Nottingham Half Marathon

So today, my limp around the Nottingham Half Marathon. The first problem is getting there. My usual short cut across Castle Bridge Road by the Sainsburys’ superstore has been closed off and I headed into town having already seen the epic queue along the ring road. Getting within a mile was fine; getting that final mile took about forty five minutes. With no police or marshals directing traffic, it was every man, woman and Robin Hood for themselves which simply made things worse.

When I finally got there, it was long after my father had arrived and it’s not often that happens. Once on site, the organisation is better and the atmosphere building nicely. After pointing my father in the direction of a good spot to watch the start, I slot myself into the sub 1:40 red zone, along with the multitude of different coloured numbers that were already lining up there. My pace was optimistic due to the state of my ankle, not sure what everyone else’s excuse was but at least I was of the right colour.

We start and my ankle feels ok at first as we head past Nottingham Railway Station, sadly currently hidden behind a ton of scaffolding. Then we embarking on the long hike out of town along Queens Drive, a dull dual carriageway lined with business premises. I pass L and the boys who are supporting at the two mile point and then see someone short cut back to the start, presumably to be an early retirement. I still feel ok at that point, so I don’t join them but within a mile the ankle starts to throb and I wonder if I’ll make it round or not.

I hobble badly for a couple of miles but then I guess it goes numb because I don’t have too much trouble after that. So then it’s just a question of surviving the course. Unfortunately the new course, introduced last year, is not very inspiring and by now we’re running through, for no apparent reason, the Boots Industrial Estate. The estate is closed to the public and there were about 10 hardy folks supporting us in the whole of that desolate wasteland. Them and the tumbleweed of course.

Sadly the support out on the whole course is also a lot less than it was due to less places of civilisation now being included on the route. Even Wollaton Park, which was always a good spectator point, that pulled the crowds and therefore helped spur on the runners, is no longer include.

In an attempt to be ‘fast n flat’, the new course misses out any such scenic bits if they are within sneezing distance of mild incline, meaning the new route also does little to promote the best of Nottingham. The old course was much better and even that didn't take in enough of Nottingham.

I had hoped to pace myself around behind some lass in a Robin Hood suit but although the organisers have encouraged people to dress up as RH in an attempt to set a world record, they all seem to be men. There’s not even a scantily clad Maid Marion to be found.

After a bit of scenery around the university and not of the Maid Marion variety, it’s another dull plod back towards the city centre. We are turned away before we get there of course but if you're quick, you do get a glimpse of the castle on your left before they finish us off, literally, with a two mile out and back slog along Victoria Embankment.

This really tests your mental preparation. I was lucky I had L and the dogs there for a quick pat and a snog. That spurred me on for a while but even that wore off as the turning point seemed to get further and further away. Once there, you were in the unenviable position of knowing exactly how far it was back the other way. Evil stuff.

One thing I haven’t dealt with before are the new water pouches and perhaps I should have watched the video they supplied on how to work them. I couldn’t get enough water out of mine, while other folk seemed to get too much. Still, I’m sure they’re a good idea. I just need some practice.

Finally the finish arrives, with lots of people sat in the grandstands and a good jovial commentator announcing people as they come in. I’m handed my medal and goodie bag. Suddenly it’s almost worth it. Still no t-shirt in the goodie bag though.

Then we sit in the stands ourselves, watching everyone else come in. Including two women with orange numbers doing it in charity t-shirts who started beside me in the sub 1:40 red zone but came in at about 2:45, an hour after I’d finished.

John 'Tommo' Thompson Memorial Ride

The conditions were a touch Autumnal for the John 'Tommo' Thompson Memorial Ride today. e.g. it was well chilly and it looked like it was going to bucket it down any moment. I think the aim by most people, us included, was to get up to the start at Carsington Water and get on with asap before the heavens opened.

As it happened they opened almost immediately after we had started but thankfully only lightly. It then fined up and stayed dry until we were safely in the car heading home afterwards. I hear some of the folk on the longest route weren't so lucky.

The route, around the Peak District and the Staffordshire Moorlands, consisted of hills, hills and more hills. Bloody hard it was. I got the distinct impression that the organisers did not attempt to avoid any climbs whatsoever and even went out of their way to find the most fearsome ones.

The route took us over part of the Ashbourne Half Marathon course that I did last year. I couldn't believe I managed to run up those hills.

