I challenge you to find any better food on a trail run than the one we did this Sat. When I mean find, I don’t mean a discarded energy bar, or your mate standing by with a pizza order (what a good idea, note to self for The Coastal Challenge race) – I mean proper foraging food. Unbeknownst to me, I plotted this Saturday’s 10 miler through a pure treasure trove of natural sweets, a massive, just ripe blackberry heaven on the outskirts of Burghley Park.

This time the purple berries aren’t out of a bird’s arse as per my cycle ride home on Thurs!

The bird’s arse story as referred to in the caption above is here.

Lumpy, seedy, sweet then tart but ultimately delicious wee natural sugar-boosters, I grabbed handfuls of them and necked them immediately. Delicious, and very well timed at 7 miles into the allotted 10. So sorry coach Rory Coleman, I did stop for about 5 mins to stuff my face, which I’m pretty sure is not allowed.

Caught in the act by the boyfriend. At least blackberries aren’t one of my banned substances…

I’m also ever so slightly ashamed of feeling terribly proud of myself for not drinking ANYTHING on Friday night out for Katie’s birthday, and only 1 pint on Sat meeting friends in the pub. I’m no AA, but I love real ale, and I pretty much had to verbally fight Rory to take it off my ‘Banned Substances’ list (more on this soon I promise, it doesn’t include blackberries, thank goodness). I wore him down from, “Your next drink is after the race,” to “Okay, okay, you can have 1 pint a week.”

Fizzy water is now my best friend. But it’s a duller playmate than beer by a looooong way. I allow myself 1-2 sips of other people’s pints when I’m about to crack, which is every two hours. How long my thus far very accommodating friends will put up with this tactic remains to be seen, but it’s based on the scientific fact that calories or alcohol you didn’t pay for don’t count…I think this is why Rory wants to have ‘eye contact’ with me over skype next week. Scared!