30 Harriers took part in the last of the Winter League races in Desford this Sunday past, which was a great turnout given that 10 of our most commited racers were in Ireland running the Connemara half and whole marathons, Graham was running the Manchester marathon (smashing his PB in the process!), Nicki did not run the Sheffield half and many more were taking it easy, tapering for London on Sunday.
After the setbacks suffered by the Winter League, which had two of its six races cancelled due to more stringent safety requirements and – what seems to me at least – poor communication between the organising clubs and the councils in the planning stages, it was great to see an event go ahead as planned. The marshalling left nothing to be desired, the route (along pathways and roads) was well marked and we while all roads had live traffic on them, I personally felt that appropriate measures were taken to make sure it stayed away from the runners who were kept safe at all times.
Harriers on the charge!
Race results can be found here, while Harrier photographs here.
There were two things that struck me most and I take away from the day though. The first was how many runners talked openly about pre-race nerves. Even on an event like this, which – fun though it is – I doubt is the climax to anyone’s season and even amongst runners who had come along for a gentle plod before London next week, quite a few of us admitted that we were feeling quite tense in anticipation and were eager to be going… I wonder why that is and why, even though I suppose we all feel the same before every race, most times we don’t admit to it while on some occassions it becomes the main topic of conversation…
But the main thing is that this blog is doing its job (even if I’m not sure exactly what that is!) and the journey to Athens is slowly but steadily picking up momentum! It transpires that another runner from the club, Karen, has entered the New York marathon (also in November, a week before Athens) and we had a good chat about training, programmes and the possibility of planning our long runs together, closer to the time. Anyone who followed my run2rome will know that consistency when it comes to going for my long runs is certainly not my strong suit in training, so a training partner to make sure you are out of the door when the programme says you should, will be of great benefit!
So, early days still, but it’s good when small pieces of a puzzle start falling into place…
Happy runner! 🙂
Running the Marathon. Again. 