Matt Gets Running

Fan­tas­tic run today. I got an extra hour in bed because of the end of British Sum­mer Time, which was a good start. Then I headed out to jog up Bridge Val­ley Road and around the Downs.

I kept to a nice, steady pace — as you can see from the Run­K­eeper map/log/stats — and did the first half of the Downs, up to the Water Tower, as usual.

On the way back, though, I decided not to let the nor­mal path force me back onto the street at a pedes­trian cross­ing, but instead went hunt­ing on the Downs for a path that keeps you on the grass a bit longer.

I fig­ured this was safe enough, nav­i­ga­tion­ally — I’d just keep going until there was a huge cliff, then turn left. As it turned out, this is pretty much exactly what hap­pened, hence the photo above. I took this from next to a bunch of guys with tele­scopes and binoc­u­lars who were look­ing out for pere­grine fal­cons, who appar­ently nest around there. Cool!

This way back was a lot nicer than my pre­vi­ous road path, so when I’ve got enough day­light to do it, it’s the way I’m going to go. It also added a bit to the dis­tance, so today I man­aged 6K, not bad for a route that starts with an 80 metre climb. And it felt just fine, all the way around!

Right. Time for a shower! Catch you later in the week :)