Marathon Eryri 2014

Second attempt, after testing the water last year. This is how it went :

Mile 1 : Almost decapitated by the mile marker. Three of us were running side by side when a gust of wind dislodged the plastic marker and it proceeded blow across the road and swipe us, narrowly flying overhead. I thought 'is this a sign of things to come', excuse the pun..

Miles 2-3 : Headed towards Pen y Pass.

Miles 4-5 : Looked up at a peleton of good runners up ahead, including our own Dave Powell. I had lost touch but was keeping it sensible & felt pretty good.

Miles 6-7 : The descent. Andrew Poole stole a technique from Dyl Lewis which I then stole from him. Head forward, long strides and away you go. It worked and Dave's zoomed back into view, albeit still up the road.

Miles 8-12 : Preparing to start the assault. The long gradual descent in Beddgelert is where you settle in to a pace and hope you still feel good. I did, but though I was probably going slower than last year, holding back a tad.

Halfway at Beddgelert

Half Way : 1 hour 29, same as last year. Hit the hill out of Beddgelert and my group all left me on the climb. Thanks guys....

Miles 14-16 : Feeling fresh, too fresh. Almost started racing an old boy who past me. Luckily I didn't as I started feeling the heavy legs just a mile or so later!

Miles 17-18 : Passing people, people passing me, hard to work out the state of play! Caught a glimpse of 1st lady up ahead, it's as close as I got!

Miles 19-22 : Slower miles than last year, where I got caught up in the ladies battle. Kept a bit in the tank for the climb this time.

Miles 23-24 : The climb, oh and what a climb. Aim of the summer training had been to work on hills so I could run up this pig. It worked as I settled on a steady trot. Got passed by second lady like I was standing still. Passed a few walkers myself. Cramped at top of climb, but breathing was leisurely compared to last year.

Miles 25-26 : Took me 10 mins to do a mile downhill last year. Ran down this time but was passed by 6, taking me out of the top 60. Far too steep for the likes of me!

Mile 26.1 : Llanberis High St, good legs and a calculated effort resulting in a PB by 10 mins for 3.13!

Great event which will have to remain in the diary year on year me thinks!

Scarily close splits!!

Twin Peaks 2014

After a fairly long childcare-led sabbatical from racing, I finally got a chance to don the blue vest at the local 'Aberystwyth Twin Peaks' race, a tough mixed terrain Welsh classic.

The event had been organised by my running mate Ian Evans, his first stab at race organising and despite being nervous beforehand, he put on a great show, one of the best Twin Peaks yet, ably assisted by freak mid-summer like conditions in early October. The local surge in people taking up running also showed, with lots of new faces meaning a record entry for the race and in addition, all the family and friends that come with them, to create a great atmosphere on the promenade.

Race start

My previous outings in 2014 had been the Teifi 10, Island Race (HM), Tregaron Duathlon & Castles Relay (12m), all in the first half of the year, but the trusty Parkrun and a good summer of training meant that fitness was good and it would just be a case of finding out whether the form was there on the day.

It was also my first year since 2010 without a Spring marathon. Whether this was a good thing or not remained to be seen.

A reccy was carried out the previous week with first timer, nephew Llyr. I'd worked out some mile splits which always sets my mind at rest (to know the course like the back of my hand). One less thing to worry about on the day.

Looking back through some previous Twin Peaks races via my Garmin data (I love this kind of retrospective analysis), I realised that my hill work had been ok in the past but my downhill and maybe even the pace on the flats needed some work.

This meant the plan was to start at full gas for once, minus maybe a couple of percent, and slacken off on 'Dogshit alley' in readiness for the first slog of the day, Pendinas Hill.

My plan kind of worked. I wanted a fast first mile but it seemed that the quality field all had fresh legs on the day and we set off at a seemingly brisk but sensible pace, only for the mile one split to read 5.39, way faster than even my 5km pace. This felt very comfortable at the time and so I decide to go for it and try & stay at the back of the lead group.

Mile 2, which ended just at the foot of Pendinas was another cracker at 6 minutes, and I'd even lost a couple of places which didn't alarm me too much. I was almost one minute up on my schedule after two miles, something had to give.....

