Here come the races

The season is upon us, and as usual, my spring race calendar has morphed from a carefully-designed schedule of well-placed races into a multi-faceted beast of confusion. Here goes:

Next weekend I am taking my first stab at the Tunbridge Wells half marathon. Local to my parents and the town I grew up in, this race is the stage for an almighty smackdown of old schoolfriends. Five of us are training for two different marathons and we are all using the TW half as a tune-up event – and probably a vehicle for extensive side bets. It’s an oldie but a goodie – this is the 30th running – and has an impressive pedigree, associated with Dame Kelly Holmes and this year started by Richard Whitehead. Apparently there are a couple of tricky hills but otherwise an enjoyable course.

Then in April, two days after I get back from a family holiday necessitating long-haul travel, my jetlagged and rum-soaked brain and I will be running the Edinburgh Rock n Roll half marathon – as I understand it a new and improved version of last year’s race.  As with all local races I’ll be out to recce the course beforehand and get a feel for what the event will be like – but I have suspicions that the Rock n Roll brand will make for  a good day out... One of my Wall Run teammates will be joining me too, so there will be a decision-making point probably about 200 yards from the finish line as to whether or not we are racing each other…

Not sure if I’ve mentioned, but I’ve only gone and got a place in the VLM. It’s the week after the Rock n Roll half, which should be fine. Should be. Fine.

A few weeks later it’s back to hillrunning, and I am planning on a first crack at the Dumyat Hill Race in May. Based on a historic bet and starting 30 yards from my office, it would seem ridiculous and foolish to pass up the opportunity to run thousands of feet up a large hill/small mountain and back down again in the space of five miles. I have two goals: 1, don’t break an ankle and 2, finish. I’m less bothered about 2.

The Wall Run. I’ve definitely mentioned this before. It’s in June and it’s really far and you should sponsor me.

As usual, I entered the ballot for the Great North Run this year, but most unusually I actually got  a place! OK, with it being in September I am rather stretching the spring season, but after The Wall it’s the only thing in my calendar at all. This year I think I’m going to wear shoes, and might actually try to run it for a time rather than just plod along soaking up the atmosphere…

Are you racing this year? Have I missed anything that I should really have a crack at ASAP? I am open to suggestions...

Happy racing

Dave

2013 to date: miles run - 141.38, parkruns: 1, miles biked: 3

More drinking, less running (Hadrian's Wall 1/2)

Isle of Wight Festival: mudbath. Olympic torch: extinguished. England vs West Indies ODI: cancelled. Great North Swim: cancelled. Hutton horse trials: cancelled. Flood warnings, gridlocked traffic, landslides and high winds.

And the Hadrian’s Wall Half Marathon? Cancelled.

Yet another Nicholson-Haines Running Adventure gone horribly wrong before it’s even started. We met in Newcastle, Ben having got a train up from London and me having driven down from Edinburgh, when we both received emails confirming that the race was definitely off due to flooding and risky conditions. But we’d cleared a weekend for the purpose of running in border country, and we were bloody well going to do it anyway.

Pod sweet pod

After lunch in Newcastle we drove deep into the countryside, eventually locating Saughy Rigg Farm, where we had booked a rather basic but entirely satisfactory ‘camping pod’. We bumped into some other runners and assumed that they had reached a similar decision to us, but when I mentioned that the race was cancelled they looked horrified and confused. It transpired that they were taking part in Rat Race’s ‘The Wall Run’, a 70 mile ultra spread over two days. Our companions, whom I shall refer to as Action Man, Reluctant Hiker, Captain Moustache and The Lawyer, were running the event as a relay in pairs, still covering a total of 39 miles each over the weekend. They very gently mocked our puny half marathon for being cancelled.

Finding ourselves on a remote farm, with only mocking ultrarunners and each other for company, we decided to do what we came for and went for a run, late-ish on Saturday afternoon. We donned trail and fell shoes and hit the hills for an hour, running the brutal path along the wall. The ascents were exhausting and the descents were suicidal, tripping between rocks, mud, knee-deep puddles, slick grass and leaping (later clambering, later still, hauling ourselves) over stiles. We laughed and wheezed our way alongside the lough, through a forest and into fields full of livestock, generally feeling delighted with ourselves. Just over half an hour in we turned around, and realised the enormous force of the tailwind which had looked after us on the way out. The way home was like running through a river of soup. Cold, wet, driving-rain-flavoured soup. The wind picked up and the rain lashed our poor, unprepared bodies, and we laughed less and wheezed more. We were a little bit relieved not to be racing that afternoon.

Back in the safety of our peculiar little pod, we set about the real business of the trip – a proper catch-up and quite a lot of beers (as soon as we discovered that the farm had a bar). The ultra-runners sat around drinking tea, keeping their hearts and minds clear for their run to Newcastle in the morning. We decided to drink more so that they could enjoy it vicariously. Captain Moustache seemed appreciative but the others were a bit put-out. Reluctant Hiker confided in Ben that he wasn’t really a runner and was terrified of the day ahead – Captain Moustache had bullied him into it. We watched the dismal France vs. Spain match in the bar, which was filling up with a group of loud and slightly deranged women who had walked a marathon along the wall that day. Our race was now the only one of three to be cancelled in the area, and the shortest by half.

Late in the evening another runner, whom we shall call Mr Exhausted, slumped into the bar. He was running the full 70 miles on his own, and had called the farm in a panic earlier in the day. As soon as he bedded down in his tent for the night, he suffered a panic attack of claustrophobia, and had rung around endless B&Bs before being invited to crash on a sofa at Saughy Rigg. As Ben and I put away more drinks and told taller tales, Mr Exhausted looked increasingly, well, exhausted. He had run more than 30 miles that day, having never done more than 22 before. His shut-eye wouldn’t come until the bar had emptied of raucous women, a prospect that looked increasingly distant. Ben and I went to crash out around midnight – Mr Exhausted’s night was still far from over.

The following morning, when we should have been running, we took our hangovers out for a couple of hours’ walk along the wall, in the other direction to the previous day’s run. We met horses, took photos and enjoyed the scenic rain. Later we went to a Roman fort. It was quite a strange day.

Hadrian's Wall fails to keep out a one-man horde of marauding gingers.

The race is being rescheduled for September – and what’s more we discovered that it went ahead on that Sunday anyway, with the 16 runners who hadn’t got the cancellation message or just turned up anyway. We felt a little put out. Fingers crossed I can be back to run it next year (and get something for my entry fee!), but we had a good weekend nonetheless.

More drinks, less running. Who am I to complain?

Happy running

Dave

2012 to date: miles run - 252.3, miles biked - 69.2, metres swum - 2350, races - 3