Keeping focussed

I love my special issues as they always do really well and are a great opportunity for local businesses to promote their services within a special section in the magazine, dedicated totally to their market. Got a great number of new businesses booked into this issue. If anyone out there runs a homes-related business the final deadline for print-ready artwork for this edition is 9 March. Give me a April issue -just shows great focus always works well.

Sadly, focus was somewhat missing yesterday on my 16-mile training run for the Marathon on 17th April. The first 8 miles were great - going well and keeping to my marathon pace. I thought the homeward 8 miles would be easier but it was really hard. Around 13 miles I slowed to a walk a few times and as soon as I did this my feet were really painful and, of course, it was harder to start running again. Picked up pace again for the last mile and a half and made it home. Collapsed on the sofa in tears feeling a complete failure for letting myself walk.

Am I being too hard on myself? I still managed 16 miles and probably walked for a total of 10 minutes out of 3 hours of running. But because of this missed my time target. More importantly to me, why did I let myself lose focus and slow down?

Need more focus for next week's 18 miler!