The two weeks training were great with some excellent session from a 22mile run, and the start of my run most loved run session, the BEAST! an 18km off road fartlek session, which lives up to it's name, there is no other session which makes me hurt like this one, but boy does it make you run fast
At the end of those 2weeks training I had the first of my race of the next 3weeks, the Penicuik 10k, which was either going to go really well after some solid training, or was going to be 10k of hell has my legs were so tired. Unfortunately it was the latter, I just had nothing in the tank. At the start of the first climb the lead runners kicked and started to pull away and I just had nothing to give, even when the second group came through I couldn't stick with them either. I ended up running the rest of the race in no mans land and came home in 10th place. Not great, but an easier week should get the legs back for the my trip to Fort William for the trail 1/2 Marathon.
The weekend past saw me make my first trip up to Fort William to take part in the inaugural trail 1/2 marathon. An absolutely beautiful part of the country and one I can't believe I've never been to before now. What a great location to train, great roads for biking, some of the best mountain bike routes in the world and amazing hills to run in. If you've never been up there I highly recommend heading up.
The half marathon was the concluding event of the weekend run by Nofussevents, as Saturday saw hundreds of mountain bikers take on the challenge of 10 under the ben. A big congratulations go out to my good friend Lelsey Ingram who won the solo ladies race with 9 laps, 1 more than any other female an amazing ride, well done dude.
On to my race which would be ran over similar routes to those of the mountain bikers the day before so I was expecting some very muddy trails. The weather thankfully was far kinder to use runners with the sunny shinning and occasional light showers to cool you down make for great conditions for the race.
Not knowing the route or the competition I decided to just go to the front, take up the lead and see what happened. Myself and one other runner (Kenny Riddle) broke away from the Field and ran together for the first few k. On the first climb of the course the other run pushed the pace to test me out, I was able to stay with him to the top of the climb, however as we swung left the trail leveled off a bit but I just wasn't able to keep the pace up and he slowly pulled away from me. From that point on I was left chancing hoping that as the course went on I might be able to pull back some time. Like the Penicuik 10k the previous week I ran the rest of the race in no mans land and just had to focus on running at my own pace and trying to keep pushing on as the course continued to climb, descend and weave it's way through the trees.
I ended the race in second place in 1:21:46hrs, initially I was quite disappointed with my performance in the race, as I wasn't able to keep with Kenny when he pushed on and I really struggled on the final 5k, I just didn't feel like I had the strength in my legs for that course. I think due to the lack of running over winter when I had my shinsplints. When I saw my time however my feelings on the race did change as I was not expecting to cover the course that quickly, I was thinking more like 1:30+hrs due to the terrain. So to finish in 1:21hrs only 4mins off my road 1/2 PB I was very pleased, even more so when I downloaded my Garmin to see we climbed over 1800ft during the race.
Check out the link below from MTbcuts who filmed the race, and well done to no fuss events for organising a great race, it's great to see event organisers triing new things.
http://blip.tv/file/3642941/
