowly meandered through town, cutting through the busy High Street, onto Silver Street and then onto Monks road (pictured above)

At the end of Monks Road, I then turn on to Greetwell Road, to run past where I work during the week

By this point I was about 12km into run, and moving well. Other my indecision earlier, I now knew I wanted to increase the run up to 30km, and decided that as I was heading onto the bypass, there is access down to the River and the the 'Water Railway' which is the name of the path that runs alongside it. A quick detour down there and back would add on the 8km I wanted

But I was soon to find out that was not possible...

Heading down the bypass...

Oh.

That is a lot of water.

Er, I mean a LOT of water.

Technically there are 2 bodies of water here. The one on the middle with the bridge crossing it is the River Witham. The one one the right handside is the Drain, which is manmade, and helps to protect from rising water levels. You can see that both of these have levels so high that they have practically merged into one.

You can see a a thin path right in the center between the two... that is the path I was aiming to run on... well not today I guess!

On the far left hand side is yet more water...

This should be an empty grassy field, it now looks to be under at least 4ft of water.

er yep... I think the path is closed!

As I wasn't able to run this way... I then had to think where else I could run to get the extra distance in. I briefly thought of a quick loop around Branston, but I wasn't sure of the conditions on the backroads. In the end I decided just to head past my house and down on to the road to Waddington and Harmston. At least I knew I'd run down here in the past week and there were no flooding issues...

Just as I left Bracebridge Heath to head down through Waddington, I became aware that my left Achilles was feeling sore. It had actually appeared about 40 minutes prior to this, while I was running along the bypass (and staring at the water). That pain was only mall to begin with, and had gradually become more persistent. After running for so long I would expect general aches and tiredness, but this seemed to be very localized. My right Achilles was totally fine in comparison. With that in mind, I decided to just turn and head back home... 25km is still a decent effort anyway, and it's not worth pushing through pain while just on a training run.

When I got home, I took my shoes off, and immediately the pain disappeared.

Had I just laced up the left shoe a little to tight... was that it?

Seemed a very simple solution lol. And to be fair these shoes have now covered over 650km in total distance, so perhaps it is a sign they are on the way out?

Not sure. But I will do tomorrows recovery run in a different pair of shoes, so time will tell tomorrow what the problem is, and I'll be keeping my fingers crossed its down to old shoes and NOT a potential new injury haha!

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If you would like to check out this activity on strava you can see it here:
https://www.strava.com/activities/10118376921

About the Athlete: Living in the UK, I am an intermittent Runner, but always striving for more consistency. When I'm not training I can be found photographing insects or listening to really loud angry music (which is the best type of music obviously!)

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