I attempted the 76k route, L did the 45k. Both had a feed station at Thorpe but by differing routes. I beat L there by ten minutes over a slightly longer route but then her shorter route home beat me back to the finish.

In between I had an altercation with a wasp, that kindly embedded itself in my face by it's sting as I bombed downhill at something approaching 40mph. There it hung there laughing as I attempted to either shake it off or to slow down and stop. Eventually I managed the later putting my leg down on a verge resplendent in deep nettles in the process. Double ouch. I nearly hit the tarmac but managed to stay upright, just or else that would have been a triple ouch.

The sting wasn’t pleasant and started to swell up pretty quickly, I always get a reaction to stings but it didn’t get really bad until much later. After I had valiantly completed the course and got back to Carsington where there was plenty of very welcome tea and cake.

Budapest Half Marathon

We skip the hotel breakfast and head into the City Park, where it proves to be much easier to find the race HQ in the daylight. It’s already warm, even before the 9am start, and I think it’s going to get warmer.

There are hundreds of foreigners in the race and we get chatting to a chap from Milton Keynes who is currently working in Budapest. We stop talking to him when he indicates he intends to run the course in 1:32.

At 9am, we’re off and running back across Heroes' Square, then most of the first four kms are in a straight line down the World Heritage site of Andrassy Avenue. I’m not too sure what constitutes a World Heritage site but I’ve certainly never ran down one before, so that was pretty cool.

Then we hit or rather cross the Danube on the Chain Bridge. The Danube divides the two districts of Buda and Pest and now we are in the former. Most of the course takes place along the banks of this mighty river, on one side or the other, until after 16km we head back to the outskirts, across Heroes' Square again and to the finish back at the City Park.

It was one of the most scenic races I’ve ever ran. Budapest is an impressive city steeped in multicultural history. From the Romans through the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the dalliance with the Nazis and the communist occupation via Ghengis Khan and Attila the Hun, after whom most of the streets seem to be named.

When I remembered to look at all this impressive-ness it was a handy distraction to take my mind off the suffering. As I’m wearing my GB Olympic top I get a few chants of ‘Go Team GB’ which also helps with the morale.

The temperature was by now approaching 30 degrees but luckily the drinks stations are plentiful, except oddly there are none in the first 5k but thereafter they are everywhere. They have also given everyone a sponge and there’s a bucket to dump it in at every drinks station, so I take full advantage of this.

The temperature rises higher still as we pass the cheerleaders...

It's all oddly very un-PC, so well done Hungary for that and the girls do an outstanding job of raising the morale of at least the male runners.

It’s a largely flat course but one thing I’d forgotten about was that we’d be running in metric which didn’t help the pacings per mile that I’d got in my head. Some on the hoof mathematics made me decide that 4:45 per km would see me home in a reasonable time. Unfortunately I regularly missed this target and was surprised, but delighted, to find my mathematics a bit off as I came home in a satisfying 1:43:11.

After a bit of lying down in some very crap grass. It’s all crap actually, it’s like MD has been around the whole park wearing it out, I head back towards Heroes Square to watch L hobble home. She shouldn’t really be running at all and hasn’t trained, so just finishing is an achievement.

Just one more thing to get and that’s our race t-shirts. Which were rather bizarrely being handed out, not at the finish or with the start packs, but at Nike's shop a mile away in Budapest's West End Arcade. It takes us a while to find the arcade but then when we do there is no mistaking that we are in the right place as we join a very slow moving queue.

There's probably only about 60-70 people in the queue but it takes 70 minutes to get to the front because they are making everyone sign for their shirt. This is almost as long as it took me to run the race. Once there we are told only XS and XL men's sizes are left or they’ll order our size in and we can pop back in a few weeks to pick it up. Like that’s going to happen.

John Fraser 10

I would have liked to have ran another half marathon today but for various reasons that wasn’t happening. Races were either full, too far away or I had missed the closing date due to being away. So today I drop down to 10 miles and the John Fraser 10 which is a jaunt around the Leicestershire countryside from a place called Countesthorpe. I’d heard of the race but I had to look Countesthorpe up on the map because I’d never heard of it despite its close proximity to Leicester itself.

Race HQ was at the local college before they took us out on to the road for the start where 500 or so of us caused quite a traffic management problem. L is supporting this morning, saving her injuries from further jarring ahead of Budapest next weekend.

