A cracking little trip

K decided that there was a high enough tarmac to snow ratio for her to drive the kids to their nag bouncing lesson at Draughton, so I was able to get out early afternoon for a run.  It had been really cold, but the easterly wind had stopped blowing and conditions were really quite pleasant.  I decided I was going to run for an hour, so headed off through Halton East and down to Bolton Abbey.

I need to start getting a bit more effort and variety onto my running, as with no track sessions for a week or two I'm in danger of getting into the habit of running about 7:40 pace every time, just different distances.  With this in mind once I turned round at 4 miles outside the village hall in Bolton Abbey I put in some effort on the hills.  My usual timing points for the climb back up to Halton East are the big tree at the bottom to the gateway at the top, and I was pleased to see I was well under 12 minutes for the 1 1/2 miles and 300' of climb.

In the end I was just over the hour (1:00:25) for 8 miles, so an average of 7:32 pace, but with some good efforts included.  Also pleased my HR stayed fairly low:

The orange sections are where my HR was over 80%, which were fairly short, and most of the run is in the 70-80% range, with a fair bit below 70% - the average is 133bpm, which is well below the 140bpm I target for slowish runs.

All in all a good session.  Hopefully out with Paul O and a few other Harriers for a long one tomorrow, from Ilkley up to Barden and back.  Their 7:30 pace might be a bit quick for me, but at least it's flat.

We'll see...