If you closed your eyes, took a deep long slow breath in and shut out the hoo-haa and chitter-chatter around, you could almost, just almost feel the heat of the early morning sun on your raised face and dream a little of being somewhere else! Somewhere where the horizon extends for ever, a wilderness and natural beauty bathed in sunshine where wild animals roam, the sound of the sea lapping ...and whoa...WTF, dream over, it's all elbows and jostling on the start line of the Helsby Half.
Mixed opinions when it comes to actual running around last week. The beginning of the week had promise. A plan, culminating in some kind of 'effort' at the Four Villages Half. An important race, the first of the Cheshire Road Race GP, so needed a good team turn out and something reasonable from myself. Then I went away...and things changed somewhat, my plans going 'tits up' so to speak. My packing priority was carry-on luggage and 2 changes of running gear.
And because I'm a man, I forgot about other stuff...clothes, toiletries. Idiot. Anyway, you know how this ends, the only time my stuff came out of the bag was when I was desperately looking for the deodorant I didn't have. And so once again, I've taken my running gear on a lovely trip to Holland. No running then. Better than that, I fell foul to temptations of the red grape. A disappointing wine tasting session resulted in the need to make amends! Regrets?
And so to the Half. Preparation was futile and randomly dependent on hand size. A handful of pasta the night before sat in my belly like an unwelcome friend, while a handful of oats race morning suited me just nicely. Don't know where I'm going with this. The car was full of excuses. Mine is as described, the others about this and that. The question is why are we going to race when none of us have a race in us? I know 6 Celsius is hardly hot, but yes, I too would rather have been in bed.
But if you found yourself in Helsby on Sunday, you'd have to say conditions were pretty much ideal, even if I wasn't. The result, well a 1.28.40. Quite where that came from, I'm not sure. Despite the pact James (first competitive race since London and standing a little too close to me on the start line!) and I made in the car, we failed to stick to our early pace and bolted off like giggling teenagers chasing girls, or Janine to be precise.
James got her, I didn't. Something to do with his compression tights. I had Matt for company, who tracked my every move, wouldn't take a lead when beckoned and breathed heavily down my neck for the whole route. A 3 min PB for him. Glad to have helped. Everyone else did better, but then they'd not had the week I have. Do I wish the week had been different, staying off the red, early nights, eating well...all for a quicker race of maybe a minute or so? In actual fact, no. I had a good run...and a great week.
