Ham Running

I knew that the weather was going to be a significant player in the Rock And Roll Edinburgh Half Marathon 2013 when the noise of bins being blown around the street made it hard to sleep the night before.  Inevitably, I managed to drop off to sleep just a few seconds before it was time to wake up again!

Princes St – view from the bus

The race was scheduled to start at 0920, and train times were such that I wasn’t sure I could make it on time. So instead, I followed a friend’s suggestion to drive to Edinburgh Airport and get the Airlink bus into the town centre.  I parked in the Short Term car park at the airport, which made the day rather pricey – it was £16.90 for a half-day of parking.  I did not notice whether this bus stops at the “park and ride” car park near the airport, but the price was the only complaint – everything else went smoothly.

Before boarding the bus, I popped into the terminal building for a quick pee.  It was quite fun to walk around in full running gear and see the looks you got.  Some time I definitely want to fly in an “unallocated seating” flight dressed in a bright vest and running tights.  Bet the seat beside mine is the last to be filled 🙂

Runners heading towards Holyrood Park

Onwards into the town centre, and the weather was miserable.  The bus made good time to Waverley, and I got out.  My geography of Edinburgh town centre isn’t great, but there were enough runners to follow that I got to the park pretty easily.  Plus a large collection of folk dressed as Elvis…

The start area was being continually lashed with strong wind and cold rain, and so most folk ended up trying to huddle behind things.  Things like buildings, walls, tents, etc.  We ended up being much more spread-out than the organisers had planned, and so we had difficulty hearing the PA system.  Suddenly word spread that it was five minutes to go, and we were to assemble at the starting line.  I stuffed my gear into my bag, wrapped the thoughtfully-provided cable tie around the counterfoil part of my race number, and joined the bag check queue.  As I did, a lovely rainbow showed over the Queen’s house.  The queue disspated, I dropped my bag, and went to the start area.

Honestly – not waiting for a pee!  Just standing in the rain!

The start area was a funnel enforced by crush barriers at the sides.  There were flags to indicate the different corrals, but there seemed to be only one entrace, with everyone pushing to get it.  It was hard to make your way to your own corral, so most people ended up huddled wherever they could get in.  And when I say “huddled”, it’s not that far off the mark.  Normally, there is plenty of space at a start and space between folk… this time I reckon that people were standing as close together as they could for warmth!

In the starting area, I noticed a few people wearing yellow patches with “1:45” on them.  I asked what that was about, and was told it was to identify the pace group they were in.  There was a gentleman with bright yellow balloon tied to his waist – he was the pacer.

Just before the start

The race started, and we ran out of the park and headed downhill and generally north-east.  It was lovely – the sun even came out.  Just after mile three we hit the waterside, and had a lovely run along the river.  I had left the 1:45 pacer behind, frustrated by his slow pace.  I was running fluidly and easily, and I was invincible!  The race was extremely well-organised and marshalled, with water, energy drinks and gels available at various points of the course.

Just before mile 5, we turned away from the waterfront and started going round the houses a bit as we made our way towards Duddingston.  That was uphill and into a bit of a headwind, and suddenly I wasn’t quite so invincible any more.  From 4.5 to 7.5 was uninterrupted uphill, and the stretch at the back of Arthur’s Seat – uphill and with a strong headwind – was misery.  The 1:45 pace man passed me, and I was ready to throw in the towel.  I was thinking of nine minute miles, or maybe ten, or maybe just walking for a little while!

Bag reclaim queue

We turned a corner in the park and had a full half mile of downhill.  It was glorious!  At the bottom of the hill, a glance to the right showed the finishing line – but there were still four and a half miles to go!

We climbed up to the Cowgate and continued through the Grassmarket, before cutting south and running along Melville Drive and through The Meadows.  Then we turned into Buccleuch Street, Lothian Street and the George IV Bridge.  This brought us to the top of the Mound, and it was pretty much all downhill from here on.  Through Princes St Gardens, right down the side of Waverley Station, along Market St and then joining the Canongate.  Down, down and down to Holyrood Park and that glorious finish line!

My friend Suzanne at the finish!

After the finish, there were various people handing out water, medals, fruit and bananas.

Sadly, that was the point at which problems started.  The weather had badly affected the planning, and I could see teams of workers hammering in massive tent pegs to hold down the marquees.  The baggage check tent had to have its frontage shut down because of the wind, and so the volunteers getting bags from the tent had to go all the way round to the back of the tent to get them.  Everything slowed down, in spite of the valiant efforts of the volunteers.  I had to wait over fifty minutes to get my bag – to be fair to the organisers, they did have people coming round giving out foil blankets, and that made a huge difference.  The weather had closed in again, and it was cold and wet.  There were a lot of grumpy runners.