Pendinas starts steep, levels out and then kicks again towards the summit. The first kick saw me hold back and run with my group, which by this point had thinned out, with the leaders making their way ahead of us. I began to overtake runners on the less steep middle section and was running 9th as we headed for the top.

The last kick was a brute and the guy in front started to walk. Psychologically, this wasn't good for me. I was in pain and saw this as a great chance to copy him, and to try and stop the burn. I did, and never really recovered.

I'd gone over the red line, and plummeting down the descent, I was out of control, lucky not to turn an ankle or slip on my back as I just didn't have the core strength to keep myself stable. Not to worry, I just thought of how fast Richard Anthony would be snowballing down behind me, and managed to keep a good pace going through the off-camber footpath whilst being chased by a couple of runners I'd past on the ascent.

Back onto the road for mile four and the legs had gone into lactic shock and I felt like I was operating at 50% power, probably due to the fast start! We've all been there and it's a test of will to convince your body to snap out of it and get going again. I thought of the old 3 min max. sprint tests on the bike that the University lab carried out a few years back. This showed that even after a maximal sprint effort where you die by minute two, you actually start producing more power again in minute three, despite the sensation of doom that you're going at snails pace...

I looked up and saw that the guys in front were in the same boat, we were all running in slow motion compared to the outward prom leg, it was just a case of hanging on. The 3 min theory did work in my opinion, and I felt a bit stronger as we headed to climb two. My Garmin had lost GPS at mile three frustratingly and so I can't analyse the negative split in great detail much to my annoyance.

'Consti' is another tough climb, albeit shorter than Pendinas, and years of efforts up there taught me in my hour of need, not to look up, focus on the three twisty corners at the bottom before crossing the two bridges and then the final slog through the rocky section to the summit. It was 'orrible. I walked, I looked up to see others walking, I looked down to see that I had ample gap to the guys & girls behind me but I still wanted to keel over. I asked a marshal where the collapse mattress was.. If you're cooked, no hill training in the world can help you speed up. I trotted and eventually forced myself to run again, cheered on by the crowd at the top, and plodded up to the access road at the very top and managed to catch up with one other runner to start the descent.
 My timer was still working and so I knew how long we had to descend back to the prom in order to try and dip below the magical 50 minute mark for a PB and it was going to be close, probably too close. I bombed down, again in a Richard Anthony esque' style, almost falling into the sea at the bottom of the ramp, with my knees and shins still reminding me of this almost a week and a half later. I didn't hit the prom with enough time to spare to run to the finish in the time required,and was duly re-caught by my companion in the yellow shirt that I'd left on the descent.

The legs had gone but I managed a glimmer of a sprint to come home with a PB by 17 seconds, at 50.22 for 12th place on the day. I reckon a sub 50 is possible next year, just hold off a tad in that first mile!

2014 - The Island Race - Hanner Marathon Ynys Mon, Gogledd Cymru

My first race of the year after a post Aber 10k period of pure gluttony, almost on a Brian Ashton / Ed Land scale (but not quite) and inability to get back into the training groove meant a belated start to the racing year.

With my lunchtime taskmaster Gancho Slavov currently out injured, there has been little in the way of his 'operation certain death' intervals so far and so I've been half heartedly attempting some of these myself, and have also been glad to be back at the Tuesday night speed sessions.

I chose this race as it's on the in-laws doorstep up on the Menai Straights and so a relaxed Saturday afternoon was spent reading the papers and putting the world to right in the father in-laws conservatory. This made a change from the usual 'Ace Ventura' style driving through Wales on the morning of the event, arriving with minutes to spare...

I picked up my number on the eve of the race, which also contained a 'do not bend' timing chip which I duly bent climbing back into the car, and a nice green & yellow T-Shirt, saving even more pillow time for the following morning.

The race started on the Menai Bridge and so I parked in the overflow car park which was Bangor City FC's new ground, turning out to be about a mile away, with not a portaloo in sight. Decision time. Get to the start early, in full warm up gear, visit loo & run back to the car, strip down and run back in race gear? This would mean 3 miles pre race! Instead, I sacrificed my trusty orange rain jacket and left the car for the day in my ready to race state with rain / warm up jacket which ended up in the back of the organisers van. I'll ask for it back one day..

