I have another
run today which is just a 10k at Victoria Embankment. There’s also a
5k which L was tempted with but £20 for that, the same price as the 10k, isn’t
cheap. So she decides to run there instead.
My 10k is pretty dull but it’s a necessary training run. My time of 51 minutes is pretty good for me these days.
On Sunday though I have a real live run of my own. Back in February 2020 when I was training for the Brighton
Marathon, as I am now because it is two years late, I was down to run the
Stamford Striders St Valentine’s 30k along with my (then) fellow Brighton
trainees L and her sister. L was to be my 'Valentine Pair' as they have such a
thing but now it's just me, 'Valentine No Mates'.
That race in 2020 was cancelled but not due to Covid which hadn't
yet reached crisis point but down to Storm Dennis who was throwing a strop with
40mph winds. In the end they ran it a week later, which meant we couldn't make
it. Instead I dragged the Lad around a 15 mile tour of Nottingham in the not
quite gale force winds.
Now I'm back at Stamford and wishing this year’s was being cancelled as well because the weather is possibly going to be worse than in 2020 just without the gale force winds which means it’s going ahead.
In the morning the temperature is just about above freezing
with a brisk cooling breeze and the prospect of heavy rain later. Nice. I come equipped in
long trousers, long sleeves and with a rain jacket that in the end I don't use
and it stays wrapped around my waist throughout.
The race starts at 11am (a really civilised time) in the dry
but the rain does come, although it’s not as heavy as promised, and the 'breeze'
makes for a challenging last few miles.
I maintain my ideal 9 minute marathon pace for just the first seven miles
before slipping to 10s and then 11s after 14 miles.
It is one of those races that makes you do one last humiliating stagger around a sports field to reach the finish line and as I do so I am shocked to realise that 30k isn’t ‘just’ 18 miles as I thought but it’s actually almost 19 but I should have known that.
My time is 3:05 which is apparently a mere fraction quicker
than L ran ‘back in the day’. If I carried on crawling long at 11s pace it would
turn out to be about a 4:25 marathon. Which I’d probably take. That’s if I
could continue to crawl that fast.