I feel sorry for the organisers here; you plan for a certain level of disruption but this was

beyond what they expected.  There is scope for improvement, I am sure they will try to get these problems resolved in future years.

Race bling!

The times were posted in the later part of the afternoon – I was delighted to have completed in 1:45:18.  Not my PB, but my second-best time.  And in these conditions, I was delighted!  The bling was nice too – a big, heavy medal and a rather nice t-shirt!

A huge “thank you” to all of the volunteers and helpers who forced themselves to turn up in these awful conditions!

This week seems to have been a week of things not going quite to plan.

My first run was on Tuesday, where I went on my usual workday route, expecting my phone to shout at me to do some parts of the run faster and some parts slower. It was threshold training, and was meant to be 5 x (5+1) (that is, five sets of five minutes at 80% exertion followed by a minute of recovery time).

But for some reason, my phone wasn’t talking to me. It wasn’t that the volume wasn’t turned up, for it counted me in to start, but it just refused to sing out the distances or the threshold intervals. So I ended up with a recovery run… which was actually quite nice!

Thursday saw the Biggart Baillie Giffnock Festival of Running, in which I was down for the 10k. I have already blogged about this here, suffice to say I ran hard, achieved a good time (for me) of 47:45, and came away happy but exhausted in spite of terrible weather.
On Saturday I had planned a parkrun, but when a plea for volunteers went out I opted to help out instead. So I spent a chunk of the morning as Funnel Marshal, followed by a trip to the Stables tearoom for a chat and some coffee.

Then home, and out for my Long Slow Run (I’m going to be otherwise occupied tomorrow). I must have procrastinated for at least two hours before eventually getting out. The weather was more like October than June – strong wind, rain and dark grey sky.
On the run, however, I discovered that it was warmer than I had realised, and my running jacket was much too warm. More importantly, I discovered that I was still knackered after Thursday night.

I got round my twelve-mile route, though I did have to walk for the final thirty or so yards of Wallace Stone Brae. The pace was lower than it should have been, and while I can blame some of that on the wind the truth was that I wasn’t good for much more.

With fortuitous timing, this coming week is going to be something of a cut-back week anyway. I need to travel to Stevenage for work on Thursday; the weekend is going to be spent moving my parents’ caravan around and I’ll have precious little time to manage any running. Maybe a rest will do me some good anyway, I’m feeling pretty tired just now.

1,000 miles in 2012

Good week, with 26 miles being above the weekly average required

18-14 Jun 2012

The Biggart Baillie Giffnock AAC 10k was my first race in my training for the Loch Ness marathon.  Held almost at the summer solstice, the event was far more than a simple 10k.  It was billed as a “Festival Of Running”, the event had a 1k race, a 5k race and a 10k.  It was held in the beautiful Rouken Glen park, and was clearly intended to be a great family event.  I could easily imagine families picnicking in the park, being entertained by the pipe band and proudly watching those family members who were runners running through the park, cheering as they reached the finish line.

The weather as I left the office

Sadly, the weather wasn’t playing along.  At the risk if using a colloquialism, it was… widdling down!  All day, the rain had been falling and it certainly wasn’t letting up as the evening approached.  If anything, it just got heavier and heavier.

I had a bit of a drive from Fife in the East of Scotland over to the south west side of Glasgow, and so was a bit late in arriving.  I wasn’t able to take part in the “aerobic warmup” that had been billed.  Instead, I got to the park and rushed to the pavilion to collect my race number.  Then I dashed back to the car where I changed for the race.  Well, by “changed” I mean that I took off my jacket.  There was no way that my running tights were coming off – I was much too cosy!

Talking of the car, there was ample parking space in the park, something that I much appreciated.

Having pinned my number to my vest with the pins provided by the race organisers, I rushed back to the pavilion for a visit to the gents, then joined the throngs walking to the start.

Scott Sport Photography‘s photo of me

There was a pretty decent turnout (according to the result page, 324 finishers), and we were started by a klaxon.  We ran a loop of paths within the park, back under the “start” arch and then took a different path, which led us out onto the streets.  All this way I realised that I was being swept along far too quickly by the crowd, and I struggled to “screw the nut” a bit and reduce my pace.  For heavens sake, it was 7:45pm – fifteen minutes to wine o’clock – and I was having real trouble getting myself tuned in to running at this time of night.  I think that the aerobic warmup that I missed would really have helped me get into the right frame of mind, but after the first mile or so I began to get my head into the right place.