Portaloos aplenty at the bridge and so we were off. The announcer went through the list of favorites, all with their own specific marathon goals, using this 'Island Race' as a preparation event. Rob Samuel, the winner of Marathon Eryri was even here.

My plan was to run at 6.20 pace or as near as I could, depending on the course, which I hadn't raced before. Mile 1 was the usual stampede as we headed into the town on the other side of the bridge, before heading north east towards Beaumaris on 'rolling roads'.

Miles 2-6 were all ok despite the hills although I was being caught by individuals and small groups and couldn’t really tag on any of them. This was the start of alarm bells and as we headed north of Beaumaris onto some twisty back roads, I began my 'second phase' of the race which involved running slower than phase one!

We turned back towards Beaumaris after what seemed like hours of wandering the countryside and hit a harsh headwind (no wonder the first 6 miles were ok!) and as we headed around the marina, I was caught by the first lady and a companion. The companion was running a very strange style, dragging his right foot. It transpired that he was in fact trying to unhitch something from the sole of his shoe and when he couldn't achieve this, he duly stopped dead, despite me being right behind him. Luckily I've watched the Matrix series of films, and instantly impersonated Keanu Reeves in dodging a bullet and somehow managed to twist myself around the human pillar in front of me, narrowly avoiding putting us both out of the race.

Miles 9-11 were even worse with headwinds and hills all conspiring against me and the rest of the field as pace went out the window and it was just time to enjoy the run. At mile 12 I glanced at the watch and still had a faint chance of a sub 1.30, needing around 8 minutes to compete the last 1.2 miles. I half heartedly trudged on, only to see a sign saying 400 metres to go..I looked down again, I had 1min 50 seconds to do 400 metres - easy!?

Thinking back to all the track sessions we'd done, I bolted off and sprinted the last '400', but alas it wasn't 400, more like 600 metres and as the finish came into view, I was in at around 1.30.16!

In summary, a well organized race, backed up by great enthusiasm from the locals with plenty of support & feeds. If you fancy a racing weekend away in North Wales, look no further.

Good year or bad year?

A short summary of my running year 2013.

What started out as one final push for a sub 3 hour marathon, threatening to take over my life during January to April, actually turned out as a year for some new training sessions, less focus on racing so frequently and a quick stab at the iconic Marathon Eryri.

With the sub 3 marathon conquered (see previous blog), it could only ever be described as a good year, but with new challenges along came new targets and some ups and downs along the way, one of the downs being the fact that I have been 'upgraded' to the veteran 40+ category for all races :-(

Firstly, the club I belong to (Aberystwyth AC) has exploded into a bigger operation with first class race promotions, new runner incentives such as 'Couch to 5k', and a website that encourages friendly competition with the Badge Scheme and the Club League...and that's not even mentioning ParkRun!

ParkRun has been the single most important new venture that has made running more accessible and social in Aberystwyth, and in turn has seen many new faces come along and give it a go. Personally I haven't had as much involvement as I'd like, with a young family this year but have helped out when possible. The credit is down to a few key players in the club (they know who they are!). 

As well as the competitive side of things, the training sessions have also grown, especially in the female sector and more and more social runs are springing up all the time which makes it all a bit more communal.

Any spare time I've had this year has been spent getting out the door for a quick hour in between baby's sleep, eat and play patterns although some great Sunday runs have been had with the usual suspects of Ian, Keith & Gancho. With Keith's dad living in Capel Bangor, the usual route has been along the Rheidol Valley with a water stop, arranged by Keith at 5 & 12 or whatever miles, just put your money in the honesty box.

The 'new' lunchtime track sessions have been really effective in tackling some PB's and again it's those usual suspects that have raised the bar. Firstly Ian Evans got the ball rolling early in the year and soon saw the benefits with a PB at Tregaron Half and then some regular sub 18 minute 5k's. Gancho then also brought some of his focus to the track with some killer lunchtime sessions which usually involved towing me around the track, lap after lap with the odd 100 metres of rest if I was lucky. These 'cruise intervals' were tough but really made a difference as I brought my own 5k PB down by around 30 seconds. 

