Plums

What could better capture the essence of late summer than a sun-dappled view of my plums, soon to made into a syrup to form part of a nice plum porter.

The arrival of the new cycling breeks, having finally accepted that the existing ones are more repair than shorts, and the little bit of sunshine was just the nudge I needed to head out for a wee run since nothing had happened on Tuesday or Wednesday. That should be enough time for the legs to recover and probably enough to stretch it beyond the 10 miles so I headed out towards Culross. The thinking was that I could opt for the fairly flat coastal run to Kincardine and just turn back when I fancied or take the hill up to High Valleyfield, through Shiresmill and pick up the cycle path into Dunfermline, making a big twenty mile loop.

I took the hill. It would be cowardly not to and it was less bad than I’d feared but not good. It was still head down, controlled deep breathing, and keeping the pedals turning and trying not to look and see how far was still to go. It’s not the worst I’ve done, although Strava tells me that of the 28 times I’ve climbed that hill, today was the 24th slowest at 4 minutes and 36 seconds. Not quite up to the standard of 6 October 2012 when I climbed it in 2 minutes and 58 seconds. Some work to do.

But with that out of the way there was just the long steep descent into Shiresmill and an easy roll up to Dunfermline with the wind at my back. I’m not sure it counts as an achievement to have rolled down a hill faster than you’d previously rolled down it but since those are the only Strava achievements I ever get, I'll take it.