race - AnnaTheApple

May 18, 2015

A parkrun “almost” and a doggie day trip

The mood of a Monday morning couldn’t be more perfectly demonstrated than the current weather of where I am in the South of England: rain and wind. Well, at least the weekend was nice and sunny. It’s not like I could enjoy the weather anyway as I’m at work!

Saturday morning I went to parkrun as normal.

Setting up in the morning

It was lovely and sunny! I tried my best, though my legs were a little heavy from intervals on Thursday and the gym on Friday. I ran quite consistent miles (just under 7min/miles) and as I crossed the line I saw my watch said 20:58. I was really hoping I’d finally broken 21 minutes for that course, but the later results confirmed that I got exactly 21:00. Ahh damn!

Then I rushed back to get a bit of housework done before meeting my lovely friend, Bhuvana, for a walk and lunch in Winchester.

Winchester Cathedral

We decided to bring our dogs along for the outing too as we weren’t planning on going shopping but rather just chatting and walking. She has an adorable bichon frise called Rain.

The weather was lovely, so sunny and bright. As we walked along the river I let Alfie off his lead. He seemed to be looking longingly at the water but after a few stern words avoided it…until I wasn’t looking and he launched straight in! He clearly regretted it immediately as he swum to the edge and scampered out quickly. His legs looked so skinny with his fur flat against them, bless him.

For lunch we stopped in the same place we did the last time we went to Winchester, Cafe Monde.

We sat outside because of the dogs and I ordered the same as last time, Caesar Salad, as it was so tasty. I think it was a little smaller this time though with less toppings. I was a little disappointed.

We also made sure we had some treats for the dogs so they would settle down. It was a lovely lunch, despite the portion size.

Then we looked around some of the castle ruins.

We even attempted a dog selfie, which believe me was no easy feat!!

We had a hunt around for some cake as well – obviously! We stopped into a cafe called Ginger Two. We tagged-teamed with the dogs so we could both pop in a buy some cake to take-away. My Freezer Cake Stock was running low so I wanted to top it up…

The choice was amazing. And they all looked so good! I restrained myself (somewhat) by buying just two slices: a raspberry Victoria sponge on a brownie base (yes there is such a thing apparently!) and a slice of red velvet. Heaven! I’m sure I’ll be back here for a roper afternoon tea soon as the scones were like the size of my head!! It was a very pleasant and peaceful cafe so it definitely has my seal of approval.

In our quest for cake I also found myself a slice of lemon and blueberry in another tea room (I can’t remember the name though) just because…well…I have no rationale! I just love cake – don’t judge me! It was a lovely day out walking and chatting, and Alfie and Rain both got on very well. It was nice to know Alfie was with me rather than waiting at home, not enjoying the sunshine. It also meant we could just get home and chill rather than me then having to go out and walk him as soon as I got back.

I ate a quite random dinner of butter beans, pumpkin puree with cream cheese and loads of random veg (courgette, kale, etc.).

Hmm doesn’t look that appealing but it was delicious!

If you like pumpkin and you’ve never mixed pumpkin puree with cream cheese, it is a SO good. Gives a really thick creamy sauce. I pretty much was limited on what I had in my fridge, hence the randomness!

The next morning was my planned 18 miles. After having such a good run last weekend and enjoying running with the guys at Southampton half I was feeling a bit overwhelmed with the idea of running 18 miles on my own. I can do it but it’s just mentally a harder slog (which I know is good training in itself I suppose).

Many of my club mates were running the Netley 10k race on the Sunday, so earlier in the week I decided to sign up to it and combine it with my own long run. I planned to drive to the race area (it’s the same place as parkrun so very close by), park and then run 12 miles out and back. Then I’d quickly change into my HERC running vest, grab my bag and water and run to the start area where my friend, Karen, would already have kindly picked up my bib (as you had to pick them up on the day).

I wasn’t going to race Netley but I hoped to pick up a bit of speed. I’ll do a recap on the race in another post as this one is getting lengthy and it was a fun (albeit hard) race.

In the end I did 12.5 miles on my own and it went well. Mentally I broke it up into two 6 mile chunks, knowing when I hit the second 6 miles I was on my way back.

As you can see there was one gradual incline that went on for a fair way which I obviously had to do twice. My pace is all over the place despite trying to remain consistent and not go too fast.

(Average 7.47min/miles)

Not sure how a 7.20min/mile snuck in there but I’m pretty sure a downhill was involved!

I did panic a little thinking I wouldn’t I get back in time or I’d be too early. I had planned to arrive 15 minutes before the race began as it was quite a relaxed and small race. I arrived about 10 past but was able to pop to the loo and chat to the guys at my running club.

Thanks Gary Trendell for the photo!