Sprinting to the line to take 3rd place in the Newtown 10k at Latham Park, May 2013.

The lunchtime recovery runs were taken care of by Steve King and myself usually lamenting Shrewsbury Town's lack of form as we trundled gingerly through Dan y Coed woods and along the prom.

My targets for 2013 after the marathon were a bit hazy, but thinking back and after looking at the unnervingly accurate Club Badge tables, a Gold badge had been achievable with a bit of hard work. A sub 18 5k, sub 37 10k and a 1.22 half marathon will have to wait another year as none of the above were quite cracked, but I still managed the Gold Badge standard times at all distances by a hairs breadth. The platinum standards are a bit extreme for me but why not give them a crack :-)

Surprisingly tho, my best race of the year was probably the Cardiff Bay 5 mile just 3 weeks after London where a sub 30 minute time (sub 6 min miles) came as a pleasant surprise and gave a bit of confidence for the year ahead. 

In amongst all of the events that I entered in 2013, my favourite running experience was probably the Snowdon Marathon in October. With no aspirations on time for once, I showed up, hung around the cafe with Dave & Lou just chewing the fat (something I've wanted to do all year but have always been in too much of a rush or simply never at the same races), eased down to the start line and just took off.  This is one of the toughest 26.2's in Europe and the one thing I didn't do enough of over the summer - the long run, came back to bite me in the bum (actually the hips) at Waunfawr at around 22 miles of the race.

I'd actually blown at Rhudd Ddu a tad earlier but had run through it and was back on track with a group that would eventually finish in 3.15. My implosion at the climb (I mean Mountain!), meant a run/walk strategy both up the hill and down it into Llanberis to lose a further 8 minutes, but that foil blanket (my first ever foil blanket) and a warm mug of tea soon made it all worthwhile and I fancy heading back again next year with some more miles in the legs.

The gap between Snowdon and the legendary Aberystwyth 10k was about 6 weeks and this was all focused on the sub 37 minute time with those afore-mentioned intervals. Despite coming close (a PB by 30 seconds of 37.28), it wasn't to be but the knowledge gained on track pacing will hopefully prove useful in future.

Another distance which has/will become a target is the sub hour 10 miler. This will probably be the toughest test of the lot as I am still deficient by around 3 1/2 minutes after Novembers Elan 10 miler. This was a hilly event but I had hoped to be in the 62's and so its back to the drawing board on that one. With no spring marathon in 2014, some genuine focus can now be spent on these shorter distances. Again, the sub 30 at Cardiff 5 has given me a bit of hope here.

Back to Parkrun and this is a cracking early Saturday morning exercise, getting all of the pressure to train on the weekend out of the way early doors. I've worked out that a more satisfying weekend is to be had in general if the Parkrun is done.. Edging closer to to a sub 18, I've hit 18.06 on two occasions, in September & October and so I'm hopeful of finding those 7 seconds from somewhere soon, surely just losing a couple of pounds will do it?!

Cardiff Half Marathon

The day started the night before. "Use boiled water to warm the flask" the other half recommended as I planned to take porridge on the 5.30am drive to Cardiff for the Cardiff Half Marathon.

An offer to stay over for the night had fallen through and so the long commute it was to be on a day when Aber AC were stretched to the limit with members racing in the Twin Peaks local race, the Chester Marathon and at Cardiff.

An alleged 100 townsfolk had headed to the capital with at least four of those from the club to make up the 19,000 total who were taking to the line.

My prep had been pretty good. Weeks of pretty poor Snowdon Marathon training had inadvertently left me in good shape for a half, or so I thought. Plenty of 6-8 mile tempos and lots of long track intervals would surely give a PB?

Back to the flask, and the porridge was gloopily added and bags were packed, out the door and on the road by 5.40 for a 9am start time. Timing meant a roadside stop was needed to have breakfast and upon pouring it into the bowl, a jet of watery porridge spewed out, all over everything and instantly deeming the car in need of a valet. I'd forgotten to poor the water out first and ended up having a very small portion, hastily topped up with a banana and energy drink...

