Outlaw Half

So today I return to Holme Pierrepont for my third Outlaw Half in four years, having taken last year off. After being slightly injured in 2015, and desperately trying to not get more seriously injured so that I could do the Ramathon the following weekend, I recorded a slow-ish 6:07 that year.

This year I feel in much better shape, so it’s chance to get back under six hours and hopefully somewhere close to my 2014 time of 5:52.

The 1.9km swim immediately dashes my hopes of a new PB. With a time of 46:27, that’s over seven minutes off 2014 and three off 2015. So a PB isn’t going to happen. Unhelpfully they have also moved the swim exit this year which means there’s quite a long run to transition on tarmac, which has shades of last year’s Leeds ITU debacle. Can we have some matting please for next year.

The bike is better, much better, although I still can’t get it under three hours. My bike time for the 90km is 3:04:17, better than last time but just behind 2014. It would probably have been a PB had I not gone wrong in the final km and overshot the turn into Holme Pierrepont Hall with the help of some inefficient marshalling.

So to the run and that is where I do nail it. My 2:01:20 half marathon is better than both previous years and even two minutes up on my uninjured efforts in 2014. Yet still I pace it a touch wrong as I come in an agonising eight seconds over six hours.

EIGHT seconds. OMG. I blame that marshal, I mean I blame myself for overshooting, and that lengthened run in from the swim can’t have helped either. Oh well, there’s always near year. Did I really say that? I better not have done. It is an amazingly well put together event, better than any of the other 70.3s I’ve done but I must focus elsewhere next year.

The post-race rubdown is gratefully received along with the lashings of Erdinger Alkoholfrei, then it’s off for the post-race food which is posher than ever.

Lichfield Half Marathon

Today we head over the Lichfield for the Half Marathon. It’s just me running with L and the boys supporting. The race starts at King Edward VI School, which is the same place that we did the 10k from. They recommend you park there and then they will bus you back from the finish which is on grass land near the town centre.

We do things the other way around and park in a car park very close to the finish. Then we walk to the start, where I warm up with both dogs and even do the aerobic warm up with MD.

Conditions are warm but the course is largely flat with a bit of an incline in the last few miles.

My race goes pretty well and I was on for a pretty good time until we reached what is known as Fine Lane Level Crossing. Apparently in the entire seven year history of the race, a train has never gone over this railway crossing during the race but it does today. Apparently a farmer’s fence not far from Lichfield got damaged and several cows wondered on to the main line, causing subsequent trains to be diverted on to this line.

I am held up for six minutes which turns my potential finishing time of around 1:42 into 1:48:41. There was one solitary marshal at the crossing attempting to take everyone’s numbers who got held up but there were far too many runners to take note of and I’ve no idea how they’d work out how long everyone was held up anyway. Many people claim they didn’t even see a marshal to give their number to.

Later, when the results go up, I see that my time hasn’t been adjusted but there isn’t really much point making an issue of it, they will really have no idea how long people were detained and everyone will have self-timed anyway.

Wollaton Park Easter 10k

Today its time to revisit the Easter 10k on Wollaton Park. This is a real old school event with big queues for registration, a delayed start and no mile or kilometres markers at all. They have dabbled with such high tech devices over the years but have never actually managed to cover the whole course for some reason, now they seem to have given up completely.

Although a jog around my local park is always pleasant, except when it’s raining and it isn’t today, this is just for training purposes. So it’s nice to find out that I am actually 30 seconds quicker than when I last ran it three years ago. Not that my time is quick by any stretch of the imagination or comparison to ‘back in the day’ but at least it’s not too disheartening.

Sheffield Half Marathon

I do like the Sheffield Half Marathon and I did like the old course but there is something rather beautifully masochistic about the course change they introduced three years ago when Run For All, the legacy organisation for the late Jane Tomlinson, got involved and decided to embrace Sheffield’s inner hilliness.

It’s possibly the way they quietly ratchet up the intensity as they take you out of the city along Arundel Gate and onto the long stretch that is Ecclesall Road, which all takes place on a slight incline. Then the slight gets less slight and much more significant as the road rises skywards, getting gradually steeper and steeper. Until by mile four you are on your hands and knees crawling up the one mile stretch that they call the 'King\Queen of the Hill' before eventually you can kiss the tarmac at the top of Ringinglow. From where you look forward to plummeting down... the scenic flat bit.

Allegedly, after the scenic flat bit, it’s all downhill to the finish, only it isn’t. It remains frustrating undulating and deliciously painful right up to the finish line.

