Training is going fairly well for the Liverpool RnR half marathon. Saying that, I’ve missed my long run this week because of the heat and the possibility of getting a cold! Typical, once again. I was popping vitamin C like happy pills in hope that it would keep off the cold until after the race day. To which, it was successful, and in all honesty I’m just a bit blocked as a write this. So fingers cross the cold crisis has been averted.
After everyone saying it was going to get hot again. I took it upon myself to check the weather the week before. First look- it was 20 degrees. After a hot Saturday I seen it had changed and was supposedly going to get as high as 22-23 degrees. My heart dropped. I had a start time of 11:15. One of the last waves to be sent on their way, to top it off, it looked like It was going to be 19 before I’d even started.
I cannot cope with running in the heat. It is my pet hate. But I love this event. I just had to try and sustain my hydration and energy levels. I didn’t eat breakfast for fear of a dodgy stomach. Probably not one of my brightest ideas! Mum woke me at 6 after having Freya in her room for night for a feed. So I was up way before I’d planned. Which didn’t bother me too much.
I knew it was going to be a hot one when at 8:30 I let the Dog out and it was already heating up. Dad came and go me and Freya at 9:20. Yes my Baba was finally coming to a race with me. The journey wasn’t delayed through any traffic and we nabbed a parking space fairly quickly by Aston University. Yey, no cock up yet.
I watched the elite wave go off and just before the Green wave went off, we seen the winner cross the line in a staggering (just over) 29 minutes!! O my Christ, I’m not even half way by that point. Incredible. Wish I was that good at running. I read a post which was pretty funny. It said, “I’m glad I’m only competing against myself, because everyone else it kicking my ass!” Couldn’t have been more relevant to myself. That is why I love running. You challenge your personal goals, it not about winning the entire race.
The time came and went. Before I could say go I was through the barricades, lining up to start. For once I wasn’t hunderds of participants behind and I managed to get to the closest I’ve ever got to start a race which was cool! I wonder if I made on tv?! God knows.
The gun went off and we started. I went off really fast (fast for my current fitness). Stupid! Just because I was so near to the front. The spectators were fab. The first mile wasn’t too bad. But I made another stupid decision to wear shorts. Before pregnancy I could just about cope, my thighs were thin enough to not make them ride up and look like my vagina was eating them! Aha. Yes this happened. The whole of the race I was picking and plucking them out, which was far from attractive and my God I chaffed. I will never do it again. I may just bite the bullet and buy the longer men’s ones. I thought about getting those compression ones. But I don’t like where they cut off just above the knee, the seam causes a tiny fat bulge because they’re fitted Lycra. Nah. No thank you. The first mile went quickly. The sun was beaming down and it took me just over a mile to gain some sort of breathing rhythm.
Luckily most of the first mile and a half was flat, or downhill out of the city centre. Important to note, I also bagged my fasted post pregnancy mile at 9:35. Yey. By 3km the heat was defeating quite a few people, most around me slowed to a brisk walk. From my Garmin data my first walk was 23 minutes in. From there it went to pot. The heat was sweltering. I was sweating like a nun in a brothel. It seemed to have zapped my energy to near zilch.
My second mile was 11:08 not too shabby. From then, my third mile came in at 12.32! Even a fellow runner came past and patted my back, saying that I could do this. By this point my shorts were driving me crazy, they were riding up like Mount Everest! I literally wanted to just take them off and be a streaker! But I savoured the public eye. They didn’t need to see that and I would have definitely have got arrested and wouldn’t get my bling or my entry’s worth.
5km in, I started to ease into it. Even though I was walk/running. I felt a sense of ease or acclimatisation. For this run, I selected the 10k training mode on my Garmin (which I never knew I could do till this point). It was ace. It counted down the miles for me, and gave me an estimated finishing time. Love it. I must admit this was the only thing that kept my optimism up. It was fluttering between 1:16. I honestly put a sub 1:20 finish. Taking into consideration the hot conditions.
My 5k wasnt actually all that disasterous for when I am now. It was 34minutes something. Quite on par to what I’ve been doing when I exceed over 3.1 mile on my training runs. Happy days. Screw you heat.
6km was bliss. The shower was located here after going through Cannon Hill Park. My chafe was at its painfullest. That was the only thing at that point reducing me to a walk, even down hill which really peeved mrbecause of the sheer pain. The support at 6k was immense too. Kids and even adults shooting water guns, families handing out extra water and jelly babies! This is why I love this event. So much community cohesion and a great sense of community belonging.
After this, the chafe subsided somehow (thank fuuuu) and I was freeeeeeee to run/walk better than I did throughout the entire race. I was saddened to see that half a mile from the finish a poor gent had collapsed. I really hope he was okay!
400m from the start I started to see fellow finisher with their newly acquired tech t shirt. I fell in love with the sky blue colour this year. I shuffled back onto Jennens Road and I seen my dad and my stepmom were shouting my name, with my little baba in her pushchair. Prior to this my fiancé stated he was right at the finish line waiting for me to cross. Yes. He finally got to see me race again and I loved it. This made me up so happy to finish. I managed to sprint shuffle! I met up with him briefly. He said he shouted my name and then went onto say that I blanked him! Whoopsy.
I was exceptionally proud to have not collapsed, I stayed hydrated and didn’t expect too much of myself. I finished in a respectable 1:14:18! My personal target had been achieved.
Once again I throughly enjoyed this event and will continue to do it! I absolutely love it. One day, when I’m earning a decent wage. I’m going to try out some of the other Great Runs in different cities to see what they’re like. But for now I will concentrate on my last long run before Liverpool Oo and the Kingsbury Classic 10km tonight! Wow. My first half has come round so fast!!!! :-/.
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