Quick run

On Tuesday I decided that I needed to go for a quick run to make sure that my legs still worked. Having not run since a couple of weeks ago, and having last week off because of the osteo (I asked if I could run that evening or that week and he replied I could if I was an idiot).
So I refrained.

Lynne went off around Shire Hill and I thought I'd have a quick run up to Shelf Benches and back, nothing strenuous, just a bit of a run really.
We started off together and ran up through the trees on the road side of Shirehill, then over into Mossy Lea where we split and I went up while she went down. I kept a decent speed on up the hill. Having watched the BBC programme on the Jura Fell Race, and a seeing a clip of one of the current Ultra Champions from the US, it struck me just how easy they make going uphill appear. None of this struggling stuff, just good, economic motion and power in spades.
So I thought I'd try to emulate it a bit, and got up to Shelf Benches relatively well, enjoying the weather and the location.
I was wearing a helly top and some CW-X tights... the helly came off pretty quickly after the ascent began, and stayed off for the remainder of the run. The tights are quite old and have a couple of holes in them, so it wasn't too bad wearing them, but it did get a little warm, it has to be said.

I felt good on Shelf Benches, so decided to carry on going up and over onto Shelf moor, but not straning myself, walking where necessary, and not running the whole way up. I didn't want to wear myself out for the race tomorrow. Going up the hill onto the moor I stopped to look at the view going back down the hill, across to Kinder, and down into Glossop several times.
I'm SO glad that I no longer live in London. It was one of those moments where you are just happy with your lot in life.
Delightful.
I wandered my way up, and then turned North West(ish) across the moor/bog to the top of Yellowslacks in order to get round to Dog Rock (the down-up approach was not a consideration today, but will be used as a training route in the not so distant future!) It was going across the moor that I found out that not everything that looks like a trod is in fact a trod. Some of them are lines in the soil where streams have eroded through the peat and are slightly covered over knee deep linear traps for the unwary. I only went over once, but that was enough to make me pretty careful about where I was putting my feet.
Across the trackless moor, down and across the stream, up the other side and a hard left down the track to Dog Rock. Bouncy peat now the order of the day, the terrain would have suited the Baregrips much more than the Roclites that I was wearing, but not to worry.

I took the descent fairly conservatively, letting my feet do the route taking, not wanting to twist an ankle (well, not that that I want to twist an ankle anyway...) I felt my ankles giving way a couple of times on dodgy ground, but my body, under self-control always seems to self right itself and I just carry on running with no issue. Its odd when I think about the amount of people that seem to twist their ankles on almost a daily basis on a seemingly innocuous flat piece of ground, and here I am running across what could only be described as very patchy and broken ground with added heather, and I can feel the ankle beginning to turn, there is enough time to get some power out of the stride before the foot is taken out of the equation and the chance of injury seems to go. Maybe its down to speed of reation of the peroneal muscles to potential twisting territory, I'll read up on that.

Down Yellowslacks, down lightside, and I see the first people since I split off from Lynne. Down the hill, and onto the path. A quiet jog to the bridge and I walk up the hill to Shire hill, and run down the other side.
I don't THINK I've overdone it, my legs are feeling pretty good, but I have been out for an hour, and I did q bit of a significant hill.
Ah well, we'll see what happens tomorrow.
The route and stats can be seen here