Hi everyone,

Happy New Year!  I can’t believe we’re in 2015.  I hope you had a fantastic holiday break!  It will be great to see you all again.  This is the week to get back into running.  The routes this week are straight forward.  If you didn’t run at all over the holidays, you might consider limiting your mileage this week and easing back into a regular running routine.  I know it can be difficult to get back to running, especially in the dark January days.  But try to block the time in your schedule and plan to run.  You’ll be glad you did it – I promise!

Keep running!

Jane

ROUTES

Monday 5 January – Hyde Park (3 to 8 miles)

Click here for all of the Hyde Park interactive route maps

Start:  Everybody starts the same way… head west on Circus Road, turn left on Grove End Road and follow south as it becomes Lisson Grove.  Cross over Marylebone Road and continue on Seymour Place until the end.  Turn right and cross over Edgware Road and then take the first left on Stanhope Place to enter Hyde Park at the intersection with Stanhope Place. Cross into the Park—you’ll see a silver orb just inside the Park.  After entering the Park, turn right and run towards Speaker’s Corner.

3 Milers:  Continue south through Hyde Park, past the Serpentine and at the Carriage drive, make a left and head back toward Hyde Park Corner.  Take the Hyde Park Corner tube home.

5 Milers:  At Hyde Park Corner continue back up/north on the carriage drive.  Exit the park at the Animals in War memorial and follow Upper Brook Street.  Turn left on Park Street which becomes Gloucester Place and then Park Road back to St. John’s Wood.

6 Milers: upon entering the park, turn right at the silver sphere and run until you meet N Carriage Road where you turn left.  Run down to the Serpentine, crossing over the bridge then left to run along the Serpentine. At the end of the Serpentine, turn left again and make your way to the eastern edge of the park before exiting at the Upper Brook St/Animals in War exit.  Continue along Upper Brook Street to Park Street, turn left, take it to Park Road and into SJW.

8 Milers: follow the 6 mile run but do not turn left at No Carriage Rd, instead cross over [this is tricky, be careful] and follow until you reach the large broadwalk where you turn left.  Run past Kensington Palace (on your right) and take a left to run along the southern edge of the park towards Hyde Park Corner, then turn left on the eastern edge and exit at Upper Brook St/Animals in War exit as above.  Take Upper Brook Street to Park Street [left] to Park Road and home to SJW.

Wednesday 7 January – The Wall (3 to 6 miles)

We head down towards Regents Park, then enter the canal at the Charlbert entrance and run east [left] cutting through Camden Lock Market until we run out of canal path at Islington and hit “The Wall.”  [Don’t forget to touch The Wall or else your run doesn’t count :p ].  At The Wall, we turn around and head back to St. John’s Wood.  This is a great route to do a tempo run because there are no traffic lights.  But please be careful and aware of the bikes on the path.

If you run all the way to The Wall and back it is 6 miles.  But it is very easy to run half the distance if you want and turn around and head home.  As a marker, if you run to the Camden market (where we have to exit the canal path and run past the food stalls for a minute) and return home it is a 3 mile round trip.

 

Friday 9 January – The Heath 4-8 miles

It’s a NEW YEAR and Friday so everyone up head up for our FIRST HEATH RUN of 2015!!!  You can pick your distance and whatever you choose, there will certainly be someone else interested in running that distance.  All of these routes are on the website.

4 miles:  A great way to ease into running the hill.   Run up to the Hampstead tube station and back.

5 miles: The Betsy Route

6-7miles:  The partial Heath route

8 miles:  The full Heath route

Click here for maps of all of the Heath routes.