Snowdon Marathon - Run Walk Crawl

So many memories from what was my third successive stab at Marathon Eryri, one of the toughest road marathons in Europe.

Usually, to run a road marathon you make a start and plod along at as sensible a pace as possible, taking your brain out along the way for three flattish hours as the legs get heavy and the mind wanders, with nothing much to focus on apart from the competitors around you and the crowds to cheer you on.

The difference with Snowdon? For a start, it's hilly, very hilly. Then there's the scenery, absolutely stunning. Then there's the weather, usually raining, which brings out some more stunning autumn colours from the surrounding landscape. Then there's the surface, which goes from road to track, back to road and finishing with another track and a steep grassy descent towards the finish. You can break the Snowdon marathon down into so many sectors that the miles literally fly by, even when your own body is failing miserable, as mine did during this 2015 edition.

There are also the pockets of crowds at the few villages en-route, and the organisation, which is mainly made up of volunteers which makes for a real sense of community and camaraderie from when you first park up in Llanberis, to when you hobble back to your car many hours later.

For me, I set myself up by ordering a large americano in the cafe opposite race HQ and made my way to my club's resident table which they seem to acquire each year. I was late, and so had to down the double shot drink in time to make the club photo call. As a cappuccino connoisseur, the hit from the heavily caffeinated water based coffee made me feel a tad alert and ready for anything, or so I thought..

Behind Ken at around 6 miles in.

The day was a rainy one, the first rain for 6 weeks after a gloriously dry autumn, but hey ho, it was fairly warm and there was no wind.

I hadn't raced much in August or September, in fact, not at all and so with retrospective regret, i decide to run the Aberystwyth Twin Peaks hill race, just 6 days before Snowdon, to get the engine into gear. The race went well, as well as the notoriously hard Twin Peaks can go, and I came away with a PB. Unfortunately, in the days after the race, my aches and pains were far worse than usual, and I even had a touch of DOMS. The hamstrings were tight and so ice baths and a pro massage were the order of the day. Looking back, the aches stemmed from a triathlon in late September that i hammered myself on, especially the run course which involved two steep descents. I remember feeling great around this time, with some fast splits on training runs being achieved and thinking at the time that i wished the races were earlier.

Two days out from Snowdon, and the legs felt recovered and I felt good as I warmed up before the start. Always a bad sign..
I started near the front of the race, just because seeing a zillion runners ahead of me in a race is always disheartening. The first mile was a tad too fast and so I wound my neck in and tried to settle into a sensible pace but the legs were feeling good.

Mile two was still faster than scheduled. An old steady state pace strategy for me would be to stick at 6.50 minute miles (sub 3 pace on a flat marathon), but having done this race twice previously and having had three strong & fast 20 mile training runs in the lead up, I was up for experiment.

As the story goes, I ran Llanberis pass at what seemed like a normal pace. I had very little knowledge that i was in fact in 30th position out of 2000 odd runners going over the summit, . My club mate Kenny Caulkett came past at the top and informed me of our position. To be with him should have sounded alarm bells, especially when he also told me that eventual 7th place man Dylan Lewis was behind us. 

We chatted for a bit and tumbled down the descent. It was half way down that the first twang of hamstring pain made it's entrance, oddly on the left, my 'good' leg.

I ignored this and ploughed on, knocking out stupidly fast mile splits for me. I'd have said prior to the race that 6.40 would be the fastest pace that I was prepared to go, but as it turned out, there were some 6.11, 6.26's and even a 6.13 at half distance. Despite a toilet stop that Paula Radcliffe would have been proud of (just ask witness, Dyl Lewis), i hit half distance with a half marathon PB. My previous half marathon PB was not fantastic, but it was done at Cardiff, not having via Llanberis pass!

The road inclines once again in Beddgelert, and this part of the course usually catches people out. I'd conked out badly here in 2013 and not done much better in 2014, but today I breezed up the hill, keeping equal distance to Ken, Dyl and Gancho up ahead as we'd all gone through half way within a minute of each other.

