I woke up today feeling great. Which made me feel annoyed because evidently, I didn’t try hard enough yesterday.
Yesterday I ran the Shakespeare Half Marathon in Stratford upon Avon (sidebar: because I didn’t specify which race, I think some people who liked my Facebook post thought I’d run the London Marathon – in 2 hours and 19 minutes. Oh, I wish!!)
I know that doing a half is a big task for some people, but I have got to the stage where I am fairly comfortable running thirteen or so miles. My annoyance was down to the fact that I was four minutes slower than January and this course was less hilly. I had hoped that I was fitter, but as I explained in the last running blog, I didn’t exactly put any systematic work in to get any fitter for this longer run especially in the last month.
I can run thirteen miles, but when I do it in training, it is usually at a relaxed pace for me, around twelve-minute miles. What I was trying to run it in yesterday was around ten-minutes-fifteen-seconds a mile. Definitely more of an effort. However, when I began the race, I felt quite comfortable at my target pace on the first part, and I hoped that the sun which was often peeking out from behind the clouds would stay hidden a little longer.
From around mile seven there was an uphill that lasted a long time. It slowed me down obviously, but when I got to the end, it seemed that my breathing couldn’t quite recover. My legs were a bit tired but could have kept going, if only I could get my breath under control. I kept having to walk more frequently just to calm it down.
Also, in the back of my head, my inner voices started babbling away:
“You’re supposed to be running a marathon later in the year. If you’re finding this half too difficult, how are you going to manage that?”
“You’re not even going up a hill right now, why are you doing all this heavy breathing?”
“That fella in front of you is twice your girth and now taking a fast walk approach, but he’s still faster than what you’re running.”
Inner voices have their place. They can be useful sometimes, as your conscience perhaps, or when they remind you of the thing you forgot last Wednesday. But when they start fat-shaming the man in front of you, and then using him to slap you down, they really have to be blocked out. Easier said than done.
I slogged away, trying to just breathe, stay in the moment and tick off the miles. There were quite a lot of supporters in the back straight. Two days previously Anne and I had walked out to have breakfast in a railway carriage that was now a café called ‘Bobby’s’. It sits on the Stratford Greenway, a lovely long, flat gravel path that used to be a railway line. By the time I ran along it and passed Bobby’s again yesterday, the sun had burnt away all the clouds, and we were cheered by a huge number of people. Not quite the density of the London Marathon crowds but pretty good for a regional race.
The sun was great for the supporters, but not so much for us runners. At least though, I knew we were getting close to the finish. I pitied the poor people running the marathon, who were turning left for another loop of pretty much the whole route again.
The finish line was in the Recreation Ground where I had done Parkrun the day before. I do love the fact that Stratford is so small that virtually everything is walkable from our Premier Inn – a mere eleven minutes from the end. And I really did love seeing so many people cheering us all in along the finish route. It is definitely one of the better supported races, at least on a sunny day.
In the end I averaged just over ten-and-a-half minute miles, with the second part being slower than the first overall. It wasn’t atrocious but I do have a lot to work on in the coming months to be able to do twice that distance. It feels a bit daunting at the moment, but I have managed it before, so I have to believe that I can do it again.
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