Another change..

but not much of one.

The outing in the canoe last week was a pleasant change from the usual batting up and down the same old stretches of the canal, even though it was on a different part of the same canal. After all, a change is as good as a rest. Since then however, what with one thing and another, it's  mostly been just rest.  The weather hasn't helped much either insofar as the canal has been frozen over to various degrees each week. The Saturday morning of the Hare & Hounds in particular was extremely cold and I really didn't feel much like driving 40 miles just to find the whole thing called off. Instead, I elected to go back to ParkRun for another try at that. 

In fact I had stopped ParkRunning and jogging altogether at the end of February, with the intention of keeping my energies, such as they are, for paddling, and anyway I was getting bored with the same old, same old, so getting back to paddling and regaining some sort of fitness for it was a bit of a challenge. Even thoughts of the DW that were still lurking in the back of my mind had surfaced again. 

Back in April I'd set myself a target of 500 miles to be paddled by the end of December and hoped everything would come good over the summer. Altogether I've managed just over 300 miles to date which isn't anywhere near enough. Although I had a certain amount of success and an improvement in some respects of technique, I haven't yet made any real improvement or got back to the level of fitness I enjoyed before the accident, now nearly two years ago. It's all been a bit of a disappointment really.

Jogging however is a bit less of a faff to cope with than paddling, so on a whim I had tried out the Bushy ParkRun in September and had clipped in at just under 30 minutes. By doing it I didn't help the back problem any, which at that time was just starting to play up, so it was into November before I was able to sample it again. That was a couple of walk/runs around the course before doing the ParkRuns in earnest in the early part of December.  Nothing particularly earth shattering there though, the first was done in 29:40 and the second  in a disappointing 29:06 which I had hoped to do under 29 minutes.k

Altogether it's been a disappointing year.  Not one thing or t'other really which shows only a lack of commitment or purpose.

Maybe next week.