Runner's Words

I remember writing this back in September 2020 whilst in the midst of putting in what remains to this day a record-breaking year of running. We were all in the depths of the ol’ pandemic and there wasn’t a whole lot else to do other than get out for a bit of exercise every day, so that’s what I did, pretty much every single day.

After six months of all that I felt that I might just be at my running peak, but annoyingly due to the times we were living in there seemed very little prospect of an actual race with actual people to try and get a chance to prove it. In the end, I did finally get a chance, albeit a full 13 months later, and we all know how that went. But at the time I remember feeling a little sad, a little disappointed, unable to know if I’d ever get the chance to truly test where was at.

I felt a bit the same in the buildup to the 2024 Wilmslow Half Marathon. As I mentioned in my last couple of blogs I’d somehow inexplicably hit a bit of a purple patch at the tail end of 2023, setting an unofficial half marathon PB one random autumnal morning and keeping the momentum going into the new year, hitting further PBs over the mile and the kilometre on my interval sessions. The stats my Garmin was chucking at me all suggested I was the fittest I’ve ever been and I began to lay eyes on my fourth go at the Wilmslow Half as an attempt to try and set an official PB over 13.1, and by all accounts it could have been a big one.

Sadly circumstances conspired against me as we rolled into February and we’ll never really know if I could have done something really special or not. Despite those injury woes though I’d mostly managed to keep up the weekly mileage, but the problem was that all the intensity was gone. I’d been forced to abandon most of the speedwork sessions so as to not aggravate anything and I ultimately came into race weekend feeling a some way behind where I’d been only a couple of months beforehand. Nevertheless, there was still a race to be run and it’s always interesting to see how these things go isn’t it.

It was a brisk morning on the outskirts of Wilmslow which had made planning my race clobber a little tricky. If I weren’t planning on going all out I’d just have wrapped up warm and had a nice jog to Mobberley and back, but I’d already decided I was just going to head off at PB-beating pace and see what happened, meaning I probably wouldn’t want to be fannying around with gloves, arm warmers and the like on the way round. Luckily I could keep warm before kickoff inside the rugby club near the startline so after quickly using the loos – treading in a massive muddy puddle in my beloved “mango” Vaporfly in the process – I headed up to the familiar startline on Kings Road, lining up just ahead of the 1:30 pacer as usual. It was time to see what my semi-broken, 42-year-old body still had left in it.

Having run this course three times since 2019 I knew the opening half would be pretty quick, with an overall, gradual, downhill to roughly the halfway point before we all start coming back uphill on the return leg. With my fitness somewhat questionable it was kinda hard to judge what the best tactic was in the early stages, whether to go out hard and hope for the best or keep my powder dry a bit and then hope I had enough left in the tank to bring it home. I mean in all fairness there was clearly stupid option and a sensible option here, and you can probably guess which of the two I went for.

It was ultimately a bit of a chastening experience but it very very nearly paid off. The first four miles came in at my 10k pace, the next couple only just outside that, by some distance the the fastest opening to a half marathon I’d ever done. There was a bit of a headwind, which I always seemed to be facing the brunt of as the little group I was running with tucked in behind me, but overall things felt pretty much on track for maybe doing something a bit special. The groin wasn’t grumbling at me, the stamina felt good and things appeared to be in control. I had a rough idea of what I was on for and starting going over a few permutations in my mind. The takeaway I would treat myself to as a celebration later that afternoon perhaps, or whether or not I would open a couple of the special beers I’d had saved for months for such an occasion.

It wasn’t to be though. After finishing the race I posted on Strava saying the wheels fell off a bit from miles 8-12, which in hindsight is a bit of an exaggeration, but it certainly did slip away from me there as the lack of fitness and gradual uphill of the second half of the race kicked in. I was still running well inside sub-90 pace, which always used to be my target for these things, but what had come so effortless to me half an hour previously was now impossible, shipping 10-20 seconds per mile from the target. I couldn’t really work out where I was at anymore so just concentrated on trying to bring it home without a complete meltdown, which as we hit the final, flattish mile suddenly seemed seemed totally doable.

It was a strong finish and with hindsight it does make me wonder if I could have pushed just a little harder beforehand, especially shortly after I’d crossed the line and seen my finishing time and realised how close I’d actually gone. We rounded the final bend and I could see the finish line tantalisingly in the distance. I knew roughly what would constitute a PB but my tired mind was unable to remember the exact figure, so without wanting to leave anything to chance I emptied the tank completely, sprinting up to the line with everything I had left.

Go hard or go home I figured, and with a bit of luck earlier in the day it would have paid off. In the end it went down officially as a 1:27:05, meaning I’d missed my PB by a mere 14 seconds, barely a second per mile. I grabbed my medal and headed back to the rugby club for some warmth and to lick my wounds with an ice cold beer.

Now all the dust has settled I’m still not sure how I feel about it all. On the one hand, it was by some distance my second fastest ever half marathon and a result probably beyond my dreams a month or so before raceday as more and more pieces of me began to fall apart. By any measure it should have been a source of pride, especially at the age of 42, but I think mostly, overall I guess I do feel just a tiny bit disappointed, thinking about what might have been. To run a 1:25:38 on a random Sunday morning six months beforehand, all by myself and after staying up into the small hours watching baseball and drinking a load of Aldi pilsner, shows I had a decent base of fitness to work from, and the way things were going into early 2024 I was well on target to prove it officially in a race situation. But it wasn’t to be.

It was such a narrow miss as well that happens it’s natural to look back on all the things I could have done differently which might have made the difference. Could I have wound up that big finish a little earlier, not realising I had more left in the tank? Should I have tried to shelter from the wind a bit more in those early miles instead of leading our little group while they took turns hiding behind me? Should I have gone quicker through the water station between miles 7-8 instead of jogging slowly to make sure I’d be able to take on my energy gel properly? I’d also clocked the run 0.1 over the distance, so had I got my lines a bit wrong on the bends, or ran further than I’d needed as I weaved about trying to low five the kids on the side of the road with their little outstretched arms?

All these little things probably contributed, ultimately though perhaps it was never really on the cards on this occasion. Maybe I should have known better than to go all out for it in the first half of the race in the manner I did, especially knowing the nature of the course with the uphill return leg. But then also I figured it was worth a shot rather than spend the rest of my life looking back on this one and wondering if I’d played it too safe and actually had this amazing potential I’d never tapped into. I rolled the dice and it almost, almost, paid off.

It goes to show how well I am running at the minute though that I’ve quite comfortably run my second fastest official half marathon and ultimately, feel disappointed. I’d have dreamt of this sort of time a few years ago when my PB was firmly locked at 1:28 and I was struggling to even hit a sub-90. All things considered this was a massive result. But there’s just that nagging doubt at the back of my mind, reminding me of that ridiculous effort on the Fallowfield Loop back in October and whispering to me every so often “what if”.

These things happen though. Injuries come and go. I guess the next step is to get this one sorted – professionally – and maybe try again later in the year or early 2025. It’s probably time to go and see a physio, find out what’s what, and then I can begin to plot the next challenge. The fast, flat Manchester Half in October could be a shout if I can get myself sorted in time to step the training back up, we’ll see. This one though goes down as one of those “what could have been” days at the office but hopefully I’ll get another go at some point. I did in 2021, after all.