Last Saturday I ran my second cross country championships race in as many weeks. This time it was at Alexandra Palace, known to many as the steepest xc hill in London. I ran it last year as my first XC race and learned a thing or two about my lungs in the process. This year I was determined to come back and enjoy the race a bit more.

Not the hill. Just one of the little ones on course

In my freshly cleaned spikes I jumped into the mud and raced the 2 lap course (The race director explained he used to only let women run XC on the flat but realised his sexist ways and now we can run up the big hill not just once, but twice!) feeling pretty strong. I ran up the hill the first time and on the second lap made it about half way until I had to power walk the steep top. I absolutely flew down the muddy downhill sections as women were trying to navigate them in trail shoes (buy spikes if you plan to do an XC race, I promise they’ll pay off in minutes).

As a team we came second (including the second place finisher overall) so it was a great day to be running.

On Tuesday I went to the BBC Broadcast House to attend a taping of Bridget Christie’s Minds the Gap Radio4 show.  She is hilarious and you should all listen to her Bic for Her comedy sketch if you like laughing at ‘the prevalence of modern sexism & misogyny.’ (who doesn’t?)

Later in the week Alex and I volunteered with LSE Volunteering Centre at the Tower Poppies installation.

I was lucky enough to be one of the thousands of volunteers who installed and de-installed the poppies. We showed up for an afternoon shift and after a quick briefing and a pair of dry gloves, we were set off in the moat to remove the poppies to be sent to those who bought them. It wasn’t an easy afternoon with the removal process including a lot more than taking a poppy off it’s stem. I ended up head to toe covered in mud and had numb fingers from sorting thousands of very similar sized washers.

To thaw out after an afternoon in the mud I met Josie at The Drafthouse for our 1 month Dublin marathon anniversary. Nothing like a massive hot dog, mac & cheese and a boatload of fries paired with their best (only) prosecco to accompany reliving marathon memories.