My legs did start to get a little stiff and I was worried they were settling down thinking the running was over now. I drank lots of fluids beforehand as well which was good because it was quite a warm day. I didn’t feel nervous, like I’d normally do before a 10k, as I wasn’t racing. But I did feel tired and mentally had to perk myself up. Then we started heading over…

Sorry another ‘cliff hanger’!

What’s your preference: running with friends or running on your own with music/podcast/nothing? I love running with other people but you’re less in control of pace and distance which I find tough sometimes.

Do you combine races and training?

What’s your favourite breed of dog?

May 13, 2015

Hackney Half Marathon (1:34:30)

In most marathon training plans that I’ve seen you tend to have a half marathon that you target a few weeks before the main even to race. I chose Hackney because it was a big race, it sounded good from recaps and what people have told me, and a few others from my club were going to run it too. And most importantly it was relatively flat.

My training has been going really well and I keep having to pinch myself that this isn’t a dream and that I am indeed successfully training for a marathon and (*TOUCH WOOD*) I haven’t had any set backs (please, running God, spare me!). My speed is coming back too so I wanted to see where I was at in a good half marathon. My PB (1:36:10) was from the Bristol half marathon in 2013 and since then I’ve just had set back after set back (with a few OK-ish races in between – and my marathons of course). But this was IT.

For the lead-up to the race, check out my last post HERE.

Source

The race started on the Hackney Marshes. Mike and Mark (two running club friends) were in a few pens behind Karen (another RC friend) and me. Our wave was the first one so we were pretty much over the line straight away around 9am.

I let Karen zoom off as to try and keep up with her would have been a huge mistake as she had the goal of a sub 1:30. I had a rough plan in my head of what paces I was aiming to hit and had a few goals:

DO NOT GET INJURED. This is not my goal race!
Be somewhere around my PB: I dreamed of anything sub 1:36, but actually would have been happy with 1:37-38.
Enjoy it.

I was near the 1:30 pacer at the start and getting out of the marshes and onto the roads was a little bottlenecked with people. I didn’t mind because this stopped me flying off with abandon. One guy loudly shouted “this isn’t a 1:30 pace is it!” – he said it twice and in a very arrogant obnoxious way. Fella, we’re thirty seconds into the race. CHILL OUT. Obviously I didn’t want to go with the pacer at all so let them fly off while I happily got into my own rhythm.

I had my music on and was feeling good. The sun was beating down but I felt comfortable. There were a couple of inclines at the start but I knew it wasn’t pancake flat from what people said so these weren’t a shock. I was also conscious of the breakfast I’d eaten. I’m not used to eating before running at all and it felt weird to feel that my stomach was full and porridge was jumping around inside. I didn’t feel sick, it just felt odd.

[Side note: I’ve realised it takes me a few miles to get into the groove – maybe this is why I prefer long distances to short distances? parkruns and 5ks feel far too quick for me…perhaps I need a longer warm-up for them?]

I noticed in the first mile there were a couple of people running along the pavements in the other direction with their bibs in their hands. Cutting it a bit fine?! This would hugely stress me out – in fact just seeing their panic was stressing me out!

There were loads of spectators all along the course, some with signs, clappers and Jelly Babies. And loads of kids wanting high-fives (always high five if you can – magic energy boosters!). Everyone really cheered you on as you ran past and it helped having your name printed on your bib, which was a nice touch. There were even people on roofs or hanging out of windows (or eating breakfast by their front door wearing onesies…) and a little corner shop handed out water. There was definitely a very strong community feel. It’s not exactly scenic as you’re running through Hackney town but the people made up for the lack of sights. There were always at least a few spectators everywhere along the course.

There were lots of people running but it never felt crowded for me. There were enough people to keep things interesting but not enough to trip you over or bottle you in. However when there came a point that we could see runners behind us as the course looped it was clear it was a lot more crowded in the two hour plus area, especially around the pacers. But not crazy crowded.

I kept an eye on my watch and the pace felt comfortable. I wondered if I could maintain this pace over 26.2 miles (7:20min/mile roughly). Er no I don’t think so! That made me feel better though as I realised I had so much less to run than a marathon!

I set myself milestones to get to: 10k, 8 miles for my gel and 10 miles for the stadium. I had a few sips of water at most water stations as it was warm and I was conscious of my last weekend’s headache but I didn’t feel thirsty. I had my gel (a High5 one) at mile 8 but on opening it it exploded a little in my hand (there’s a joke there I’m sure…). There was enough in it to still be OK but now my hands were really sticky.

Luckily I saw a drinks station not long after but realised it was Lucozade – not what I needed! And then I saw the volunteers had water in one hand and a Lucozade in the other. This was good but it meant trying to aim for water where someone else wasn’t going for the same and letting the volunteer know what you wanted – bit of a navigation job! But hydration and sticky hands were soon solved!

