Finished?

So I've done it. It's over. Yesterday I ran 13.1 miles (well 13.3 but more on that later) for Rainbows Childrens Hospice. A massive thank you to everyone that has sponsored me - it's not too late to do so if you've got a spare £1 or two, you can use this link.

I was nervous yesterday morning, I woke up much earlier than the alarm and lay there thinking of miles and hills. At breakfast, where I was very pleased to find the hotel had porridge, Flino & I discovered we'd both dreamt of trying to get through a tunnel but things kept blocking our way - weird anxiety dreams!

We'd booked shuttle bus tickets to the start of the race so had to leave the hotel at 7.50am. This got us to the start area far too early so we had a wander round, covered up in some Asics foil blankets that were being given away.

Nerves are strange things, I couldn't stop yawning and had to go for a wee about 5 times. Why, at events where there are portaloos do us British only form 3 orderly queues outside a row of about 15 portaloos? Why don't we queue outside each one - surely that would make the whole process quicker? Or at least seem quicker.

It was soon time to get to our allotted start 'pens'. There were huge screens between the pens so we could see the start of the wheelchair race and the elite athetes. When they showed the Elite Mens start line I was proud to see my brother's friend Jon Gilby!  He finished 32nd in an amazing time of 1hr 7mins 36seconds ( I was at around 6.5 miles then!).

Once the gun had gone off it took us about 12 minutes to actually cross the starting line. The race has to start on a motorway as it's the only 'space' big enough for 50,000 runners.

The first few miles seemed to fly by despite the rain and I was surprised how quickly we got to 6 miles. I was feeling good and the supporters, bands and other runners served as a great distraction. It was at about 10 miles that I started to feel the pain. My legs hurt, the course started to incline and I could feel myself starting to panic. I think if it hadn't been for Flino motivating me I would have stopped to walk. But I didn't stop, I reached the 12 mile marker and could see the sea where I knew the finish line was.

The last mile is all downhill which on paper sounds great but in reality hurts your knees! There were so many supporters on the sidelines, the noise was incredible. Those 1600 metres lasted a lifetime and I admit that I cried for most them. I managed a very pathetic spint over the finish line and thought I was going to throw up.

So these were my splits:
Mile 1 - 9.12
Mile 2 - 9.45
Mile 3 - 9.51
Mile 4 - 9.52
Mile 5 - 9.55
Mile 6 - 9.34
Mile 7 - 9.29
Mile 8 - 9.39
Mile 9 - 10.10
Mile 10 - 9.57
Mile 11 - 10.23
Mile 12 - 9.36
Mile 13 - 9.49 *and a bit

Final time 2.09.47
My watch clocked me at 2.08.13 at 13.2 miles but that was before the official finish.

If I hadn't been such a drama queen I probably could have finished a minute or two quicker!!

We got our finishers goodie bag, put the t-shirts on and then went to meet the other Derwent Runners at the Rainbows tent in the Charity Village. A lovely woman from Rainbows gave me a cup of tea which made me very happy. It was great to see the other Hoops and find out how they'd got on. We'd all done well especially Matt who had done a new PB of 1.18! Brilliant.

So that was it. Finished, training done, half marathon in under 2hrs 10minutes, goal acheived.

I couldn't have done without help & support from a lot of people  - Flino who puts up with the majority of my moaning & whittling, Rob for writing my training plan, Rachel & Lee for looking after Frank and the Hoops - Matt, Suse, Carolyn, Adel, Bee, Rachel, Matt B. Also thanks to everyone that sent me a message before or after the race yesterday, I've got such lovely lovely friends & family.

I'm at home today, my legs hurt but I'm feeling pretty pleased with myself. And thinking about how I can get to run under 2 hours.....

Pre race nerves....

So it's Saturday night, almost 9pm and I'm sat in a hotel room near the Metro Centre. My number is pinned to my vest, my watch is charged up, I've eaten noodles & chicken for dinner and I've been drinking lots of water all day. 

I've done every training session that was on The Plan. Every mile that Rob planned for me, I've ran. I've stayed in when my friends were going out, I didn't drink alcohol for a month & my jeans are definitely feeling bigger.

I've done everything I can to prepare which is more than I can say for any other race I've ever done (about 5 in total!). All in all I'm pretty excited about the 13.1 miles ahead of me tomorrow. Let's see how I feel at the end...

Strong is the new skinny...

Usually on a weekend morning you might find me reading the papers, having a coffee or sleeping in. 10 years ago on a Sunday morning at this time I would have just got in from a night out. This morning I was in the garden with Frank at 6am and yesterday I had run 11 miles by 10am! I hate admitting it but I think I'm almost a grown up now.....

So, 11 miles. I got up at 6.30, ate some scrambled egg on toast as we'd run out of porridge, drank some water, mopped the floor a few a more times after Frank and eventually got out of the door just in time to meet Adele, Sues & Carolyn at Darley Park.

The route was  - Darley, Allestree, Duffield, Milford, Makney, Little Eaton, Darley. There were a couple of good hills thrown in as well. I hate hills. Rob explained to me last night this was all to do with my threshold levels. Basically, I've not been running enough miles for long enough so whenever I have to exert extra effort i.e. a hill, my legs & the rest of my body have to slow down. That's the non scientific answer anyway.

Running with other people definitely made the time pass quicker, even though we weren't doing much talking. I felt fine until we got to the last bit through Little Eaton and then I had to rely on some motivation from Carolyn and Suse to get me up Ford Lane hill.

These were my splits:
Mile 1 10.30
Mile 2 10.26
Mile 3 9.56
Mile 4 10.10
Mile 5 10.12
Mile 6 10.06
Mile 7 9.58
Mile 8 10.01
Mile 9 10.16
Mile 10 11.07 *Ford Lane hill
Mile 11 10.37

Overall average pace was 10.17, total time 1.53 and the best bit, 1306 calories burnt.

When I finished running I walked (well in a fashion) down Broadway to get home. In 2 weeks time I have to run 2 more miles but 2 weeks ago I had only run 9 miles so I know I can do it. I think, being realistic, my target time of 2 hours is possibly not going to happen given that would mean me running at 9.07 pace for the full 13 miles. 2 hours 10 mins is more likely. Flino is going to run with me so I can be sure of running even splits - he's the human metronome.

This week coming is the last, possibly hardest so far, full week of training:

Monday 35 minutes at 9.45
Tuesday 2 x 4 miles at 9 min mile pace with 5 mins recovery
Thursday 5 x 3 mins at 8 min mile pace with 90 seconds walk recovery
Saturday 2 hour run

I've been finding inspiration recently from this blog. Strong is the new skinny. We all need healthy, positive role models, not famous for fifteen minutes fakers. Like my Gran used to say "It's nice to be important but it's more important to be nice". 

The whole point of this run is to raise money for Rainbows. The hospice is the only one of its kind in the East Midlands, it offers valuable support for life limited children and their families. So for anyone that is reading this you can sponsor me here. I'm sure you'll agree it's a very worthy cause.