I had a horribly painful long run yesterday. I had planned to run 21 km, and did run 21 km in the end, but boy! how many plans did I do to stop my misery along the way. "I'll run to the university (17 km) and then take the bus back," or "I'll run to Granville Island and turn around if it's too painful," (10 km), "I'll take the bus back up the hill," (saving 2 uphill km) and so on. I hadn't run for more than an hour in recent weeks and my ankles and other joints had gladly forgotten about the constant banging of running. Plus, part of the run was on really terribly hard surface.

But! I did the run exactly as planned in the end. I walked for 1 minute every 20 minutes for five cycles and for the last 2 or 3 km I was running 5 and walking 1, cursing at myself for having so much willpower.

I was really sore and drained immediately after the run but it's much more bearable today, and I have no residual joint pain.

The decor for the run was very special though. For about a third of the route, the skies were clear and beautiful. For the other two thirds, I ran through a thick fog. Bizarre...