Everything was going well until mile 10 when I started to feel the occasional stitch. This panicked me as I had visions of having to stop like I did on a training run a few weeks ago (I had to stop four times for an annoying stitch). That would ruin any PB attempt. I stretched out my arms a bit (I looked crazy!) and breathed deeply as this had helped previously. I also took several sips of water and thankfully it disappeared for good. Now was the time I needed to push the pace. Just a parkrun to go (sort of).

We ran through the Olympic Park and we were completely un-shaded from the sun now so it felt very hot. The Olympic Park wasn’t that exciting but it was different and I was now concentrating on keeping my pace up. I knew my pacing had gone well so far but I tried not to think about potential times and what I could achieve so I wouldn’t get too excited or freak out.

Just before 13 miles a man asked me how far we had to go. I looked at my watch and saw it was 12.8 miles…honestly the brain power it took to work out the maths was unreal. I managed to give him a rough answer before apologising for my maths skills. Then suddenly I could see the 13 mile marker and the finish not long after. Time to hammer down.

Manic determination

I saw the clock ticking to almost 1:35 and pushed through to the end. DONE. I looked at my watch and couldn’t believe it! I had PB’ed by 1 minute and 40 seconds!! I was over the moon.

A kind spectator took my photo for me and said well done – I could have burst with happiness at this point!

The photo above is hilarious as I hadn’t seen the man behind. I’m sure he’s OK as his friend doesn’t look too bothered haha!

According to my Garmin I ran an average of 7:14min/mile pace which was around where I was hoping. I didn’t feel like death afterwards either. In fact I felt surprisingly OK and, most importantly, niggle and injury free. Can I get a HALLELEUIGH! The race wasn’t easy but I’d describe it as comfortably tough. My long runs are paying off I think.

I came 762nd out of 10, 268 (40th in my category position)! I’m very chuffed!

Karen sadly didn’t achieve her sub 1:30 but let’s put this into perspective. She ran Southampton Half a few weeks ago and smashed a great time there despite tummy issues and has been a bit full-on with smashing every race she does (she’s like a machine). She’s got it in her for definite as her PB is like mere seconds from sub 1:30. She did the sensibly thing though when mid-way she realised it wasn’t going to happen and decided to enjoy the race instead.

The boys did great too. They ran together and achieved a time of around 1:50. But sadly calf cramp caught Mike out again towards the end. He’s been drinking lots of nuun (“having a nun” he says!), wearing his calf guards and taking magnesium tablets so it’s a little frustrating. He’s going to try doing more race pace long runs now to see if that helps as he doesn’t do any. Finger’s crossed!

Deep concentration – thanks Karen!

And then we checked out the goodie bags…

It was a very good goodie bag! Banana, Bounce snack, Border biscuits, The Dormen raisin mix, nakd bar (yum), Soft & Chew cereal bar, Fruit Snack Nuggets (fruit sweet things), Little Miracles black tea drink, Popchips, squidgy stress ball and a technical T-shirt. I got an extra small and it’s still a little too big as (like most races) they’re made for men. But still a great amount of decent freebies! And the medal is big and chunky.

The 3 mile walk back wasn’t quite as enjoyable as the walk there but it did keep the legs loose. Our hotel had kindly let us check out slightly later so we could shower which was fantastic. And then a 2 hour car journey home (with the obligatory stop at Starbucks!).

Sadly I still had my housework to do but after getting all that guff done and Alfie walked after his return, I sat down and enjoyed this bad boy.

A slice of toffee apple cake from my Freezer Cake store. Some things in life are perhaps not meant to be together, but cake and running most certainly are. I enjoyed every single mouthful.

How do you celebrate an achievement?

How do you stay cool in a warm race?

What’s the best thing you’ve received in a goodie bag?

May 12, 2015October 28, 2016

Hackney mini-break

I am buzzing. I had such a fantastic weekend full of lovely people, good food and my first (non-marathon) PB since 2013. To say I’m pleased is an understatement!

So the weekend started, as normal, with parkrun at Netley Abbey. For the first time in the year we were on the faster course, which is five laps of a cricket pitch. Fairly boring and repetitive but, crucially, flat. It’s called the “marmite course” as you can imagine.

Annoyingly I couldn’t attempt to blast it as I had the Hackney Half Marathon the next day that I needed to save my legs for. However I did go faster than I should have. I remember looking at my watch and seeing 7.30min/mile and thinking it felt comfortable enough that I could chat to Mark, my running club friend who was running with me, but wondering if I maintain it (and faster) for so many more miles? I started to doubt myself a little bit. It was a good run nonetheless (22:25) though it did start raining at the end.

