This is where the fun part starts.

Distance: 15.79 km

Time: 1:46:33

This run was dedicated to my friend Scarlett, who is recovering from surgery. Big hugs from me, and I hope you get better soon.

“Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.” - Winston Churchill

I’m starting to get into the longer distance territory now, and I can feel it. There’s a transition when the muscles in my legs start to feel really tight and uncomfortable. Soon, when I’ve added another five kilometres to my long run, maybe I’ll get into the zone where they stop being tight and go slack and baggy, making it even harder to run.

My right ankle felt a little odd when I started out this morning, like my foot was striking on a strange angle and it was pulling on the inner side of the ankle. The feeling cleared up after a kilometre or two, and because there weren’t any other little niggles bothering me, most of the run was without incident. It started raining at the halfway point, but it never got past a sort of half-hearted sprinkle, and it gave up entirely about half an hour later out of boredom.

My planned trail wasn’t quite as long as I expected it to be, so I took a slight detour and extended the run, if not quite to the 16 km I planned, at least half a km closer than it would have been. I’m probably going to have to find another path son, because when I get to the 20 km run, I’ll probably have to circle Lake Gininderra twice and that’ll get old really fast.

On Monday I’m hoping to take a jog up Black Mountain. I don’t know how achievable it is, but there’s nothing gained by not giving it a try.

Hope everybody enjoys their long weekend, and if you should happen to not be having a long weekend, my most heartfelt sympathy goes out to you.