Have you ever been out on a run and your legs felt like dead weights? That was me on Sunday, I was struggling with every step and it felt like I was doing more harm than good. I have actually never felt so flat, not even when I’ve been running my ultras.

Looking back I can see why I was tired as I’d given myself a kick up the butt last week and ramped up my training schedule as the physio had given me the thumbs up last Monday morning. So what had I done differently since then?

Tuesday morning I got up and ran 3km of hillyness with the dog around my local area, I had a work training day & dinner that night so couldn’t fit anything else into the agenda unfortunately.

Wednesday I got up early and took the dog for a 3km power walk around the block, then went for a 9km run at lunch out to Pyrmont wharves and back.

Thursday I got up early again and took the dog for a 3km power walk around the block, then decided that I would try a new class at the gym called ‘HIIT’ which stands for High Intensity Interval Training. HIIT was a lot of fun but it was also very high intensity, which meant that I was knackered and dripping with sweat by the end of the class. I knew right then that I would be sore for a few days.

Friday morning i got up and took the dog for another 3km power walk around the hilly block, then decided that I would skip my lunch run as I was feeling very tired from the HIIT session the day before.

Saturday morning I got up early and trained my client Amanda with a Boxing session, then headed over to a friends place to go for a run with Kristy and her hubby Nigel. We snuck in about 13km of trails through the Royal National Park near home and I felt a little sore in the muscles but generally pretty good. So we had a cheese and ham croissant for brekkie to celebrate.

Sunday I got up early and drove to St Ives to meet up with my Oxfam crew for a 1hr run and then we would meet up with the Trailblazers for an additional 1.5 hour run. This is where I came undone. I didn’t feel too bad for the first hour, but as soon as I started the session with the bigger group I knew it was going to be a struggle, and I ended up turning back early with another 2 runners who had to be back for other reasons (like work). I was getting pain in the arch of my foot & I just felt sore all over. I felt bad for slowing the other 2 runners down as they had to wait for me on several occasions when I walked, but luckily one of them was my good friend (& fellow Oxfam team member) Emma and she helped keep me going.

I got back to the cars, got warm & chatted to the runners as they were coming back then headed home for brunch & a snooze on the couch, I felt exhausted.

Time to rest and recover 🙂