Training is the hard work that ensures you won’t suffer more than necessary on the actual day.

It’s great to look through Facebook, Twitter or Instagram and see people fighting through the elements to put in the hard winter yards.

Maps, pictures and status updates give a glimpse into the work being put in for events of all sorts and sizes.

Mine, as you may have seen from the pictures, tend to be in and around central London which is amazing.

Constantly finding new things and see architectural wonders are just part of my everyday running.

But it’s not great if you are trying to train for an event which crosses the North and South Down’s, culminating in a steep climb up Ditchling Beacon just as you think you are nearing the finish line.

So how do you run up a hill in a city, which despite names like Ludgate Hill and Tower Hill, is about as flat as a flat white coffee run over by a Flat Eric with a flatulence problem in a flat bed truck in front of a block of flats while singing in the key of D flat.

The annoying answer is, I have to travel to find hills.

Getting on the DLR out to Greenwich for a run round the park and up the hill next to the observatory or getting on the District line to Richmond Park to run around the deer and slipstreamed cyclists is great but I never thought I would have to commute to run.

My “commute” to Richmond is over two hours door to park gate and back and for what?

To run up and down a hill or two or three or four. Honestly, something is not right in my head or the heads of other runners who do the same thing.

The only thing I can say is that I hope it is all worth it when I head up that final incline in May to finish in the Brighton Racecourse because otherwise, the only hill I’ll be going near is a hill of nachos.

Day 13

Total words: 3779
Total miles: 65.9 (106k)

#writeandrun31