I’ve been thinking a bit more about good last-third-of-a-marathon music. Rather than surveying the entire history of pop music, or worse the entire history of recorded music, I’ve been focusing on something more manageable: my MP3 player.

I’ve been going through, separating the wheat from the chaff, the sheep from the goats, the running songs from the non-running songs.

  • Bach – “Goldberg Variations”. That’s out. Not aggressive enough.
  • Billy Bragg – “Black wind blowing”. Definitely out. Too mopey.
  • Jeff Buckley – “Witches Rave”. That’s in. Perfect beat
  • Leonard Cohen – much as I love him, he’s banned from the marathon. Not right at all.
  • Jimi Hendrix – “Manic Depression”. That’s in.
  • PJ Harvey – pretty much all of “Stories for the city stories from the sea” is in, particularly “Kamikaze” and “Big Exit”.
  • Stevie Wonder – “I was made for loving her”. That’s in, just because I like the song.

This outta keep me busy for a few weeks.

Running
Last night’s run was one of those runs you savour for a long time, when everything comes together in one harmonious whole. The stride seems long and fluid, the hills conveniently seem to flatten themselves as you approach. You can feel yourself working hard, and moving fast, but you wouldn’t dream of stopping for a second.

A good omen.

It was my normal 12k course, lengthened slightly. The program called for 2 sets of 10 minute tempos. In reality, the whole thing was more or less a tempo run. I didn’t note the start or finish time, so I have no idea how fast it is, but that’s not the point.

A fluent, fast, morale-building run was just what the doctor ordered.