My first experience

Well, I started race morning feeling fairly ok after a good nights sleep. I decided a early night was the right decision (not including the wife) and seemed to have paid off. Breakfast as they say is the most important meal of the day, to make me nice and strong for the race Weetabix was the only food on the menu. I was secretly hoping i'd be able to run like the jockey on the weetabix ad. Kinda did at the end i suppose. 12 bells arrived, 3 hours to race time. In walks Neil all ready to go in his shorts and jumper under his T-shirt, yes a jumper. What a tool. We decided to head over to collect our race numbers early so we could take in the atmosphere and race build up later. 735, my new lucky number. Neil was only registering so he was given 1923. Back to my house then to get ready. On arrival at the house we found a old man, full of wisdom on running, or so he believed. Yes, he told us about his storys of old, and how he used to run when he was younger, a long long time ago. But we decided not to listen to Dermot, as his expierences no longer count. We were then at the stage of lunch. Will we or won't we. What effect will it have on our performance. We decided it was best to have something as we had plenty of tome to digest, or so we thought. Ham and cheese toasties it was. None of this cold pasta stuff Tom. It's only 5 mile. Right, quater to two. Need to be in Al's at two so better get going, downing the isotonic lucozade on the way. Every little helps. Race time arrives, Al and Al eile head for the front to get a good start. Not for me I thought. Too many people will pass me out if I go up front. Somewhere in the middle will do me fine. I'm joined there by my running buddy Neil, or so I thought, Tom, Noel and Stevo. Here we go. Horn sounds and the sound of buffalo stampeding begins to comes towards you as people begin to make their way. It's almost a minute later before I actually get moving. I just cross the start line and my running buddy is no where to be seen. Fair enough I thought, wouldn't have the spare breath to chat along the way anyway. I'll keep to my normal pace of 9 minute miles and if I can push a bit more at the end, then great. Noel's just ahead of me running at the same pace. Kev had reminded me the night before not to get beat by his dad. Was this possible. Surely not. Well best get ahead of him just in case. Past out Noel just before mile one. Checked my pace at mile one, 8.20ish. Jeez, keep this up and you'll never finish. Felt ok so continued on. Mile 2 I was down to 8 min mile. How long before I fail. Take your time. Although the down hill parts really helped. On to mile 3. Ham and cheese toasties starting to kick in now. STITCH. Ok , deep breaths, it'll ware off. Got to the coast road and felt the heat of the sun for the first time. Would usually have stopped by now for a can of heino, a smoke and catch a breath. Not this time. Left at the lights and on up the hill. Suprisingly I still felt ok, a little harder I thought. You can manage. I pushed it up the hill and passed out quite a few people. One lad wasn't happy with that as he tried to keep up. He didn't have the energy in the end and faded off. As we turn into the housing estate I feel nauseous. Not to far to go. I have the final green in my sight. Everyone ahead of me starts to jump onto the path. They want to keep the last few hundred metres to a minimum. There's no room for passing. Gotta get back on the road. I dodge through a couple of cars back onto road. Lots of space, time to up the pace. I round one corner and hear screams of support as I head towards the final bend. Brilliant, I can go faster. I turn the final bend running as fast as I can. Probably only crawling along but it feels like I'm running with a rocket up my ass. The final straight looks like it's a mile long. Will I ever finish. I see the clock, but I really don't care about the time. I knew already it was quicker than anything I had run before. I was just glad to make it to the finish. Across the line. Yipee, but no energy to raise my arms, never mind jump up and down. Drink, drink, where's my bleeding drink. No chance. We have to remove the tag first before shuffling through the crowds for a goody bag. It's all over until next time. How do I feel?

Over the bleeding moon.

As Nike say, bring it on.

Steve.

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