Second faux pas of the day was the lack of Vaseline in my race bag. I rarely use it any longer as the body seems to have hardened to general running without the need, but longer runs still require a quick dose on the nipples and groin ;-)   I didn't like the thought of running without and so asked the nearest other guy (why did I ask a bloke?!) in the 'car park' and was instantly told 'i ain't got none', in a slightly to nervous voice. The same thing happened twice and in the end i was resigned to running 'dry'.

Enough of layby's and car parks, the race was much bigger than I had presumed with 19,000 starters, the second biggest half in the UK. I was under the impression it would be a slightly bigger version of Tregaron Half!

The route to the start was a bit clumsy and bottle-necked via the castle grounds, but the rest was spot on with plenty of feed zones, good crowds and atmosphere. It just seemed so weird to have such a big race so close to home, I don't think I fully took in this atmosphere as the area was already so well known to me.

My aim was to run sensibly, and try for 6.20 minute mileing pace as an average. This would be around 20 seconds slower per mile than my Cardiff 5 mile pace and 15 seconds slower than my 10k PB but a big 29 seconds faster than marathon pace. It would be a challenge and that's what it turned out to be.

My track work meant the first few miles were comfortable at the race pace, even a tad faster but the lack of longer training miles meant miles 5-9 were 'a bit harder'. Nevertheless the pace was still good and it was at around 9.5 that the feeling worsened. Even then, I managed a 6.30 and so was still fully on target. Then came the drag up to the top end of Roath lake. This took its toll and what was left in the legs was left on the road. At the turn for home at around 11.5, I had to shorten the strides and fall back 30 odd seconds per mile, so it wouldn't be a total breakdown.

The guy who physically spread his arms out to stop his colleagues going to fast at the start flew past me at 12.5 miles, he was not a day younger than 60 and he had a female veteran in tow - there's always someone more clever....

The finish came eventually, a great long and wide road with big crowds and an orderly finish protocol - finish, water, medal, t-shirt, recovery drink, goodie bag, expo, exit.

My time was just over one minute slower than my 'best case scenario' (1.24.13) and so I'm pretty satisfied as it was a PB by over two minutes, without the aid of enough porridge or any Vaseline whatsoever!

London 2013 - Project Sub 3 Hour (Mk IV)

Last year's 3.00.02 at Manchester had been chipping away at me ever since I came across the line in Trafford Park and so when I found out that i was eligible for a 'good for age' place at London 2013, there was only one thing for it!

After an injury free stint since Christmas, I actually arrived on the start line with more miles under the belt than any of the previous three other marathon campaigns that I'd done, albeit with a side issue of a newly born baby to look after and so sleep deprivation had been a small factor! They had always seen weeks of 15's and 20 miles thrown in among the more enthusiastic weeks which topped out at 35 miles. I once read on a running forum that a sub 3 hour marathon time was impossible on a training plan of less than 35 miles per week. I nearly overturned that claim last year, failing by 3 seconds but I was determined to try again, and so edged the mileage up to between 30 & 40 miles per week, with the odd 50 added in for painful measure this time.

Three 20 mile runs and an uber-long 18 miler off road would surely see me right this time? With three weeks to go, my enthusiasm for same old, same old began to wain and after a slow Monday 20, 2 weeks and 6 days out, i began to slowly wind down for one reason or another (excuses were increasingly easier to find).
Panic set in, surely I would be too rested? Some said yes, other more seasoned opinions said no! Should I do an 8 mile tempo on the Sunday before the race? Of course I didn't, but the thought was there..

So leading up to race day, i was ultra fresh and bouncy, yes, bouncy. The joints, cartilages and muscles which had all been hammered down and compressed like processed ham since Christmas began to open back up and almost sprout, just like shrubs in the Spring. This was also down to a course of Glucosamine tablets, IT band stretching, yoga, a couple of sports massages and just the odd recovery drink tipple after a long run.

I'd also nominated the Welsh Air Ambulance Service as a charity to raise money for and at the time of writing, I have around £1700 to hand over to them!

