Struck down (sort of) at the final hurdle

I have a cold. 

After months of training - months of SUCCESSFUL training, I might add - and months of doing everything that I possibly can to get myself to the start line in one piece, I have been felled by a bloody cold.  FFS.  I knew from a raging sore throat that it was coming on last week but told myself that if I could just get my last two long runs in, I'd have two weeks in which to recover from any unwellness that was lurking.  And while it's true that there were two weeks, I had forgotten that my colds (and more specifically, the hacking, booming, endless cough that I get with my colds) take forever to resolve. 

One week has passed, in which Ben suggested that I not run until today, and I'm still a coughing machine.  I've coughed so much that I lost my voice for two days and then gave myself a migraine.  I have not, though, cracked a rib like I did several years ago during another violent coughing episode. #gratefulforsmallfavours

As horrible as my cough is, it is not in my chest so I did do today's run, which was meant to be 6x5 minutes with alternating sets of threshold and 10k pace, but I felt for most of it like I just wanted to lie down on the soft grassy verge in the sun and have a nap.  A combination of wind, post-cold lethargy, and sluggish legs from not having run for five days meant that threshold and 10k paces just were not happening, and even a fast jogging pace was a bit of a fantasy.  I was left feeling that if the ultra had been today, I'd have been a DNF.  I've felt so optimistic about this race and today was the first time that I've thought, I'm not going to be able to do it.  And frustratingly, not because of poor training or injury, but a bloody cold.

I'll try to stay focused and try to stay positive - there's still a week to go and surely I'll be a bit perkier by then.  If not....well, let's hope that it's a lovely day for a long walk!