Perfect Day

Cold and wet this morning as I left the house at 8am to meet a friend at Loughton Station. We were travelling to Stratford for the Mo Farah Foundation 10K run in the Olympic Park which is a great space and fantastic legacy of 2012.

There was a big contingent of Nike Run Club Stratford runners in either the 5K (at 09:30) or 10K (2 waves at 10:00 and 11:00) and many of us met up before our respective start times.

Huddling under one of the leaky charity gazebos I got stripped down and attached my running number to my t-shirt (it was wonky...Oh well) and my timing tag to my shoe.

Four of us started together in the 10:00 wave but we all ran our own races. I ran with Chantal for first few miles then on my own. I don't know why but everything just clicked today and I felt really good and ran comfortable negative splits from mile 2 onwards, all in sub 8min range. As I came up to the finish there were a bunch of my friends cheering and this spurred me to a sprint finish.

I didn't find out my official time till much later (47:15) but I knew I had finished in sub 50 mins for the first time in race conditions. As it turned out I also PB'd which is an awesome way to finish my racing year.

Afterwards those of us who ran in the 5K and first 10K wave waited to cheer those friends in the 11:00 race. It was so cold but we were ebullient after our own races.

With everyone having completed their races it was to Café Nero for a warm drink and some food. I had a bowl of mushroom risotto and a Winter Berry Latte, both of which were very welcome. I also bought one of their amazing mince pies and took it home for later.

I then had to rush home to get changed as one of my friends and fellow runners was having a surprise (organised by her Sister) high tea at Fortnum & Mason. Bit of a mad rush but finally suited and booted I headed out and although I thought I would be late I actually was bang on time and beat the Birthday girl there. Doc (she's a GP) didn't know who was invited so it was a nice surprise when the elevator doors opened and she saw us waiting there for her.

F&M is very posh and proper and I was a little out of my comfort zone but all the staff were lovely and it was nice seeing how the other half lives.

The stands had 3 levels each with a plate; finger sandwiches on the bottom, scones in the middle and cakes (petit fours?) on top. My friend Quy and I were sharing so we worked our way from bottom plate to top then ordered a refill as it was essentially a posh all you can eat affair.

I couldn't decide on just one picture so we have a collage including a selfie I took in their posh loos.

Finally we all ordered our choice of cake to take home and received this along with a red Fortnum & Mason Christmas bauble that had special Christmas tea inside.

All full of tea and cake we headed back to Stratford to meet others in the Sky Bar at Aspers Casino for drinks.

Apart from missing the last train home (forgot it was Sunday) it was pretty much a perfect day.

Music: Perfect Day by Lou Reed