The route was pretty much how I like them, pretty dull. It was an out and back with a loop on the end through countryside, mainly on country roads with a single track tarmac section which wasn’t used by traffic. It was all very well marshalled and with plenty of drinks stations (in cups). One thing it wasn’t though was flat. You were either climbing a hill or descending one. None of the hills on their own were particularly evil, it was just that there was barely a flat piece of road in the whole 10 miles.

I didn’t start particularly fast and as the terrain eventually took its toll, there wasn’t much chance of improving on that. So my finishing time of 1:18 is very much on the slow side.

Great Scottish Swim

Today we are at Balloch where the Great Scottish Swim takes place. I believe this is the first Scottish swim to beat both the weather and the algae, to actually take place. Although this is their first attempt at Loch Lomond. Which is also, according to the signs, 'Certified Unsuitable For Swimming'.

Both L and I swim the mile. I start at 10.30am, L starts at 1.05pm, giving enough time for dog handover in between.

As I wait to start, at first I don’t realise that I’m stood next to Evan Thomas. 

Then after L has pointed this out and asked me to take photos of him, I suddenly realise that I’ve also been stood next to Keri-Anne Payne, super open water champion babe, but was too busy biting my nails to notice.

The swim itself is ok, as swims go. Actually I’m sure I swam well over a mile, so my half ironman distance of 1.2 miles shouldn’t be a problem. I get lost on the way out and get corrected by a marshal in a canoe. I get even more lost on the way back due to the sun being very low and totally blinding me as I swim back to shore. Simply following the pair of feet in front of me doesn't work, when another canoe based marshal paddles after him and turns him around until he's pointing in the right direction. Do they do SatNav for swimmers?

As I swim past a marshal actually stood in the middle of the loch, I realise I could have probably walked some of it.

I’m quicker than at Windermere but a lot slower than at Nottingham, where there was the advantage of following the edge of the rowing strip to stay in a straight line and therefore I didn’t get lost.

Then we hand over the baton (the dogs) and L does her swim. A mile being a bit of a come down for her, she's used to doing two.

Coll Half Marathon

We are booked on the early morning ferry which has a last check-in time of 6.15am, so it’s practically still dark when we take the charred remains of the tent down. The two hour forty minute ferry crossing to Coll is packed. Packed with runners that is, many who take the journey as an opportunity to catch up on their sleep. Others are tucking into their pre-race muesli but some are on the full Scottish. What the hell, it’s a 2pm race start, plenty of time to digest it all. We tuck in.

Once docked in port at Arinagour on Coll there’s a mad rush up the hill to the Race HQ and the temporary campsite on the local football field. As most are on foot, the car gives us quite a head start and we get there early enough to pick a decent spot.

The day consists of four races. A half marathon, a 10k, a 5k and a kids’ race. Which, I think, are all scheduled to start at the same time from different places on the island, converging at the finish line at the community centre.

This involves everyone getting lifts to the various starts. My injury ravaged partner has opted for the 10k, so she disappears off in one of the minibuses. My start is down at the ferry pier, nearly a mile back down the road. With half an hour to go to start time the heavens open. Twenty minutes later and with the start now just ten minutes away we are all still peering out of the community centre windows praying for it to stop. At least we have shelter. I hear those dropped at the 10k start are not so fortunate.

Eventually with the race already almost turning into a 14 miler we hot foot it to the start where a brief, soundless, aerobic warm-up is in progress. At least the rain has now stopped and the sun is coming out.

Moments later, we’re off. I punch start on my watch, which instantly turns black for a few seconds before rebooting itself and informing me it’s 00:00:00 on 01/01/01. Bugger. Flat battery or water damage me thinks.

By now we’re heading back to and past the community centre, then steadily uphill into a brisk head wind. We continue steadily uphill... steadily uphill... into the wind. L certainly knew what she was doing when she got a lift to the half way point for the 10k start.

Four miles done and my watch is telling me it’s 33 minutes past midnight, so at least I’m sort of timing myself. Not that it matters, I’ve already realised that this isn’t going to be fast.

Eventually we turn and the wind becomes sideways on but still we climb. Then we turn again, get the wind behind us and head downhill. We pass through the 10k start and along a path that runs through the sand dunes. It’s all quite pretty actually. I think I can actually enjoy this.

I overtake quite a few people in the second half of the race, apart from one stubborn *******, who after I’ve spent a whole mile reeling him in, suddenly has a Lazarus moment at the 13 mile point and sprints to the finish.