I had such good intentions of getting all my housework done before leaving for Hackney later that day but time just flew away. I got home, showered, breakfasted, picked up a parcel and packed and saw my parents as they picked up Alfie and suddenly it was only an hour from when I was to be picked up by Mike who was driving Karen, Mark (different to the previous Mark) and me to our hotel in Hackney. I hadn’t done any of my normal jobs! This did plague me a little as I hate leaving the house with chores left to do, knowing I’d need to do them the next day post-race…

I’ve never been to Hackney before so it was all very new and strange to me when we got there. I’ve been to London a few times but obviously London is a big place and there are so many different areas. Hackney is very culturally and ethnically diverse. There were so many shops selling food and bits and bobs I’d never heard of. Our hotel wasn’t in the most affluent area so it was a bit of an eye opener to me (I fully admit I live in a middle class bubble – it’s just how I’ve grown up and I know I am very, very lucky).

Despite our hotel (Ibis Style) being very cheap and not being in the safest area, our rooms were lovely. Karen and I were sharing one, and Mark and Mike shared another. They were James Bond themed which was quite cool.

But what does the top right stencil mean??

It was very clean and modern – though it was a little loud in the evening with a few boy racers and police sirens. And most importantly, it wasn’t too far from the race start in Hackney Marshes.

After checking in and dumping our stuff we decided to head to the nearby Westfield shopping centre for a little mosey about the shops and some food. The last time I was there was in 2013 when I did the National Lottery 5 mile run around the Olympic park and Olympic Stadium (also with Karen funnily enough). It felt surreal being back for another race.

It’s massive. So many shops! And shops that aren’t on normal UK high streets either, like Victoria’s Secret, Forever 21, American Eagle…Karen and I were in heaven. The boys not so much 😉 We also depressed ourselves by looking in Nike. So many beautiful things but so expensive. I did get these shorts in Forever 21 though:

I’m really chuffed with them because I found them online last week and really wanted to buy them but didn’t want to pay P&P for just one pair of £12 shorts. They also have a zip at the back which is so handy as my other shorts don’t. I was tempted to wear them for the race the next day but thought it best not trial a new pair of shorts for the first time during a half marathon.

We then found a brilliant restaurant called Cabana Brasil which just sounded right up my street. I was secretly quite glad we weren’t going for the (in my opinion) boring option of just pizza or pasta but it hurt my soul not to be able to order the full rack of ribs. Especially when I saw someone else enjoying them. Major food envy!

Instead I went for nachos with guacamole to start and then a garlic marinating chicken skewer with sweet potato fries for my main – safe food. Although it was all very tasty, I was a bit disappointed with the size of the main, especially as I had to add in the sweet potato fries. For my monster appetite it wasn’t really enough! I couldn’t help but steal some fries from Karen who has a far more lady-like appetite and was feeling full with the same meal.

We all went for pudding though and honestly it rocked my world. The boys had a delicious looking cheesecake, Karen went for a frozen yogurt with toppings and I had a frozen yogurt sundae (with brownie chunks and chocolate sauce).

Frozen yogurt sundae?! Good lord, it was good.

The boys had a cheeky Starbucks before we left and we got to admire the cool London 2012 Olympics display they’d created.

Different Olympic athletes had signed a cup! It was fascinating to read what they wrote and who they were. Admittedly there were a lot from Team USA…what? Americans liking Starbucks coffee – surely not! Hehe 😉

Then we headed back to the hotel and had a master plan meeting for the next day: what time to get up, breakfast, leave, etc. Then we headed to bed. I wasn’t nervous and fell asleep quite easily surprisingly.

But then the stress began when the alarm went off the next morning at 6.20am. Not my alarm, but Karen’s alarm because my phone had decided to turn off and not turn back on at all. PANIC. I went into Full Anna Melt Down. No phone means no contact with anyone (what if I got lost on my own in Hackney!?), no music during the race and no photos. My phone has been playing up recently with the touch pad going crazy and either not working or just randomly typing so I did a full restore on Friday but now I had no idea what was going on.

Mike came to the rescue with his excellent Googling abilities while my dad (on Karen’s phone) calmed me down. I managed to wolf down some instant porridge and a shot of Beet It with a black coffee through my pathetic drama thankfully. I chose not to have the breakfast that came with our rooms as I wasn’t sure they’d have porridge (they didn’t) so I brought my own.

I strangely enjoy the Beet It shots. I love beetroot so maybe that’s it? The shot is very earthy but also sweet with a hint of lemon they add to make it a bit more palatable.

Karen and I made the executive decision to wear crop tops instead of our Hedge End Running Club vests because it was already warm despite not even being 7.30am and the forecast said it would be hot and sunny later. I was quite nervous about wearing a crop top as I’ve never run in one before and I was worried people would think I thought I was some sort of elite or I thought a lot of myself. I was glad Karen was with me as I’m not sure I’d have had the courage to have worn it without her! But honestly it was the best decision I made – I felt very streamlined and cool (temperature wise!) wearing it while running and was grateful to not have a vest flapping about me.

