In complete contrast to last year's wake up call of torrential rain on the morning of this race, it was hot and sunny when I got out of bed this morning!
Drove up to Horndon-on-the-Hill and met Sam, Andy and Rich - the temperature was 26 by just after 10 according to the car! We had a little wander through the village, saw Steve M who had cycled up to support and also Keith and Bosco who were running.
With about 20 minutes to go we headed towards the start line where I really realised how far I had come in a year. Last year, I was the only runner I knew and waa stressing so much at seeing the serious runners doing their complicated looking warm ups and sprinting up and down. I was almost in tears worrying about if I would make it/get injured/be last until Megan from Bosh rescued me.
Fast forward 12 months ... I was a bit sore after 29 consecutive days running and 125 miles but I was relaxed. I wasn't going to get a great time, but it didn't matter. I could do this, and with good friends.
(Andy and Rich warm up ....)
As we went through the start, I realised how many more runners there were than last year, the main road was really congested and quite claustrophobic. We headed down the hill to the turnaround point and had settled into a really good pace ... Looked like we may be able to get Sam a PB. I had got too optimistic, too soon, heading back up the hill, Sam started to get pain in her calf so we stopped for a few seconds to rest/stretch. We continued to run/walk up the hill and then managed to get back running again.
We went back along the main road, past the start again then turned into a residential area. The atmosphere around the course was brilliant. Lots of people were outside their houses cheering us on, children were high fiveing but my absolute favourite were the many people who had their hoses on. Even after just a mile or so we were struggling with the heat so these showers were very gratefully received although my number did disintegrate a bit. I was very glad I had decided against wearing my (white!) CATS challenge shirt!
The next section of the run was 2 loops of a kind of country path section - this was quite nice as there was some shade but I'd forgotten about this smaller hill. Good thing Scotty didn't come, he'd not have been impressed!
We continued alternating little walk sections with running over the rest of the course, especially after we reached the final just over a mile of farm track. This bit was very uneven and in direct sunlight at midday with no water stations or shade so it was tough going. Many other runners had the same kind of strategy going on so it was lots of overtaking people then being overtaken by them - we chatted to some nice people, all of who were quite a bit slower than when they did it last year which made me feel better.
After the track it was back onto the main road to the finish line halfway up the big hill we ran up at the start. We got a bit quicker, hoping to end well but I lost my temper a bit when there was a car in the way of the funnel to the finish line, could have done without having to slow down to squeeze past a moving car!
We made it in 78 minutes. Not a time to be proud of you might think, but I am. I know Sam was worried about slowing me down but I wouldn't have been much faster alone and time isn't everything in every race. Today was about getting around - we started together, we finished together :
The boys did great too, 51 and 53 minutes for Andy and Rich, an hour for Keith, (same as I did last year) and 49 for Bosco!
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