Mile markers – or rather, kilometre markers – were provided by helium-filled balloons that struggled to stay “up” as the rain tried to push them “down”.  But I must say that I like kilometre markers – they come around so much more quickly than mile markers!

The race continued along roads that had one lane closed off for running.  Soon we turned off Rouken Glen Road and on to Stewarton Road, and at this point the climb started.  Over two miles we climbed about three hundred feet.  During this time, I found I had a reaction I’ve never had before – a gagging in my throat.  I stopped and almost was sick, but then it passed and I was able to run again.

By the time we got to mile four we were at the top of the hill, and we turned on to Ayr Road.  From this point on my pace never dropped below eight minutes / mile, and I was able to enjoy the downhill almost all of the way to the end.

Finally we reached the finish.  As well as the 10k Dri-Fit t-shirt, I was given a 5k t-short because there were some left over from that race.  A banana to help provide some energy, and we were done.  I walked back to the park, shouting encouragement to those approaching the finish line, and drove home for a well-deserved shower.

This was such a lovely event, I do feel sorry for the organisers.  It should have been the wonderful family event I described; the organisation was impeccable, the roads cleared for us to run on and a beautiful park to start and finish in.  But the weather just didn’t play ball.  Shame.

On finding the results, I came in in 47:45, a PB for me for a 10k.  I came in chip position 87 out of 324 finishers.

So, thank you to the organisers – it was a great race.  What a shame the weather let you down.  My thanks also to Scott Sports Photography for allowing me to use the picture above.

GPS track is at http://www.endomondo.com/workouts/65618908

Good grief, I just cannot believe that we’re back into this already!

Falkirk Parkrun In The Rain

Training started badly this week when I missed my Tuesday lunchtime run because a meeting over-ran.  But on Thursday I went for my usual six mile run out to Aberdour and back.  It was meant to be four five-minute threshold sessions with a minute recovery between times, but I misjudged the pace at the start, and blew up a bit.  So I managed three “over threshold” sessions, and an elongated cooldown!

On Saturday at Parkrun, “cool” was the word.  In fact, “Bloomin’ cold” was more appropriate.  And it was wet.  And windy.  So in fact, maybe “miserable” was the summary.  But huge credit and thanks to the organisers and the volunteers, they were there braving the weather and the run went ahead.

Ally Mckay’s photo of me from Parkrun

When I got up in the morning I decided to wear nice cosy running tights over my shorts, and a waterproof jacket over my vest, just to wear until the moments before the start of the run; I would take them off and run in vest and shorts.  Well, I managed to get the jacket off but changed my mind about baring my legs, which stayed cosy, warm and covered!

As for the time, well I forgot my barcode (idiot!), but my Garmin time was 23:49 – which is a touch faster than average, so I was happy!

Today we moved on to my first Long Slow Run of the new session.  This was a route that was one I had done many times before, but with an extra tweak at the end to get the distance up a bit.  Eleven miles, just enough to get me over twenty miles for the week.  And why did I care about my weekly total?  Well…

Which part is towpath, which canal?

1,000 miles in 2012

Apart from the “run a marathon” thing, another challenge that a lot of distance runners seem to set themselves is to run 1,000 miles in a year.  And no, I still don’t quite have the confidence to call myself a distance runner, but it might be worth going for the 1,000 miles.

As of today, I stand at 455.98 miles for the year.  And it’s mid-June.  So I reckon I’m pretty much on-target, and if I manage the distances I’m hoping to achieve in the next few weeks I should be able to get ahead of the game

So, it’s time to reset the statistics, and start the tables afresh:

11-17 Jun 2012

I went out for a run today!

I felt heavy, ungainly and knackered.  And I only ran 2.6 miles!

I drove – yes, I drove – to where the A801 meets the Union Canal, and ran along the canal to the Muiravonside aqeuduct and back.  A grand total of 2.6 miles.  And I felt every pounding, jarring step along the way.

Maybe I’m not fully recovered from the marathon yet.

Actually, the most annoying thing was my right oxter (“oxter” is Scots for “armpit”).  I seem to have rubbed it raw in the marathon; I guess that I keep my arms close to my sides and the skin of my torso and arm rubbing together has caused a series of lesions on my torso, just below my right oxter.