It would've been nice to get back to sub 7's after halfway's climb, but as the graph below shows, pace remained ok up until mile 21. Mile 21! That's only 5 miles to go right? If the graph showed heart rate, i pretty much died at 23 miles, which was to be fair, one of the steepest road climbs of any marathon out there. 

My calf's and hamstrings were now unresponsive and i was overusing the glutes and quads, calling on any other muscles that could help. I pretty much walk/jogged/crawled the remaining three miles and the pacing target got hammered as I lost over 60 places to the finish in Llanberis.

My final time was 3.17, which ain't too shabby to be fair, but the target had been a sub 3.10 before my fast start demons got the better of me.  

The next day, i woke up with a bad ankle and pulled calf on the left side, direct results of whatever niggle was caught at the triathlon. Prognosis - it's a scratch wound. Onwards and upwards to the Aber 10k in December before a spring marathon to prepare for. Surely i won't start too fast again, will I? 

A grimace for the camera.

Walking the final descent

The Ystwyth 10

8 year old club 10mile TT record falls 

I went along to help marshal the Ystwyth 10 mile TT recently on the Lovesgrove course which is currently the faster of our two 10 mile distances, based on the then club record time by a member – 21.23 by Dafydd Dylan. That night, the record fell to Gruff Lewis.

The achievement was not struck on me until the next day when I actually thought about how many riders had ridden that race over the years. A very rough calculation tells me that it's approximately 16 events per year, so to take it back to 1955, that's 960 events in total. For arguments sake we'll round this down to 900 to allow for cancellations for road works and weather. An average turnout, despite a late noughties peak of 40 riders per week, was usually more like 8-10, and so based on 10 rides per week as a conservative estimation, the Ystwyth 10 has been 'time-trialled' at least 9000 times in its 60 year history. 8999 of those rides were slower than Gruff Lewis' ride that evening, some of which were his own attempts since around 2011 when he began to attack the previous record of 21.23, set by Dafydd Dylan, a school friend of Gruff's and also a former semi-pro who set that record in 2007.

The history of the record itself is sketchy before 1987, ironically the year that tri-bars first started to make their way into the sport, via triathlon. It was student Rick Morris, a popular and successful triathlete who broke the record with 22.53. How do I know? I spent three seasons with that time sellotaped to my stem, with splits for various locations on the course to  hit, to try and beat Ricks time. I can remember most of them : Lovesgrove junction (now a roundabout) - 3.55, or anything sub 4 minutes, Capel Bangor village sign (6.55), 5 mile turn (11.30), Capel Bangor sign on return (16.00 ), Lovesgrove roundabout (18.50), Finish (21.53).

The fatal error in my split calculations was that I only planned to match the course record, and so that is exactly what I did, twice, before finally breaking it with 22.46 in 1996. Gruff probably had a similar idea of splits and of course, expected power output these days, in his pursuit of Dafydd.

So Rick's time stood for 9 years, Dafydd's for 8 and mine, well only for one year, as another student, Arwel Davies came along in 1997 and rode what can only be described as 'the perfect 10' one summers night that year. The local scene was strong in 1997. Arwel was a fine tester and road man and still races to this day. Another two students, road racer Simon Owens, a Welsh International at the time, and Daniel Roberts who was possibly the most talented cyclist I had witnessed up to that point were also on the local scene at the time.

These three, coupled with locals like Alastair Rhodes, an international standard duathlete, Meirion Davies and myself, both second cat roadmen at the time meant that chaingangs were tough and thus the time trials became faster. That said, my record wasn't threatened until that night. A calm, non-existent wind, plenty of traffic, a hot but not too hot night and Arwel with his Jeff Bruce TT machine and Spinergy wheels had a flyer to record 21.57. He's knocked me out of the water and then some. He's even broken 22 minutes, something that only four riders have managed in history!

