A Muddy Start to Red January.

 My attempt at Red January last year got off to a bad start because I had a chest infection for two weeks. 

 This year Red January has got off to a much better start. After a late night with friends in Badby, I headed off to do the Parkrun at Daventry to Christian my 250 Parkrun shirt.  I think this was the third time I've run at Daventry but in the past it has always been a 10.30 start. 

I managed to get out of bed and dressed without waking anybody up. I even had to step over a cat that had fully stretched itself across the top of the stairs.  I was just about to leave the house when I realised I'd put my compression pants on but no shorts so I had to go back upstairs again and straddle the cat to retrieve my shorts.

Having negotiated several large puddles and numerous potholes I arrived at the carpark at 8.30 and was a little concerned that I was the only person in the carpark. But within a few minutes the carpark slowly started to fill. 

After a light warm up I headed to the pre-race briefing where a number of volunteers had reached significant milestones.  I then made my way to the start.  For the first half a kilometre I was starting to question why I had put on my trail shoes rather than my usual running shoes, but then the mud and the puddles came thick and fast. 

Just when I was starting to get into my stride I managed to run into a tree and knock my cap off so I had to make a quick U-turn to recover it.  The rest of the run was pretty uneventful until I got to the last 200 meres which involved running down a very muddy hill and then ploughing through a very muddy finishing straight.  

Whilst my time was fairly slow at least I had managed a positive start to the year. Onwards and upwards.  I'm now busily planning how achieve 30 different activities in the next 30 days. At the moment I've got aqua-aerobics and axe throwing on my to do list.

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