This was the week that would change the entire course of my life! Happily ticking sessions off training for Amsterdam Half Marathon; I'd felt that I'd been a little bit 'off' doing sessions and longer runs recently but was keen to get stuck into a good week of training, ending with the Great North Run which I was planning on running as a progression run.

The week began well enough....

Mon noon – 8M, middle 4M steady.  7:30 pace felt a little harder than it should have.  It was quite warm and windy so I didn't think much of it.

Tues PM – 8M easy, supposed to be 6 x 5 mins but horrendous stitch from setting off put me off.  Blamed this on the flapjack I’d eaten when I got home from work, 30 mins before heading out.  I’d usually be OK but just guessed it was the flapjacks fault!

Wed AM – 8M fartlek: 5 mins, 2 mins, 3 mins, 2 mins, 5 mins of efforts, 90s in between.  Nice session and felt like I’d ran hard but the pace was barely marathon pace!  For the effort I would have expected at least 45s faster.  Puzzled what was wrong, blamed the fact that it was 5:40am when I set out running and I’d not even had a sip of water.  Complained about it when I got home, sucked it up and decided to take it easy for a few days then look forward to getting a good hard training run in on Sunday.

Little did I know when I went to bed that night that things were about to take an unexpected turn!

Thurs AM – woke up feeling a little bit sick.  First thought went to the test in my drawer and as I was bursting for the loo I took advantage of a concentrated wee!  Test came up positive straight away.  YIKES!

Thurs PM – Didn’t dare run.  Bought another test just to check – definitely positive.  YIKES! 

Fri PM – social 6M with the running club, nice easy pace on Friday night runs so would be ideal to keep these up. 

Sat AM – Sedgefield parkrun.  Warmed up for 10 mins or so, then ran at what felt like a half decent effort.  Managed a 7:03 mile before my breathing caught up with me (and the Sedgefield hill) and got slower, then slower!  But Raspberry’s first parkrun and we managed to finish 3^rd lady.  Nice little warm down afterwards then the café J

Went to see It at the cinema on the afternoon, felt a bit odd leaving Rob in the house as it dawned on me that I get to hang out with Raspberry all the time and poor Rob doesn’t get to. 

Sun AM –Great North Run – Ran with Jo, had contacted her Saturday to see if she minded me running with her (she had a friend’s place)  Started in Pen E with my coveted stripey Pen A number, took 15 mins to even cross the start line!  What a different experience running from there, spend the whole run dodging and overtaking people but had so much fun running together, even if I was blowing on the hills.  Hopefully a sign that my body is doing a good job of growing little Raspberry!