I cross the line in 1:48 where L is waiting for me, having survived her downhill 10k.

There is a great post race setup with various food stalls, a BBQ and real ale from the Fyne Brewery. 

 

Later there is a Ceilidh with the band Trail West but by then we are pissed and up to our own drunken frivolity so we don’t join in. 

Stafford Goes Pedalling Sportive

Today Staffordshire Goes Pedalling and we join in. L has blagged the 35 mile route which means I have to man up and do the full 70 mile option. The start is at the rather pleasant location of Shugborough Hall.

I roll out at 8.30am with an hour's head start on L. The initial group of about 20 that I’m placed with seem to go off at a steady enough pace and I’m happy to stick with them. As we leave, we are pre-warned that the only hills in the main route are early on and within three miles we are heading up a climb on Cannock Chase. I change down to a lower gear and my chain promptly comes off. Bugger. By the time I’ve got oily and reattached it, my group are no longer looking quite so sedate and are already half way up the climb. I set off in pursuit.

Pretty soon there are bodies all over the hill but I don’t find it that testing and pass most of them, eventually catching up with the front of the group, although gasping and out of breath a touch. Just as I do the four girls in the group opt to pull over to admire each other’s sunglasses. Two of the guys in the group pull over as well, presumably to admire the girls admiring their sunglasses. The remaining four of us 'surge' over the top and immediately form a breakaway group.

We are making reasonable, if unspectacular, progress until a chap appears out of nowhere, doing about twice our pace and seemingly intent on time trailing his way solo through the whole distance. Everyone, except me, attempts to jump on his wheel. Total madness.

Momentarily abandoned and on a descent, I watch a girl upfront take a wrong turn, attempt a swift u-turn, hit some gravel and down she goes. I stop to scrape her off the tarmac and help her wobble to the curb for a sit down. There are plenty of signs on the route but they are small, in not very bright colours and often they do not give you enough advance warning of upcoming turns.

I leave the girl babbling to herself and push on. One by one I catch the foolhardy ex-members of my breakaway group, now with their tails firmly between their legs. I stick with one of them and with Cannock Chase now behind us we head through Lichfield. We’re going nowhere fast again but I’m happy to gently advance towards the first feed station which is after 36 miles. Then bizarrely the guy I’m following decides to stop and dismount in the middle of the road. I swerve around him and am almost wiped out by the fast moving peloton coming up behind me, which I had no idea was so close. Where was the chap on the motorbike holding the blackboard telling me that they were like 5 seconds behind?

As everyone pieces their nerves back together I try to look as anonymous as possible amongst their number and hitch a ride. We head over the A38 and round past Catton Hall where there is as expected a dog show in progress, there always is. Although not in their usual field that’s been taken over by the Bloodstock musical festival.

Then we roll in to the feed at Barton Under Needwood. Held in a bike shop with one toilet (big queue) and a stock of bananas, water, energy bars and gels. No tea and cake, shame. The CNP black cherry gels are rather nice though and would be great drizzled on ice cream.

The peloton that I swept in with are still recuperating or OD-ing on the black cherry, so I head off alone but following someone, so that they can spot the signs for me. Even then I miss one, even though the rider I was following took the turn.

That rider is one of the girls who was in the group I chased up the initial climb and eventually the rest of her group sweep us both up and yay, I’m moving swiftly in a group again. Then disaster. None of the eight of us see the upcoming right turn until it’s too late. The chap pulling on the front yells as we pass it, the girl behind him screams as she passes it, clips him and goes down. The girl behind goes over the top of her and the person behind her, me, takes swift but successful evasive action. We all stand at the road side and survey the damage count...  two cracked helmets, a pair of smashed sunglasses, a twisted but fixable set of front forks and quite a bit of blood. 

The group quickly swells to about 30 concerned faces, so I make my excuses and hope-you're-oks and head off to the second feed at Blithfield Reservoir which is just a mile away. If this look familiar, it is, it’s where I cycled in the triathlon last weekend and I now head across the very same causeway. The feed also has cakes, so that’s good. Still no tea though. Whilst there I get a text from L, saying she’s now at the finish. So it sounds like her new tyres stayed up.

I have just 12 miles to go, which is achieved without incident and back in a group.

At the finish there is real ale, a decent ham roll and bag full of bling that sadly will mostly go in the bin.