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.