I applied sun tan lotion all over me as I knew I’d burn or risk overheating (despite wearing next to nothing!) and wore a long-sleeved top and leggings to walk down to the start that I could put in my bag for the bag-drop.

Our walk took us along a pretty canal

The walk was about three miles and it helped calm my nerves and loosen us up.

As we got closer we saw more and more runners and began hearing the music. It was all very exciting!

There were loads of food stalls in the race village and I instantly zoned in on the rib stand! I mean, come on, how mean is this?? I can’t have them before and undoubtedly I wouldn’t fancy them afterwards *sighs*.

The place was buzzing with people stretching, warming-up and milling around. We headed straight to the portable loos as we knew they’d get very busy closer to the start (we got there about 45 minutes before the 9am start). Then we peeled our layers off and headed to the bag drop. It was very well organised so no complaints!

We wrote a message on the Brooks chalk board (“Come on Hedgies #HERC”) and had a standard pre-race photo. I still felt very nervous about wearing pretty much nothing but saw quite a few other ladies wearing similar tops so this helped. As did this…

Very amusing!

Karen and I parted ways with the boys so we could visit the loos once more and then go to our pens. The guys were aiming for 1:45-1:50 and Karen was aiming for sub 1:30 (yep, she is that fast) and I was aiming for anywhere near 1:36 (my PB being 1:36:10).

The loo queues were massive and we wouldn’t have had time to queue as our pen was going off first (I say our pen but really I mean Karen’s pen as it was the 1:15-1:30 but we wanted to start together, though, crucially, not run together for my sake!!) Anyway, we decided to find a bush instead and as we went round the back of the loos we saw a lone portable loo sat on a trailer. No one was near it and on closer inspection it looked perfectly fine. What a find, eh! Though it did slightly rock when you were in there as it was on a trailer – we just made sure not to lock the door in case it fell over or something. Could you imagine?!

And then the race happened 😉 I’ll recap that fully in another post. Stay tuned (or something as equally as cheesy…).

Are you calm or stressed on the morning of a race?

What’s your usual go-to pre-race meal? (Breakfast or dinner!)

Have you seen a lot of London?

April 29, 2015April 29, 2015

Southampton Half Marathon recap

Originally I had planned to race this and attempt to come somewhere near my half marathon PB, but after speaking to a few people I realised this probably was going to be harder than I wanted it to be as I didn’t realise quite how undulating the course would be.

So I re-planned what I was going to do. Before the Liverpool marathon in June I want a half marathon that I can let myself go a bit on…but I’d quite like to give myself the opportunity to do well (yes, yes cherry picking courses for PB potential purposes I know). I haven’t actually been able to test myself out on any sort of flat course yet as my local parkrun has a hill you do three times and other runs are either intentionally hilly or are my long slower runs.

I heard about the Hackney Half Marathon (two weeks time) and found it was flat and fast so signed myself up. This meant that I could use the Southampton half as a training run, and with running there I could make it up to 18.5 miles. There would be a time gap between the 5.5 mile run there and the start but as my first 18ish miler I was happy.

I had a High5 Energy Bar after my run there to tide me over and some water with nuun in it. I was also able to put some fresh running clothes on too. I met up with some running club friends and we headed over to watch the 10k start. We cheered them on and then headed to the race village. It was lovely and organised and honestly didn’t feel like the first ever event.

You could pick up your finisher’s technical T-shirt before the race but I decided to leave getting mine until after I had finished as the queue was massive (though this did stress me out a little as I was worried they would run out of Smalls – they didn’t thankfully). There were so many of my running club, Hedge End RC, doing this race that I was just surrounded with red, white and blue vests everywhere which was fantastic. The atmosphere was brilliant as well, but it was COLD.

Eventually we all had to reluctantly peel our layers off and head to the bag drop (nice and well organised). I realised in my bag I handily had my poncho that I’d kept from the Paris marathon (last year!) so while everyone else was donning their black bags I had this huge, quite posh green ponch (with a hood!) to wear. And as we walked to the starting pens I saw someone else had the same poncho so I tapped her on her shoulder and said “snap!”. She smiled and replied “yes but mine is last year’s” and I said “yes mine too!” and we chatted about how much we enjoyed that race which was lovely.

After the standard pre-race selfie with the guys I was going to be running with and hopping around trying to keep warm for a bit we were soon off. I was running with a lovely bunch of running club guys, some of whom were after a PB or was their first half. We’d discussed beforehand a range of paces to stay at and we started nice and relaxed.

