From my point of view it does not feel like I have done anything special from the beginning of September just slowly built up the milage 30, 40 50 miles per week but nothing higher and not a lot of specific speed work only some sessions here and there.
It was then somewhat satisfying to get the first Kent League Cross Country of to a start with a solid 41st place, probably somewhere around where I was hoping to finish, and ended as 5th Vet home.
The following week was the Givaudan 10km in Ashford including the BMAF & SCVAC championships, I had hoped to train hard up to this and look for a good performance, but as it was I went into it hoping for somewhere around 36:30. Well the end result was some quite unexpected and I really don't knowhow I pulled it out of the bag, finished 15th overall and was Silver medallist in BMAF championship and Gold medallist in SCVAC championship, beating a few of the guys that were in front of me a week before in the cross country. The time 35:05!!!!!! phenomenal I think probably it was due to being a championship race the quality of the field was a little better and therefore I was actually racing other runners rather than just running a time trial on my own.
Two more weeks of about 50 miles each and we came to last weekend which was going to be a tough double header of Kent League Cross Country on the Saturday and Great South Run on the Sunday. Hadn't really thought about the clash when I had booked the GSR. But as I love the Cross Countries I didn't want to miss it and I wanted to well in the individual league over the season. Saturday had turned very cold after the mild weather we were accustomed to and after some overnight rain the course was very soft and greasy. As the race started I forgot all about the 10 miler the following day and got straight into the race, wasn't feeling too bad and got a good start and was just behind Barry Royden, was expecting him to slowly pull away from me but he didn't so we battled our way around two and a half of the three and a half lap race, nip and tuck but at the beginning of the last lap I really tried to put some effort in and pulled away. The ground was very soft and the long uphill sections were quite exhausting, but at the top of each hill there was a down hill so pace picked up straight away, tried to keep strong right to the finish and was rewarded with a 31st position (10 places higher than last time) and 3rd Vet home. Overall now after two races in the league standing 19th in Senior Individual and 2nd in Vets.Now looking forward to a good season of cross country running.
Sunday 28 October - Great South Run. travelled down to Portsmouth on Sunday morning with Lucy Rona & Steve leaving home at about 06:00. Got to the outskirts of Portsmouth at about 08:30 and got the train into Southsea and met Tim & Angela. Then we had about a 20 min walk to the start.
My right heel seemed somewhat painful since yesterdays cross country but the more I walked on it the easier it got. There were a lot of people around the start area as 25000 had entered the race and it was still very cold and there was some very light rain. After changing and warming up we got into our relevant start areas, I was lucky I had a good club runners place and was right behind the elite start. In the few minutes before the start, the TV crew (Channel 5) were interviewing Sally Gunnell And Iwan Thomas and on the start line I was standing right next to Iwan (reason being I thought he would be easy to spot on the telly!!!!!). Anyway got away cleanly and running fairly well, at about 2 miles I could feel my quads and thought it must be from yesterdays run but still tried to push on as much as I could and try and use the runners around me to do this. At approx 4 miles saw Tim heading the other way down the dual carriage way I had previously come along before doubling back, soon I was at five miles and back on Southsea sea front, quick look at the watch showed 29:04 through 5 miles and 36:30 through 10km. Really concentrating and trying to keep the miles under 6 m/m and wind was behind us up to 8 miles, then we turned onto the sea front into a head wind for the last two miles home, this was very tough and I was beginning to feel yesterdays race now but stuck in and tried to keep with two guys that came up on my shoulder letting them passed and then tucking in behind to try and get out of the wind. Then saw signs for 800m to go and tried to move up a gear and two of us broke away from the third guy and with 200m tried to put in a sprint but could not quite catch the guy in front and finished in 74th place in 59:15, missed my target by 15 seconds but when I set it I didn't realised I would be racing cross country the day before. So all in all very satisfied: 5km splits were
5km = 00:17:59 10km = 00:36:30 15km = 00:55:09
= 00:17:59 =00:18:31 = 00:18:39
Also 1st Place in Vets Age Group Category (45-49)
Tim , Steve, Angela & Lucy all got fantastic new PB's, and my cousin Vanessa was commentating at the finish line so got a big shout out from her over the PA system.
Rona had taken part in the Elite Ladies race and was enjoying the hospitality when we called her, she managed to get us into the hospitality tent as her guests so we all enjoyed hot shepherds pie, raspberry roulade and coffee as well as seeing the winners interviewed and then getting our photos taken with Kelly Holmes and Jo Pavey!!!!
