Cold Comfort

Never attempt a marathon if suffering from an illness is the generally held, and wise, view.  However, when you tend to spend your free time with folk who grind them out day in, day out, no matter what their health issues it's easy to forget the impact of being in less than top condition.  This is my excuse for deciding to start the tough Beachy Head marathon despite having a scratchy throat and the vague cloggy-headed feeling of an impending cold.  That and the fact that I'd had to pull out after four miles last year.  Oh, and that it would be my fiftieth of the calendar year which would put me ahead of clubmate Martin's best ever year's total in our unofficial private competition...

A month off long runs and a few fast paced efforts in the meantime had my legs feeling pretty good at the start line.  Despite the  hilly terrain it all felt fine up until mile 18 and I was convinced that I would finish well under five hours, even daring to think about a charge for 4:45.  At this point I met up with Paul, veteran of over 300 marathons including several Beachy Heads, he mentioned that it always seemed like sub-5 was possible at this point but that the remainder of the course was very tough indeed.  He was absolutely correct!

It was during this final phase of continual sharp ascents and descents that my cold began to tell.  During the uphill hikes my head started to spin and chest ache, I was slowing to barely moving in order to allay the light-headedness, and then on the downhill jogs my legs seemed unwilling to pick my feet up off the floor which meant I was stumbling and staggering all over the place.  But I got through it, accepted the sub-5 was gone and jogged through to finish in 5:07, faster than I would have expected a month or so ago but well over what I feel was achievable on the day had all been well.

And that's it for this mammoth year of endurance running, now for a bit of rest and then to commence a proper training plan aiming for a substantial PB in March of next year.  It's been a bit of a slog for most of the year but there have been a number of achievements which I don't ever expect to repeat;

• 100th marathon/ultra (obviously - I can only reach 100 once!)
• 50 marathon/ultras in a calendar year
• 53 marathon/ultras in a 52 week period
• 7 marathons in 7 days

My long term aims now are to eventually get my marathon PB below 3:30 and to ease my way into the world of 100 mile events with a view to completing the Centurion Grand Slam , possibly in 2017.


24th October 2015  Beachy Head   5:07:41    #101