In fact, I’ve never run so many miles so easily and with so much enjoyment before on a training run. The miles just flew by! We chatted, we joked, we waved and shouted. It was brilliant! We pushed each other and got pushed on by the brilliant spectators (and swarms of our own club mates who weren’t running).

Not the whole gang, but looking quite focused

We pushed each other on when we got to Itchen Bridge, which was a slow long incline up and down and then back over it again. We enjoyed the scenic (sort of?) sights of the Southampton football club. We encouraged each other up the steep Burgess Road hill. We even sung to Matt Le Tissier (old Southampton football player) whom we caught up with. In fact, we got everyone around him singing and he looked quite pleased (though very knackered).

Photo credit: Stephen McPhillips – thank you!

The support from our club was amazing and from the people of Southampton who came out in droves to support us. OK so Southampton isn’t London or the most scenic of places, but it was an interesting course with lots of variation in terms of sights and elevation. A good number of water and gel stops too.

Sadly though the fun times ended somewhat at mile 10 when Mike experienced some horrible cramp in his calves. He had to slow down and stop a few times to try and alleviate the tightness and pain. It’s happened to him quite a few times during races and he doesn’t know how to prevent it or cure it when it occurs. Any ideas or advice would be appreciated! He’s going to try calf shields while running and taking magnesium tablets to see if that helps.

The others carried on but I stayed with him as my time didn’t matter as I was just looking for the miles on my feet. I just wish I could have helped but there was nothing really I could do but try and take his mind off it and encourage him round. He was on for such a good time which was clearly very frustrating to him. But that being said, he still got a good time despite stopping and slowing down (and the course being hilly!) so he shouldn’t be too disappointed at all.

I don’t regret staying with Mike at all as it would have been awful for him to have suffered alone and if anything keeping the pace slower meant my legs felt really good the next day! I wasn’t as tired as I normally am after a long run as well. My official time was 1:54:58.

As we headed to the finish the crazy thought did cross my mind that I felt I could run home but realised that would be tempting fat far too much. Let’s not get carried away! I did feel very good running though and it’s given me a great confidence boost for the marathon. I just need to survive the coming weeks. I have two more 18 milers, but without a break as I realise having an hour and half between the runs wasn’t a good emulation of a marathon experience!

The medal is quite chunky and hefty and the post race goodie bag was a real drawstring bag with crisps and water…and they tried to give me some weird pink protein drink which I managed to duck away from – looked suspect to me 😉

All in all an absolutely fantastic race. The company I ran with was brilliant and I thoroughly enjoyed myself. I just wish Mike’s calves had behaved so he could have had a better race, but (perhaps selfishly) it showed me that being sensible during a long run in terms of my pace could mean quicker recover for me afterwards. I even did intervals on Tuesday morning they felt that good!

Have you ever done a race as a training run or part of a training run? It’s brilliant. It’s catered, you get a medal and you’re with loads of other runners.

How do you deal with cramp?

What do you like to see in a race goodie bag? Generally I like food, but decent food not a Mars Bar or some sugar-filled drink.

October 1, 2014October 28, 2016

Berlin Marathon 2014

Thank god that’s over. What a weight off my mind! This will probably be quite a long post, so here’s a quick spoiler: I survived, I absolutely loved it and I got a PB.

I’ll do a recap of the Berlin visit and the expo another time, but today I just want to recap the marathon. Cliff notes of the days leading up: Ben and me arrived on Friday (we got the expo done and dusted that afternoon – best time to do it, no queues whatsoever) and my dad arrived late Friday night. On Saturday I did a 3 mile easy run. I wanted to do this run to reassure my brain that everything felt OK. The run went fine and was lovely through the Tiergarten, a huge beautiful park in Berlin. Everything felt perfect and I saw the elite runner Tsegaye Kebede running with his coach – we exchanged “good mornings”!

For dinner I ate a huge tuna and onion pizza and drank a 750ml bottle of sparkling water. I felt good to go.

Just before going to bed I had an Anna Panic. I noticed by bib for the first time had my wave letter on it.

It was ‘H’. I thought I was ‘E’ or ‘F’. ‘H’ was the last wave (4.15 hours plus runners) and I realised I was put here because at the time of applying I didn’t have a marathon time to prove I was able to be in a faster wave. No disrespect to anyone who was in the ‘H’ wave or is a 4.15+ marathoner, but I realised I wouldn’t be around people who were running similar paces to me and also there would be a lot more people in this wave than the other segregated waves. Though I wasn’t aiming for a super fast time, I didn’t want to be held up by (relatively) slower runners. I wanted to run the pace I’d planned, which was faster than a 4.15 hour finish.