Poor Daniel Roberts. He rode to 22.01 on the same night, albeit after Arwel and so never actually held the record.

A 22 minute time has become a regular occurrence in recent times, none more so than Danny Thorogood, a regular at the time trials since the early 2000's and in a second coming after some rides at the distance during his student days in the 1980's. Both he and Paul Robinson of Felifach ruled the roost during the 2000's until the 'Penweddig' youngsters Dylan, Lewis and Williams came along with their regular forays into the sub 22's.

How long will the new record last? How long will the courses last, with all the new regulations regarding no dead turns and no right hand turns in any new time trial course, it seems Llety's days are numbered, although somehow, it seems to soldier on!

 

Ynys Mon Hanner / Anglesey Half Marathon

The first race of 2015 and the first since the birth of yet another daughter. I say yet another, it's only two in total with the new arrival meaning, inevitably that since 29th December, running has taken a major back seat.

I entered this race as its on the outlaws doorstep. I say entered but I actually forgot. Maybe we think about races so much that we assume we've entered them and then after this self assurance, we spend the next few weeks training in the belief that we are about to pin a number on.

After 'booking' the weekend and driving the family north, I luckily decided to log on to the race website and for some reason, checked the 'am i in' page, mainly to see if any other Aber AC runners were coming. To my horror, my name didn't appear under C for Blimey Charley...

Panic set in but I calmed enough to send an email, leave an answer message to which none were replied to on the eve of the race. There was absolutely no entry on the day permitted and so I had to make a decision. Did I admit the error to the family or plod on and see if I could wing an entry. I decided on the latter and parked up in a grassy layby near the HQ and pleaded ignorance that I had definately entered online and couldn't understand why i wasn't showing on the entry list. This was all played out just 40 minutes before start time.

To be fair, the staff were great, and I was convinced that I'd spent a lazy Sunday morning entering on my phone a few weeks prior. They soon sorted me a number, T-Shirt and numerous freebies and I was on the way to the start line on Menai Bridge.

With a poor number of miles in the legs, i decided to go for a 6.30 pacing which would give a 1.26 time. Having done the race in 2014, i now respected it as a hilly, windy half marathon rather than one that a PB could be achieved on. I was just happy to be there.

The start was very picturesque, going over the famous bridge and onto the island of Anglesey on an out and back course along the Menai straights from Menai Bridge to Beaumaris and back.

Having done the race and crashing/burning in 2014, i now knew the hills and windy sections that would knock the stuffing out of all but the toughest of runners. I spotted Lauren on the start line and after her narrow victory over me at the Aber 10k, i wandered if revenge could be gained today?

The gun sounded and a mass of runners headed off on the largely downhill first mile. A zillion runners seemed to be ahead of me but i was running to pace and so didn't worry too much about this. As mile two and three came along, i felt a bit rough due to that lack of a run in the three days leading up to the race. At one point, I felt that it wasn't my day and decided to look for a place to stop, such was the lactic acid build up in the legs...!

As the course flattened out at around 5 miles, my legs came to and I was still hitting target pace and feeling better, decided to plow on.

Miles 6-9 were my best of the race. Despite the hills in these miles, and the turn into a block headwind, I'd passed numerous runners and was catching a group of Eryri Harriers, running a negative split. Maybe Lauren was in among them?

Unfortunately my lack of miles meant that by mile 10, i slowed a tad as we hit the climb out of Beaumaris. I didn't crack, but i was no longer gaining on group Eryri and footsteps behind were becoming louder.

The last three miles were tough but I knew that i was on a good time and at the line I scraped in under 1.27 (despite what the clock says in the picture!), for an improvement of over three minutes on 2014.

Happy with that, i chatted to Lauren at the finish to find that she had 1.23'd to which she wasn't very happy with!

I was very happy that despite a slow start to the year, I'd still improved and it gave some hope for the rest of the year.

I now await the clocks to change so that late evening runs do not seem so depressing!

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?!