Plus there is an additional nuisance factor this year, a dose of very unseasonal Yorkshire weather. Obviously in Sheffield in April you expect wind, rain and maybe hail or possibly snow, or all four at once but this year Sheffield is struck by a heat wave which really wasn’t that welcome.

I survive though and cross the finish line where I am bested by last year’s time by a three mere seconds but you still can’t beat it as a location for your Sunday morning jog and they’ve even given us a wearable t-shirt this year.

My only wish is that they would put as much effort into the mile markers as they do the km markers that map out the last 10k, for which there is an additional prize. These are all nice sail banners whereas the thirteen mile markers appear to be an assorted collection of whatever was lying around at the back of the race director’s garage.

Coventry Half Marathon

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Today I am entered in the Coventry Half Marathon. We head over without the dogs and once the race has been started by no less than Coventry Olympian Dave Moorcroft, L heads across the road to the local Puregym. 

Her Puregym membership apparently enables her to use any of their gyms across the country which will save her having to bide her time heckling me when she’s not running. Unfortunately no one had told the computer at Puregym and it takes her a bit of time to gain access. By then I’m well on my way around the sights of Coventry.

Coventry turns out to be hillier than I thought, much hillier, but at least my legs lasted as long as Mile 5 this time. Progress. I did try to hold my pace back a touch to save something for the end and was more successful in keeping to something approaching eight minute mile pace throughout. I ended up beating last week’s time by 37 seconds despite the hillier terrain.

Retford Half Marathon

Today I run the Retford Half Marathon which starts at Retford Oaks Academy. L and the boys come along to offer vocal support.

Some folk from Sheffield Running Club described what is to come as pan flat which, as there is nothing anywhere near ‘pan flat’ for them to compare it with in Yorkshire, could mean anything. As it turns out the course is remarkably flat for the first five miles but then becomes quite undulating thereafter with several long but gradual inclines.

The race is well organised, on closed roads, but very low key e.g. somewhat lacking in atmosphere. Outside of Retford itself, it’s a case of spot the spectator and it’s also not hugely scenic, which I don’t mind at all.

As is the way with races early in the year there are not many slow runners so the pace is brisk. I make a good start but after three miles my thighs stiffen up and I gradually get slower and slower. This is where actually doing some training might have helped.

My time of almost 1:49 leaves a lot of room for improvement although, being very early in the season, there is plenty of time for that. If I was to ever get among the awards here I have some serious work to do. First 40+ Male clocked 1:14, first 50+ Male 1:18 and first 60+ Male 1:23. Ouch. So, just half an hour to knock off my time to get first 50+ Male next year. I suppose I did want a challenge for my 50^th year.

I also entered the Nottinghamshire Amateur Athletics Association Half Marathon County Championships which was part of the race, and I didn’t win that either.

There is no goody bag, just a bottle of water and an orange t-shirt. It was ominous at registration, that they gave me a pile of leaflets with my race number as this is the sort of tat that usually weighs down the goody bag. T-shirt wise, as orange t-shirts go, it’s not too bad.

If I found the lack of a goody back disappointing then MD found it positively soul destroying. He is so upset at the lack of crisps and/or biscuits that he starts to eat my race number in frustration.

East Midlands 10k, Holme Pierrepont

Today I needed a 10k purely as training for next week’s Retford Half Marathon. Yes, it may be a bit late to start training for a half marathon but I always get injured training so perhaps not training is the best way...

The day dawns damp and gets damper as we join an impressively long queue to get into the car park at Holme Pierrepoint. I don’t recall anyone ever having charged for car parking at Holme Pierrepoint before and we have been here dozens of times but they are charging £5 to park, which has manufactured the queue.

As start time approaches I jump out of the car and leave L to park up, just in case they don’t delay the start but sensibly, they do. Now I have the problem of having excess clothes to dump which I hide behind one of the porta cabins in front of the main buildings.

As I said I needed a 10k and any 10k would do...

Question: What’s worse than one laps of the rowing strip at Holme Pierrepoint?

Answer: Two laps.

Question: What’s worse than two laps of the rowing strip at Holme Pierrepoint?

Answer: Two laps in driving wind and heavy rain.

Yes, it’s not pleasant but then the omens have never been good for this race right from the moment they sent me my race number ‘666’.

My time is unsurprisingly unimpressive but it’s only training. Isn't it? The bonus is that despite the inclement conditions nothing snaps.

Afterwards we head to Wetherspoons in Beeston for a bacon roll and a hot coffee to warm up. My dedicated supporters are as wet and cold as I am.