Aside from that panic, I was actually able to get to sleep relatively early. My dad was in a different hotel and breakfast wasn’t included in his, but Ben and me had breakfast included in ours. So we decided that my dad would have my hotel breakfast with Ben downstairs while I got ready and ate the breakfast that I’d brought from home in the hotel room. This way Ben and my dad would have had a good meal and I could do my stressing alone 😉

Annoyingly our coffee machine turned out to not work but luckily we still had a kettle so I could make my porridge and have a cup of tea. Unfortunately there was no milk and what I thought was creamer was actually a cappuccino powder thing (hence why my tea in the photo looks disgusting). I still drank it; I needed the caffeine. I had my porridge and a Beet It bar. This was absolutely perfect. Got my go-go beetroot power and my traditional oats!

Then we headed out to walk to the start. It was quite chilly but not too cold and we were only about 15-20 minute walk away. My dad had given me an old jumper that I could toss before the start so I was fine.

So nervous

Then I had to say goodbye to Ben and my dad and go to my allocated wave. I reluctantly headed off to ‘H’. I had about 30 minutes before the start so I found a portable loo and then decided to see if I could change waves. There were marshals standing guard on the wave entrances and checking people’s bibs before they could go through. I headed to ‘F’ and showed the German lady marshal my bib and she shook her head and pointed down the road. I got my phone and desperately showed her my Paris marathon time and said that I should be in this wave. I literally begged her and she sort of wryly looked at me and then quickly pushed me through with a “don’t let anyone know” look. Thank you German lady! You are amazing!

Unfortunately I realised the error I’d made when there were no loos within the pen and I still had 25 minutes to wait. I knew I’d need the loo one more time but to go to the loo meant leaving the pen and then having to get back in again. What a nightmare. I sat down and resided to the fact that I’d have to find a loo when I had started running.

Five minutes before we started the pen got very busy and people were stripping off layers. Suddenly it was very chaotic and the loo queue I could see on the other side of the barriers had gone and a few people were leaping over the barriers for one last wee and then jumping back in, bypassing the marshals completely. Ah ha! I followed suite quickly – hidden by the crowds. I ran to the nearest loo. Dear lord. I wish I could unsee what I saw. I’m not exaggerating when I say there was an actual lump of poo on the seat. A LUMP OF POO. I had to go and just didn’t have time to swap loos. I did my very best hovering technique and thankfully avoided any poo contamination – could you imagine running 26.2 miles with someone else’s poo on you?! That would be pretty horrific.

I jumped back in the ‘F’ wave and was ready to go. I was very pleased (though traumatised) to have successfully mastered that problem.

Miles 0-10

My plan had been to stick to 8.30min/miles for the first 10 miles with no music or podcasts. I felt brilliant, all was going well (as I guess it should so early on). The temperature was perfect. I was running faster than I had planned but I felt good. Ben and my dad would be waiting at 7km so I had that to look forward to and it was fun just to look around and ‘runner watch’ (people watch, but people who are runners). What were people wearing? Running styles? Nationalities? All very interesting. Lots of people were wearing leggings and jackets which I thought was a bit much – it really wasn’t cold at all.

There were quite a lot of spectators (more than Paris, but that’s not saying much) which was great. There were some very busy sections and people had cowbells, shakers and flags. Pretty much from mile 3 I started looking out for Ben and my dad. This kept me entertained. When I saw them it was for literally a few seconds and I was over the moon (see above picture). It really spurred me on and made me so happy.

I really can’t remember much about the course other than it was exceptionally flat. There were a few occasions you’d go over a bridge and it would incline ever so slightly but that was it. I remember seeing the S-bahn (the German metro) go across a bridge above us and people were waving which was a cool experience. Lots of young children wanting high fives as well. I tried to do as many as I could without veering too much around the road. I tried to stick to the blue line as much as possible but it was quite tricky, especially going round corners as everyone made a bee line for the line. It was a crowded course but it didn’t feel packed because the roads were so wide.

The first water station was a nightmare. I didn’t need water so I ran straight through the middle. But the water was in plastic cups. I mean seriously?! Firstly they are the worst things to drink out of when running and secondly when people dropped them it because a minefield of slippery plastic. Each water station was just chaos. I had my first gel at mile 8.

Miles 11-20

When I got to mile 10 I popped on a podcast. I didn’t think I especially needed it but I knew I had to keep my mind occupied. My plan had been to go to 8.20min/miles for these miles but I still felt good and wanted to have a little bit of buffer time as I knew I was running longer than the course. There were no mile markers to be certain but from the km markers I could work it out. At each 5k we ran over a mat and this, I knew, would send my times to the app to anyone who was following. This helped keep me focused. I also had in my mind that Ben and my dad were racing from the 7km spot to the halfway spot.

Just after halfway I saw them and it was once again a nice boost. After seeing them I had my second gel. I continued to feel very good and was chuffed to hit 14 miles – the furthest I’ve run since Paris in April. Unlike Paris I found the miles 14-20 fly by. I even looked at my watch at on point thinking I’d see 15 miles but saw 16. It was crazy. I felt so good.

