The Longest Mile

My intention was to write this blog entry last night. Unfortunately I felt so shattered after my exertions during the afternoon that after a hearty dinner and a long soak in the bath I went straight to bed. So here I am one day later, surprisingly free of aches and pains, beginning my report on the Windsor Half Marathon.

I'll start by saying straight out that it didn't go to plan. Nowhere near in fact. The weather let me down. My legs let me down. The lack of flatness in Windsor Great Park let me down. But it was fantastic nevertheless. Doesn't make sense?  Let me explain.

Heading towards the Copper Horse statue of King George III along the Long Walk at the start

After a few weeks of distinctly chilly autumnal weather, summer decided to return for this, my final half marathon of the year and with a 1:00 pm start, much later in the day than is usual for such events, I found myself sweating even as I stood amongst the massed ranks waiting to start. This was not encouraging, especially with the first mile of the course comprising of a steady incline along Windsor Park's majestic 'Long Walk'. 

'Learn from previous mistakes' I told myself, 'Take it really slowly to start with; don't use up all of your energy early on'. And take it slowly I did, expecting the terrain to level out once the 'Long Walk' had been negotiated. However it turned out that the second mile was mostly uphill as well, and in fact the whole course was surprisingly undulating, the only exception being a mile long level section approaching the impressive Guards Polo Club, along which seemingly out of nowhere a fierce headwind made forward momentum nigh on impossible.

As if running 13.1 miles on a hot afternoon wasn't hard enough!

After three miles I was really struggling. My legs felt like lead, screaming their dislike of the heat and hills combination with every laboured energy sapping stride. What goes up must go down, however, but whilst the downhill sections were very welcome to start with, negotiating them soon began to pull painfully on different muscles and place an increasing strain on my knees. The whole experience felt brutal. Progressing so slowly, I felt for a while that I would never make it to the finishing line. The stretch between 6 and 9 miles seemed particularly endless. Only a week before I had completed a 10 mile training run trouble free and fleet of foot, and I found myself wondering how it was possible for my body to feel so different from one long Sunday run to the next.

The scenery, though, was fantastic. Windsor Great Park is vast and especially beautiful at this time of year as the leaves begin to turn into the browns, reds and oranges of autumn. The tied houses of the Royal Estate workers were fascinating, some of them pretty chocolate box cottages, others not insubstantial country piles in their own right. The park even has its own pub and Village Store. The route was very well marshalled by cheerful and encouraging military types, who were assiduous in clearing up discarded water bottles almost before they had landed on the ground. Strict orders from their boss in the castle, no doubt. The Royal love of horses was there for all to see, not only in the strategically placed statues of Kings and Queens on horseback, but also in the pungent lumps of manure that necessitated the occasional swerve as I progressed along the estate roads.

Struggling almost from the outset, I found myself nearer to the back of the field than I've been in other events this year. Amongst such company a pattern emerges, as floundering athletes summon up the energy for a burst of overtaking before fading again and being overtaken back by the runners overtaken shortly before. It's a recurring cycle and soon you start to recognise and feel an affinity with your fellow strugglers, get chatting and encourage each other along. It's very uplifting and enjoyable, and something those serious runners towards the front lose out on in my opinion. Particularly worthy of a mention yesterday was runner number 397, name unknown but affectionately dubbed by me as 'Bird Man'. He was probably a few years older than me and his running style looked even worse than mine felt, but every time I caught up with him he would point out something of interest overhead. 'Look, there's a flock of parakeets over there!' or 'Did you see that Hawk just now? I think it was a red tailed one.' Fantastic! In the end, I managed to pull clear and finished a couple of minutes ahead of him, but I bumped into him again after collecting my bag and shook his hand.

The finish, and beyond that, Windsor Castle.

The final mile, back along the Long Walk was torturous even though it was downhill. Every inch of my legs was hurting by now, and although the finish was in sight all the way, a cruel optical illusion meant that for a long time it didn't seem to be getting any nearer as I pounded towards it. With Windsor Castle in the background, though, this was a majestic and inspirational end to the race and I overtook a lot of runners as I approached the finish, only being overtaken once, by a young couple at least twenty years my junior. Once over the line, I felt strangely elated. The race had been tough, really tough but I'd made it in one piece and the visual magnificence of that final mile had somehow raised the experience to another level.

My time wasn't good by any stretch of the imagination. It was by some measure the slowest of my three half marathons this year. It meant that Project 50 would not be graced by a PB for this distance. On the bright side, though, it was comfortably faster than both of the half marathons I ran last year, in itself a pleasing and worthwhile outcome. It also made me realise just how well I'd done to achieve my PB (over 30 minutes faster) five years ago at the age of 45 having started running only two years before that. Everything's relative. I'm beginning to think that without some kind of bionic implant I probably won't get close to that particular time again, but that's not going to stop me from continuing to lace up my running shoes and enjoy the incredible high and the sense of well being that comes from a really good run, irrespective of the time. And as yesterday proved, even a bad day on the road can end up as a positive experience if you just stick at it.