Union Canal Picnic Area

Even a liberal application of Vaseline before I left didn’t help.  It was sore from very early in the run, as the sweat poured into the open wound and my arm continued to rub against my body – I guess I’m going to be wearing short sleeves until it heals up.

There are lots of things going on just now, so I probably ran faster than I should, not really giving this first run the time it needed.  I felt heavy, and as if I was plodding even though I was at times running at better than 8 minutes/mile.

Still, I was able to run, even if I did feel that I was making heavy weather of it.

Now, that was 2.6.  My current training plan has something north of 430 miles on it… just 427.4 to go!

A side note on the Union Canal: it is a contour canal, that is it is built such that it is always the same height above sea level.  So in spite of what GPS says, the towpath doesn’t go up and doesn’t go down – it’s great for running on!

After sixteen weeks and more of preparation, the 27th of May 2012 dawned and it was time for the marathon.

Polmont Station – I wonder where the normal people went?

To say I was nervous would be something of an understatement.  In spite of promises of mist and fog, the sun was splitting the sky as I had my breakfast of Weetabix and Cheerios.  A glass of water, and it was time to go.

Marie drove me to the railway station, and as she dropped me off I wondered if there would be any other runners on the train.  That turned out to be a foolish question – the real question was wheter there were any non-runners on the train!

On the platform, it was quite clear that there were loads of people who were going to Edinburgh to take part in the marathon.  I started chatting with a lady who was also doing her first marathon, and seemed almost as nervous as I was.  She was hoping to meet some friends on the train, but when it arrived we realised that just getting onto the train was going to be challenge enough by itself!

Busy Train

I don’t know how busy the 0750 from Glasgow Queen Street to Edinburgh normally is, but I’ll bet it seldom requires six carriages and is still standing room only by the time it reaches Polmont!

Those who were obviously regular users looked on aghast as their train was filled with people in strange running costumes, talking about gels and race timing, race strategy and just how long a distance of twenty-six point two miles was beginning to look!

On the train, as I chatted to a few others, I realised to my horror that I had left my Garmin at home.  I had left it charging on top of the PC, and it was undoubtedly still there.  Not a great start, but not the end of the world.

The train got into Edinburgh, and we all departed.  I walked towards the starting area, and found the toilet block.  It wasn’t hard to do, you just looked for the queue of several hundred people.  Luckily, I had prepared for this, so I walked back to Waverley station, fished 30p out of my racing bag and paid to use the facilities in the station.  They were busy, but nothing like as busy as the toilets at the start looked!

East end of Princes St

I went back to the bag drop-off area, put my label on my bag and deposited it on one of the trucks that would take the bags to the end.

The next area you came to as you walked towards the start was a kind of preparation area.  There were runners and well-wishers, all wandering around somewhat aimlessly trying to work out what to do next.  People milled around, but already we were very well aware of the heat.  The promised mist was nowhere to be seen, and the hot sun was a harbinger of more to come.

Preparation Area

I walked through this area, up the hill and on to Regents Terrace.

When you sign up to take part in an event like this, the organisers of the race ask you to predict your finish time.  This allows them to put you into a “pen” with others who are expecting a similar time.  The aim is to avoid putting fast runners in with slower ones, and the fast ones having to slow down and force themselves past the plodders.

I had put down a predicted time of 3:50.  This was as a result of my time for the Alloa half marathon (1:44:00).  The Runners World Performance calculator said that I could expect something like a 3:35 marathon time, and so I added something on to that time and submitted it.  It wasn’t until I started running some long runs that I realised how stupidly optimistic that was… but by then it was too late to change it.

The Orange Pen

So I walked past pen after pen of people who had put more realistic predicted times.  They were named after colours, and I must have walked past an entire rainbow before I got to my pen – the orange one.  There were two starting points, but the orange pen was the very front of this start point.  Too late to change anything now, I entered my pen and started listening to the Radio Forth outside broadcast that was being relayed to us all.

We learned that over 12,600 runners were taking part today, that a 72 year old lady was doing her first ever marathon, and that a 101 year old gentleman was taking part in the relay marathon.  And we learned that it was really, really hot.  That latter part wasn’t from the radio!

Soon we were told that the élite runners had started, and we had ten minutes to our start time.  A couple more motivating songs (e.g. Eye Of The Tiger), and we were off!

The Race

We started off running downhill towards Holyrood Park, through the park (it’s very pretty – I’ve never been there before), then towards Leith Links.  I was running very easily here, relying on the once-a-mile shout of pace from Endomondo on my old phone.  Things were going well, and I had to hold myself back as at one point I heard my back pocket telling me I did a mile in 8:20.