Race day started with me trying to find Blackfriars Station to no avail, and a subsequent 2 mile walk from row Z to the very front of the start pens through Greenwich Park among the zillions of fun runners. I'd gotten off at Greenwich thinking it wouldn't be that far to go. This resulted in my 'buffer' safety hour being put to annoying energy wasting use, also trying to find my kit drop-off lorry (unsuccessfully) and eventually arriving at the good-for-age / secretly awkward to find / pain in the a*se' tent with only 25 minutes to go. If only I could afford a PA or even a Butler!

A quick change and clamber to the correct kit lorry and I was ready, joining the others around twenty rows back at the start of the race in the red zone. A 30 second silence was given to honour the bombing victims of the previous week's Boston marathon and everyone of the 35,000 odd competitors followed this to a tee.

As the gun went off it was game on. The brand new yellow race socks were on, the spongy, relatively new Aber AC blue trainers were on, 4 gels in the pocket and a fully functioning Garmin unit strapped to the wrist.

This was in addition to two main pasta courses from the previous evening at the Ramada Hotel (sounds extravagant, but was actually cheaper than the thieves at Travelodge'), plus as much porridge as was comfortable that morning. I'd even re-read some great advice from the previous months Runners World magazine and also scanned over some critical marathon race guidelines from some old training books and did some manual split time rehearsals, rather like I was an actor studying lines! Nothing was left to chance, apart from those dodgy arrival directions.

The first 10 miles were quite frankly boring. I was in a menacing mood and should probably apologise to thousands of very pleasant supporters on the race route who smiled, cheered and held hands out for high fives that were not returned. I was here to do a job, and ran like an i-robot.

Those miles were knocked out at a few seconds below my average target pace of 6.52. Without the actual data from a sports lab, my experience led me to believe that my 'lactate threshold', the point at which your muscles start creating lactic acid, was at around 6.40-6.45 pace and so i was on a very thin line. If I strayed over this 'red line', my body would be unable to uphold this pace for 3 hours. Even if I only ran a few early miles at this pace, there would be no return, only pain and disappointment.

Basically I was playing with fire in going for a sub 3 time. Whilst knowing it was possible, it was really going to be touch and go, with a high risk of blowing up and hitting the wall, it was only barely possible but I love a good challenge, and my Manchester time had given me hope.

The half way point would be the first real indicator and despite being closely followed by a leprechaun, i went through in 1.29.11. Maybe a bit slow as I only had 49 seconds in the bag to waste the second half? As it happened, another benchmark would be my 2011 failure point, the 15 mile marker at Westferry Tunnel. This is where my hamstrings failed me last time and so as I sailed through still feeling like it was a Sunday stroll, I started to at least think that maybe I'd get to 20 with enough in the tank.

It was at this point that my loose tracking of the 2.59 pacer started to become a factor. Up until now, I decided to run my own race, with it just so happening that he passed me at about 5 miles, and then I passed him back at around 17. His pace seemed slow, and at the same point, my trusty Garmin finally died on me! The old steed had seen better days and simply couldn't cope with the Canary Wharf sky scrapers, plus the thousands of other devices probably all out to attract the same satellite like mating birds on an Attenborough documentary.

This was awkward as had i been able to check my pace against the slowing pacer, I would have known that he was suffering. My instinct told me that anyway. Finally benefiting from a few previous marathons at this pace I guess, I knew that I had to speed up and get to 20 miles in around 2.16, leaving a final 10k of just under 44 minutes. Easy? Not easy but certainly doable. You just have to love the marathon for all the races within races!

I got to 20 in 2.16, i think it was a tad under, and two scousers behind me immediately announced 2 hours 57 minutes for them and everyone else around them. That may have been a tad optimistic, but it was good to hear those positive vibes. I'd not felt this good at 20 before, but a new 2.59 pace man had taken over the reigns of his predecessor and seemed to be rapidly gaining speed up ahead to make up for what I could only assume to be a less than satisfactory job by our previous friend.

This set a few alarm bells ringing as I thought that current pace seemed good enough. I decided to let him go, but keep him within a minute, just in case.

There were now casualties all around, wobbler's and stretchers who had ground to a halt yet I still felt good in the Embankment tunnel. When I say good, I mean awful, but still able to run at 6.52 pace. It was certainly uncomfortable and a few early signs of cramp set in. I was determined to get to 24 miles on target and then surely, anyone can run 2.2 miles, can't they?