It started to get very warm as we were running and the sun was right in my eyes for a lot of the first half. Each water station I would dash into and managed to get two or three sips of water before it flew everywhere out of the cup. Luckily there were stations every 5km as I got thirsty very quickly.

Ben rang me and we had a quick conversation. We’d agreed beforehand that he could ring me if he fancied as I had a microphone on my headphones. We thought it would be cool. I wasn’t out of breath so I was able to talk – I was running at a very comfortable pace. But instead of lifting me I found talking to Ben very hard psychologically. I wanted to be with him and my dad, not on my own with so many miles still ahead. It really didn’t boost me at all and I told Ben I couldn’t talk anymore as it was too hard. He understood, bless him. He did tell me though that he’d see me at mile 20-something and to be prepared for a slight incline just before. I took my last gel at mile 18.

Miles 21-to the end

At mile 20 and put my music on. I felt ready to let myself go a bit. Daft Punk ‘Hard Better Faster’ came on and was amazing. I remember looking at the actual time and seeing it was just after 11.30 and realising I would be finished before 12.30ish. This was a good feeling. I just needed to hang on.

My mind was foggy and confused and I couldn’t remember where Ben and said he’d be so I was looking out all the time for him, worried I’d miss them. Then at 23 miles (I think!) I came to a slight incline and suddenly I knew they’d be there! It felt brilliant again to see them and I knew I’d see them again soon. My quads started hurting – not in an injured way, but in a “Jesus I’ve been running for over 3 hours” kind of way. I tried to keep the pace up but it was unbelievably tough.

I may be smiling but I’m in a world of pain

The last ‘real’ mile was the hardest, as you can imagine. I just couldn’t seem to maintain the pace. The finish felt so far away – I knew I still had the 0.2 miles to go and I knew it wouldn’t be just 0.2 miles at all because of all the veering around the course I’d done.

Then Spotify just randomly stopped! Just when I needed its support, it just stopped. I fiddled about with it and finally got it working again which kind of ruined my flow but I needed that music to really push me.

I got through the Brandenburg Gate and saw the finish line about 200m ahead. It was all pain here. But I made it. My official time: 3:36:26.

I can’t tell you how over the moon I am. 5 minutes-ish better than Paris. Having Ben and my dad support me during the race hugely helped. I would be looking forward to seeing them and then boosted when I did see them. It was amazing.

Finished!

What was not so amazing was wandering around like a lost sheep straight after. I was desperately thirsty and just couldn’t see water anywhere. I got a poncho and kept asking everyone where the water was and then finally finding it a fair walk away from the finish. I received my goodie bag (disappointing for a marathon major) and just stumbled along having no idea how to get out or where I was. The only directions I could see were where to pick your bag up but I didn’t need this, I just needed to get out!

Finally Ben and me were able to speak on the phone (signal was terrible as you can imagine) and we agreed to meet outside the Reichstag building where there were letters for meeting points. I was so confused and tired I had no idea where I was and said I’d meet them by ‘S’. I put my poncho on the floor and sat down and just stared into space exhausted.

Dazed and confused on my poncho picnic spot

About half an hour later I saw Ben and my dad who were exasperated with me as I was sat under ‘V’ not ‘S’ (despite me thinking because I could see ‘S’ that was the same thing…). It was so crowded.

Ben and my dad were exhausted too as they’d had to walk over 13 miles to get around the course – and fairly quickly to make sure they saw me! So we were all dragging our feet trying to find a way out. All the roads were blocked so we ended up walking round in circles before eventually finding a way out. We were very tempted to get a taxi but we resolved to walk the 20 or so minutes back. The most painful walk in the world!

My heros

So there we have it. Done and dusted. A worry off my mind. It was bittersweet as I would have loved Ben to have run it too but sadly he wasn’t able. He said he enjoyed watching, especially as he saw a world record happen and a world marathon major is quite a race to see. But I can’t thank him enough for his support and the amount of effort he put in to get around the course. Truly an amazing husband. And I’m very thankful for my dad being there as well, keeping Ben company and walking miles to get to the different spots. It really helped.

Like I said, the goodie bag was disappointing. There was a Powerbar snack bar, a gel, some leaflets, a rubber wrist band and, the best thing by far, an apple. Actually there was a leaflet explaining the different apple varieties which I thought was cool – obviously knew I would be running the marathon 😉 The medal is quite small – almost like a 10k medal and on the back is a picture of Wilson Kipsang “the world record holder”…which he no longer is. But I won’t complain, I’m just happy to have completed it and done so well despite my poor training. Thank you for bearing with me and supporting me!

*Huge sigh of relief*