10 in 10 Day 2 - 3'55

Day 2 of the TiT, 3'55, two minutes up on yesterday but it felt like a race to 16 miles of it as I had Anna right on my heels before she dropped me. I find it really stressful having someone breathing down my neck and asked her a few times if she was going for a time or if she was going for the win, but she said no, 4'07 would do to average 4 hours and she was out for the personal achievement, not the win. I think though anyone would be crazy not to go for the win if they were strong enough, so perhaps it's psychology. Or perhaps she was just having another very good day. Either way, I have to revise my game plan. I think I can still break the 41 hours, and I'd still like to break 40 hours. If Anna breaks it by more than me then that's the way it is. Today though was hard as I was pushing it for the first 16 to see if I could drop her. I was absolutely knackered in the last 10 miles so hopefully I can be a bit more even paced tomorrow.

Today's highlight was the laser therapy treatment. The physio team here are so dedicated to getting you through this event that when I mentioned a touch of pain under my left heel and wondered if they'd have a look at it during my massage, they got me straight into "triage", ice massaged it for the vaso-constriction, then decided to laser it for vaso-dilation. When they proposed lasering my foot, I imagined a Blofeld style amputation, surely it wasn't that bad. It's very clever - the ice contracts all the blood vessels, stops all the internal bleeding and cools everything down. However, you need blood flow to encourage healing, though you don't want to heat the area, hence the laser that opens up the blood vessels without heat. Plus you get to wear cool glasses. This place is super high tech, we feel very pampered.


The very very positive side of today was my sister, mum and other members of my family who've come up to support me. They're just superb, they've got balloons and pom poms and Team Naomi t-shirts, even my sister's dog was wearing a Team Naomi t-shirt with Support Crew on the front, and are always there with a hug and encouraging words. And my sister has surpassed herself. She made up a scrapbook with my blog all printed out with all the best photos, and a great Eddie Izzard cartoon at the back. It's going to be a great way to pick me up in the bad times. She's given me a pack of cards, one to open each evening before the next race, which have brought a tear to my eye every time. And when I come over the finish line, she presents me with a rosette with Team Naomi and the number of the race on it, 1 for yesterday, 2 for tomorrow. We don't get medals every day so she wanted me to have something. I want a full suite. So today's for Catherine. Love ya big sis!!

Me and Catherine at the finish