A bit too similar to a Jim'll Fix It badge for my liking!

The 24 mile flag finally appeared and it was here that those last three mile doubts of 'who cares if I'm over 3 hours' went away. I started to claw Mr 2.59 back and as Westminster approached, the crowd roars just pulled you along. Turning right to head from Big Ben towards the Mall and we hit 25. 26 popped up in no time. Just 0.2 miles to go and the clock saying 2.57..i could maybe even walk it in 3 minutes!

A quick right hander at Buckingham Palace and the line appeared with 2.59 on the clock. With chip adjustment, that turned into a 2.58.55 which suited just fine. Any elation at the end? Not as much as I thought! No silly victory salute, no tears and barely a raised smile, just a content feeling and later, a cheeky grin that a two year goal had finally been achieved.

Everything went to plan, I even managed to 'consume' my gels, on time and without most of them ending up on my hands or the inside of my shorts :-/ I kept cool by splashing copious bottles of water over my head at the feed zones and I'm also thinking about taking up shares in Vaseline.

I have no thoughts or plans to try and improve on this time. That would take a lot more training and too much time. 50 miles a week? No thanks!

Next stop, a few weeks of nothing inparticular and later the Lake Vyrnwy half marathon and maybe some Duathlons after that. Ah damn, just remembered, I've entered Snowdon ;-)

Tregaron Half Marathon

A full 48 hours after finishing this race and I'm still aching. No it's not the usual DOMS muscular pain, as the recent training stint had prepared me for the distance & effort, its more a dull ache that shouts of joint pain, creaking kneecaps and flu like aches without the actual fever!

I've put it down to a pretty busy program of training recently which meant arriving at the start line already a tad fatigued, but in a healthy, training related way. Unfortunately the unforgiving Tregaron course really doesn't take any prisoners with its gradual hill start, followed by some real stingers both up and downhill, followed by the longest straight this side of Utah which cracks any lingering mental strength any of the competitors had remaining.

I woke up on Monday really feeling it yet still managed a recovery 'run' which really brought home how incapacitated i felt. So with this run not really helping matters, I took to the internet to help me gain some faster recovery techniques - Yoga!

A quick search for 'Yoga for Tregaron victims' brought up some helpful videos which required 15 minutes of copying a very flexible lady who seemed to be in a far sunnier place than I was. Anyhow, the workout actually had an effect and after the session, I was able to twist and turn, then walk with a far less achy body.

I'll try another session tonight to keep the recovery ball rolling.

As for the race, well I was around 20 seconds slower than last year (see previous blog post). The first non-progressive race run I've had in a fair while although considering the build up, conditions and physical state before hand, I'll take that as an ok run.

As per usual, I went off too fast at 6 min miling pace, pulled back after mile one to 6.30's and then tried to hold this for what would have been a tidy sub 1.25 run.

Warning signs sparked up at mile 3 as a 6.45 turned into another 6.45 which I initially put down to the hilly first few miles and the headwind. Surely things would improve on the homeward run-in?

The hips and back were feeling heavy by mile 7 and although i was still just about on target, it felt a real struggle and i was losing form. Ian Evans then came up from behind and took my scalp as he flew past. I initially held on to his coat tails but upon hitting the 'bog', he sped away. I later learned that this was an attack and looking back, that makes me feel a little better. I thought I had hit a wall at the time!

As Ian bridged to the guys in 6th & 7th place up ahead, my new target was to keep at 6.30's to try and maintain a PB pace and at the same time, keep some nifty chasers at bay.

As I lost the will to live after 3 miles of straight line old railway track, I was gaining a tad on a lad up front, but then I thought saw Ian Evans running back towards me...I soon realised that I was hallucinating. I'm sure they used Cors Caron in the 1960's Spaghetti Westerns?

With two miles to go, the course takes you back onto the road and I've never been so glad to see some tarmac. The hips were rioting at this point, not a sensation I've had to deal with previously, hence the Yoga, but I somehow held on to hold pace and sneak in under 1.27. Not ideal but two months of sleepless nights with the baby and some  weeks of heavy(ish) training miles might well be the reason for that so I'm not too worried about the  lack of progress just yet. Then again it could just be plain old age??