Well today was the first day that I doubted myself. I sat down last night and planned the route from South to North Leeds. It was huge. I did not sleep very well and felt very nervous in the morning, but as soon as the high visibility coat went on, it was running mode. So off I went and trotted along the designated route, although some had to be tweaked as there were no paths. I have also acquired a water camelback which helped to keep me hydrated but to say it is like carrying a 500ml bottle of coke around, I think not!
Kept myself going until I hit the first hill and I said that I would walk up these to preserve running energy so that is what I did. Once at the summit, back to the running. I was happy at 20km around 2 hours and then at around 18.5 miles, the pain came. My legs began to burn, my arms felt sharp pains in them and my stomach got a stitch, so U had to slow down again but at least it was flat at this point. Once the stitch went, I continued with the run and hit the 20 mile mark near to my finish line, but ran the last 0.5 mile to fininsh, in just over 3 hours. My legs are so heavy at the moment but hopefully, a couple of hours resting them will be fine. I left myself just under 10km for the actual race and estimate that this will take about an hour, so I may move my estimated finishing time to 4.5 hours as this is more achieveable than the 4 hours I previously wanted.
I now know how Claire feels with her MS as my legs feel like hers, although mine will return to normal later where as hers remains weak and painful. If you want to help find treatment to suspend the suffering of MS as there is no known cure, please feel free to sponsor me on the link below:
http://uk.virginmoneygiving.com/johnwestgarth
Thank you for your time and have a good day
John
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