I had a very enjoyable run on Thursday night. I did my Bromley-by-Bow run which is 9.3km. I started conservatively, as usual, but there were long stretches where I felt good stretching my legs at a decent pace. The stretches were good afterwards. I had no discomfort in my knees.

In contrast, Saturday's run was dissatisfying. I did the run to the office and back. It felt like the sun was shining too brightly. My top got heavy with my sweat and it felt uncomfortable. Even the stretches afterwards felt like a burden. I won't be running in that particular black top again.

The marathon is only 3 weeks away.  I went back up to the Tate Britain run - my longest run.  I need to do this run at least a couple more times before the marathon.  One of those times was today and the second time will be next week.

I carried a small bottle of water - the one that I got when I did the JP Morgan run a couple of months ago.  It is an ideal size.  Big enough to carry a decent amount of water, but small enough to not be a hassle for me to carry in my hand.

The run was ok: legs were not too tired, but I noticed that I was a bit down on energy from 7km left to go in the run.  I think I need to get a running pouch/bag of some sort, so I can carry some sweets with me to boost energy levels when I need it.  I don't care about the style, so long as it doesn't take up much room and doesn't move around when I'm running.

I noticed that I had done this run in around 2 hours 47 minutes when I ran it in April this year and today's run took 3 hours 8 minutes.  That's quite a big variance!  Granted, there were a few times during today's run when I fully stopped and did a range of stretches for 3-5 minutes, but I still thought that it would even out in the end.  I am aiming for a sub 3 hour run next week.

I am still working on the strength of my knees and the muscles that support them: the quads.  When I'm waiting in a queue, I will balance on one foot and raise the other leg, bent at the knee, or I will do some gentle squats.

Someone vandalized the apartment block gym, so it was closed off for the past week. I have been doing a half hour run along the side of the dock instead of the usual half hour bike ride or row. The half hour run is a simple "out and back" done three times. I have done this run twice now and I am running times slightly on either side of 29 minutes. I haven't felt my best on the runs, but the times appear to be quite good: around 4 mins 20 per km. It made me suspect that I undermeasured the run, so I took 200m off it when I added it to my spreadsheet.