Woods, Mud, Glorious Flood

Saturday 21st February

Run #52 (parts the 1st, 2nd & 3rd)

Kingston parkrun, with a 4k Easy Run There & Back

M had been talking about a Kingston parkrun ‘triptych’ – run to a parkrun / run a parkrun / run back from a parkrun - for a week or so, but we’d gone to Bushy in the end last Saturday because the run home distance worked better for the rest of that week’s training plan. But this week the 4k easy road route to Kingston parkrun fitted perfectly into the plan and gave me the opportunity to fit a few bonus ks in, having been a tad slack on the run distances this week.

We were alerted to fact it was likely to be a tad muddy and wet from a Facebook post suggesting runners might want to bring spare socks and maybe a change of legwear. We did neither planning as we were to pretty much keep running. We kept the run to the roads and the pace very cruisey, adding a perimeter of ham common for a few extra metres and minutes as we trotted along, arriving with a few minutes to spare and nicely warmed up.

We’d heard enough rumblings about mud and the odd jape about a Duathlon swim section to realise that the pace was likely to slow once we left the concrete path after the 1st k. So we set a very rough plan of a fast 1st K, take it easy through the mud, and use the saved energy for a strong last k back on the tarmac. Setting off at the go we established a fast (for me) pace. As we hit the trail path at around 1k the mud was sticky but not unmanageable and we kept the pace up. I dodged and skirted the puddles we did encounter, reasoning that the longer I could keep my feet dry the less unpleasant the run home.

Before half way it became apparent that puddle avoidance became a tactic that would have required a stop-and-pick-your-way-gingerly-through-the-undergrowth and I elected instead for a dry-feet-be-damned tactic instead. Which proved far more fun and interestingly enabled us to keep a fairly good pace.

Where the route turned off the trail into the Ham Lands loops things got very interesting with the appearance of not one but two marshals warning about the excessive slippiness of the mud and flood water ahead.

Hang on.... flood water?!

They weren’t kidding. Just in front the water started looking boggy with standing water and, looking up and ahead the grass could no longer be seem and it was like looking across a sizeable muddy river to an opposing bank. Having run the route a handful of times before I was fairly confident there weren’t any hidden holes to break an ankle in and, with only a moment's hesitation and a reflex and rather odd war-cry of ‘belieeeeve!!!’ I ploughed straight through the middle much in the style of Phoebe from friends, arms and legs in all directions.

Ploughing out of the flood and back to the mud I mentally appreciated the fact that the deepest portion had been over my knees and spared a puzzled moment for the chap with the spaniel and the super-dad with the buggy I’d passed at the start… Still, I was in my element now, figuring I was at max wetness, and laughed as I careened my way through the middle of every puddle and mudslick on the return leg.

Hitting the solid path with fractionally more than a k to go M, who had been planning on leaving me and upping to his sprint pace for the last k, elected to stay and pace me when we realised just how good time we’d kept through all the off-roading. Pushing the pace up to the very top of my comfort zone, after the fun and elation of the previous 3k, the last k felt hard. But I was rewarded by a solid course PB: almost 30sec off my previous PB at Kingston in December. And leaving me confident that, in dry conditions, I could drop another 30 off.

The run home should have felt tough, but a parkrun course PB is always the best start to a Saturday and the mud-running elation overrode the fatigue. Knowing I’d tucked in an extra 8k that I wouldn’t have to tag onto the Sunday long run was an added bonus. So, wearing a goofy grin and most of the Thames path mud, I ran home happy.