Eventually we crested the small rise at Seafield Road and got our first view of the water.  It looked lovely… but there was still none of the promised haar and the temperatures were steadily rising.  Even at the six mile point I saw several runners who looked as if they were going to have to apply loads of after-sun cream when they got home.

There were loads of water stations – every 5km or so – and loos at all of them.  I succumbed at mile nine and went to one, which was the first break in a run of sub nine minute miles.  However, I was able to restart and pick up my former pace.

The support along the way was tremendous, with people lining the streets, cheering us on, shouting our names and encouraging us to keep going.  We went through Musselburgh and Prestonpans, but I began to realise around this time that I was losing pace.  Mile 11 – 8:48.  Mile 12 – 8:55.  Mile 13 – 09:00.

It must have been around mile 14 that a ripple of applause broke out amongst the runners.  As we were running east, the élite runners were passing us, going the other way.  They didn’t even look tired!

I kept going through Cockenzie and Port Seton, but between mile 17 I found myself walking.  I was by no means the first – I had passed people walking since about mile six – but I was still disappointed in myself.  I started back to running, to pass the huge Macmillan cheer point in the grounds of Gosford House, but from this point on I struggled.  I alternately walked and ran, never stopping but not keeping up anything like the pace I had hoped for.

Not that I was the only one walking.  Far from it.  Every time I walked, I recognised about half the people that passed me.  And when I started running, I passed many of them walking too.

As we ran on, the number of people at the roadside being tended to by first aiders was quite alarming.  When we later got to Marie’s car, it told us that the temperature in the shade was 24°C – out on the road it was considerably higher.  Once or twice we were ushered in to the side of the road to allow an ambulance to pass – I hope that everyone was okay.

Having said that, I cannot fault the organisers at all on the level of water available to us.  Every 5km or so, a water station with no shortage of water for us to drink.  Energy gels were widely available too, there were occasional water showers for us to run through, and members of the public were out spraying us down and handing out sugary sweets.

My pocket stopped talking to me after mile twenty, so I have no idea what my actual pace was.  That may be a good thing.  But as we got towards the bigger mile numbers, the periods of running began to get longer.  As we approached the twenty-five mile mark, the crowds were swelling and the noise increasing.  People kept shouting “Keep going, Alan”, and I couldn’t stop.

From somewhere I found the energy to run again, and I was catching people.  I was looking for people in front that I could recognise – a brightly coloured top, or something similar – and I was making them a target. I was catching them.

I heard a shout and someone waved to me.  It was my wife Marie, my kids and my mum cheering me on!  I probably should have spotted them, but I was just focused on getting to the line now.  I caught up with one target, then the next… and then it was a left turn into the finishing straight.  I was really running fast for me, and… I was through!

I had completed 26.2 miles.  Not, perhaps, as I had wanted to, but I had completed it none the less, and in pretty torrid conditions.

Once through, I was given a large bottle of water, I collected my goody bag, found a space on the Astroturf and sat down.  I wasn’t quite sure if I would be able to get back up, but that could be handled later.  I put the electrolyte tablet we were given into my bottle of water, shook it up and drank.  I have no idea what it tasted like!

Soon a steward apologetically asked us to move on, out of the runners finish area into the general reunion area.

Reunion

Finished!

My supporters had come through to the reunion area, so we met up and had a chat and some hugs.  We found a place to sit, and I drank some water that they had brought for me.

I was told that they had been standing for about an hour and a half at the roundabout just near the finish.  The kids had been great, cheering everyone on, shouting out the names they saw on shirts, and doing their best to encourage as many runners as possible.

After a little while, we went to the Macmillan tent. This was an area set up for people who had been raising funds for Macmillan cancer support, and it was really well organised.

Leg massage – heaven!

I took them up on their offer of a leg massage – it was lovely – and also took some of the food and drink they had on offer.  They even had a group of cheerleaders cheering on everyone who came through.  It was somewhere between lovely and embarrassing – but the amount of effort that was being expended on making the runners feel special was clear to see.

We hung around for a while, enjoying the atmosphere, but decided to leave and head for home.  I guess it was here that the only minor “nit” about the organisation came in; it was a walk of over a mile to get the shuttle bus, and the queues for the Edinburgh buses were huge.  But that aside, I have nothing but praise for the organisers of the marathon – everything went smoothly and I had a great time.

Conclusion

Me With My Bling