Today was my first run as a Marathon Runner. After resting for a few days post run I was fine last Saturday morning; a few light sessions on the exercise bike (8k on Monday, 12k on Thursday) convinced me it was time to get my running shoes back on. Down to the usual parkrun of Hove Prom, last seen as the 25th mile of Brighton marathon. Last time I went along there was a slow drudge along helped by the appearance of Kerry and Patrick for a motivational boost - I had to do better this time.
Another notch on the motivation scale was my parkrun times. I hadn't had a PB since March last year, and in that time Kerry has overtaken me with her own PB. This added an extra mildly competitive edge, especially as she turned up today wearing a Swindon shirt! Last night's run prep of a late night at the theatre, together with being clogged up with London air, wasn't ideal preparation - but I didn't want to let that stop me. I'd compiled a special playlist for today, eschewing the backlog of podcasts as I wanted to keep the tempo up.
A nice few chats before the start, with Carly, Claire, Emily and the Swindon pair, before we took up our positions...closer to the start line than usual. A shorter opening speech than I remembered and we were off!
00:00:00 Ennio Morricone - The Ecstasy Of Gold
A swift start, and we quickly got into a steady pace. I hung off Kerry's shoulder to get a good pace going - 5:29 min/km for the first kilometre of five. I spotted Claire not too far ahead of us and briefly wondered if I could overhaul her as well, but focused on keeping Kerry close.
00:03:24 AC/DC - Thunderstruck
Round the first bend, and Kerry had realised I was close behind, content to preserve my energy. The first Km was done and I was feeling good, not bad considering I didn't properly warm up! I kept the top of the i360 in my sights to improve my posture and breathing. A quarter of the run done and I noticed that the frontrunners hadn't reached halfway yet - as the course is two laps, with the start/finish passed the other way as halfway round each lap, it was good to see that they weren't too far ahead. It's demoralising getting lapped!
00:08:16 Motley Crue - Kickstart My Heart
I'd planned this playlist to gradually increase the tempo so as not to blow out an early pace. At 2km I was still hanging off Kerry's shoulder but I noticed she was starting to slow. I decided to take the lead and have her become the hunter, so I motored past her and kept my pace up.
00:13:00 Bruce Springsteen - Born To Run
Just after 13 minutes down, I passed the halfway point. Around two minutes faster than I usually hit this bit, and I was still feeling good. I told myself repeatedly that I had run further than this without slowing to walk during my marathon, and I didn't need to reserve nearly as much energy for the rest of my race, plus I didn't wanna disappoint Bruce! This took me round the 3rd turn of four, and I noted Claire not too far ahead, and Kerry behind.
00:17:29 Guns N' Roses - Welcome To The Jungle
The four kilometre was the toughest, and Kerry noted she saw me starting to wobble. I was regretting my long sleeved undershirt, but some relief came from losing my microfibre technical reflective go-faster headband (£3 from Decathlon) and focusing back on the top of the i360.
00:22:03 Van Halen - Jump
A check of my watch as the song changed and I passed the 4km mark. One more to go, a final turn and I was facing the cooling breeze. This helped and I could see the finishing line in sight! Kerry was behind, Claire too far ahead to catch up. Keeping up with the same pace would see me surpassing my personal best time of 00:29:18. All I had to do was not slow down.
00:26:04 Motley Crue - Kickstart My Heart
Didn't I listen to this already? I put that out of my mind as the course passed under my feet. I steadily advanced towards the line, slowly reeling in the woman in front until a blur of peach out the corner of my right eye. Someone was going for a sprint finish. Well, I wasn't having that and I found an extra burst of energy to keep her behind me, overtake the woman ahead and finish in 252nd position with a new personal best time of 00:27:44!
The post run chats revealed a successful day for a lot of us, with a fair number of new PBs. I was pleased that my marathon hadn't caused any lasting damage, and that a lot of my slower times recently had been fear of getting injured before the marathon - with no such worry this time around I could think positively. I was convinced before the start that I'd beat my previous times and this mental attitude definitely helped.
L-R: Patrick, Emily, Kerry, yours truly, Claire
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