A busy weekend well done all who ran
On the wise advice of Rose I swapped the flatlands and the cone of Lydd 20 for River Thames, Hampton Court and Kingston Market Sq for a 20 mile pre London test.
With the option of my Sister and her 3 young kids or my Mum, both living close to Kingston and an 8am race start, I took the safest option and left TWells at 5.30am this morning..
Check in was slick as was bag drop.
The course , 2 x 8 mile loops and 4 miles around the town. Pacers were in mins per mile starting at 6.30 mins. I was stuck between the 2 so the plan was to run with the 7 mins per mile and try and push on after 5 miles.
Start from market square down onto the Thames Path 3 miles in Hampton Court is on your right , memories of 3 hour coach trips, jam sandwiches, warm squash and 1 teacher and 2 mums trying to extract 30 kids from the maze.
8 miles in the 6.30 per mile was still in sight , my race plan out of the window
11 miles in Hampton Court again , my thoughts are on Henry VIII’s misdeeds of torture and beheadings, I wondered if he considered adding a 20 mile race to his repatiore, I was starting to hurt.
15 miles in around 70% race distance, which for me, no matter what length of race, is where you make or break it. It’s hurting but there is still a long way to go. Self motivation kicks in, how much do you want it , don’t be shit, do you want your Strava splits to look like a side view of Niagara Falls..etc.
2 loops done and into the unknown , the town is getting crowded and the paths are thin,my only gauge is a young guy with a cadence of about 300 steps a minute , we have flip flopped all race. He is 50m ahead, if I hold on to him I know I’ll beat him in the last 2km
2 brutal out and backs along different stretches of the river, and some twists and turns through the town , I pass him with 1 km to go and push on to the finish .
Sub 2.20 goal , 2.18 target, to go sub 2.15 very happy
Overall a great event with 16 mile and 8 mile options
Mens Winner George Grassly 1.46.28
Ladies Winner Steph McCall 2.03.21
Me 46/592 – 55-59 2/28 beaten by an incredible run Paul Cox 2.05.00