New PB and 33rd at Great North West Half Marathon

What a great week for running! Monday nights track session had a downer when Chris pulled up during drills with a calf problem. Don and I were quick to his aid and hopefully the injury will heal in good time for the VLM. Chris is my room buddy at London and it will be a shame if he cannot run both for him and Dr Kershaw's hospice which he is supporting.
I had a run to work on Monday but baled out of running home as my legs are taking a bashing, the training load and my Adidas Sequence trainers getting no respite.
Tuesday was a hectic day at work and I decided not to go to the track, on Wednesday I was travelling down to Reading and finally arrived at 7pm so food was much more interesting than donning the trainers.

Thursday morning I went for a run in the centre of Reading which was no fun at all and gave up dodging ignorant pedestrian and headed for breakfast.

Friday morning I headed out on the road and made the snap decision to use Rochdale Canal towpath which is finally starting to a) get dry and b) get light enough to dodge to duck poo!
I headed back on the canal at home time and the legs responded well to a bit of speed now and then.

Saturdays Oldham parkrun was great and 35 runners set off at 9:00am, 12 PB's were the result of runners desperate to get back into their warm homes! I headed off to Sweatshop, Hyde to get shiny new racing shoes which will get their first test at the Silverstone Half next week. I also picked up some new Brook's to partner the horrid Adidas Sequences!

The Great North West Half Marathon

I started the day nice and early and headed up the motorway to ensure getting a good parking spot (Which was near as dammit outside the reception door). I also struggle to run well on morning races so had the idea that if I was awake for long enough I could trick my body into thinking it was the afternoon!
After joking with the girl who handed me the timing chip "at least I will be first at something today!" I headed out to the promenade to catch some sea air.
I spotted a lady setting up the runners world pacer promotional boards and offered to help. She turned out to be the Marketing Director for Natmag-Rodale who produce runners world! and enjoyed a chat whilst fighting the wind which was threatening to blow cars over let alone flag poles.

I decided to get near to the front of the pack for the race, which on reflection mingling in the pack would have been a warmer option!!!

The race itself was a windy affair with no real benefit of a tail wind on the lower promenade and a hellish head wind on the undulating top promenade. I spend most of the race by the side of Dave Kershaw (on the right in the picture) I could not however match his finish and he dashed to the finish around 10 seconds ahead of me.
I say around 10 seconds as there appears to be a fault with my timing chip!

My legs are giving the usual aches after a race and look forward to trying out the Brooks on the track as I do a recovery run. The Adidas Tempo's on an interval session Tuesday.

Roll on the VLM and have a great week

Mark