Day 102 – Scratcharse Hill and the High-Stakes Heart Rate
The Easter holidays have officially begun and for once, the morning didn’t begin with the dulcet tones of my alarm trying to convince me I’m a morning person. I rose at a sensible hour and managed to wave off Kelly, Daisy and Polly on their grand expedition to Old MacDonald’s Farm in Essex. Emilia, meanwhile, was deeply entrenched in the land of GCSE English Literature revision—somewhere between Macbeth’s ambition and Scrooge’s four ghostly visitations, I imagine. This left me at home with pretty much just myself for company. After a relaxed breakfast and a bit of reading, it was time for the inevitable: the run. A Sensible Man Wouldn't Have Given that my back is still staging the occasional rebellion, I took no chances and lathered on enough Deep Heat to alert satellites. Despite this, I decided that a VO2 Max session was somehow a good idea. Now, VO2 Max efforts are designed to push you to around 90-95% of your maximum heart rate, which is generally the sort of level most peop...