One down 3 to go

Thankfully I got a decent night’s sleep, and spent the night breathing through unblocked nostrils. Hooray! 

Firstly a small summary of the day:

Today's attire:

JW Ultra vest (forecast was for good weather)

Black / Yellow shorts

Light Grey and Magenta Triaxes

Today’s nutrition:

Number of Gels consumed: 5 (one every 5 miles - last one at 22.5 rather than 25)

Nunn (salt) tablets in water: 1

Water top ups: LOTS (it was WARM)

Mental state:

Number of times I've muttered "F**KING HELL!!!!!" whilst staring up at a mahoosive hill today: 4

Number of times I've muttered "F**KING HELL!!!!!" because the view was so beautiful today: 7 :)

I woke up this morning not really feeling nervous, just wanted to get started. Ate my weetabix alongside several nervous looking people in shorts, went for a pee 50 times and checked out. You think I am exaggerating. Well maybe a bit. 47 times.

About 20 of us were huddled in the car park, a few less than I thought really. I suppose with an event this big you are lucky if you make it to the start line in one piece, or it seems like a good idea, then you don't train... anyway they all seem really nice if a little quick. I felt very underdressed in my vest / shorts combo, but was very grateful of the lack of clothing later on as we had a sunny day here. 

This is a new event, we are the first people to run these marathons, and to get things off to a suitably comedy start it appeared that whist the race director (Harold) was absent mindedly playing around blowing the starting horn at 8.55  the man with the timing clock thought that was the actual start and drove up the road with the timer clock on. He didn't realize no runners were following. False start! So it was almost 9.10 before we actually started.. Not that I should be bothered, start and the end is the only time I get to see the race clock. Had a nice chat with Graeme who I hadn't seen since the queue for the porta-loos at the Amsterdam Marathon last year. We meet in all the best places!

BEEEP! and we were off. Up the driveway of the hotel and out on to the main road. We wound along the road through Moville and Greencastle following the coast, which was lovely. The sky was blue, the sea was even bluer and people were out and about clapping us. We got to see little boats, pretty buildings, and some pretty fresh (well... alive) fish being landed from the Atlantic. I took it steady and tucked in behind two guys, and with them I stayed until about the 13 mile mark. A quick stop to top up my water bottle and some encouragement from Harold "You think this view is good, wait till 16 miles". Hmm, thanks.

I've read the course profile, and I knew he meant - the "big" climb was starting. I could see a TV aerial at the top of a big hill seemingly miles away, and that was where we were going. This is where I lost the other two - I let them go on. I wasn't going to bust my arse to keep up with them. I'm thinking of the longer game here.

The climb between 13-16 miles was one of the hardest I've ever done. I would say if you are a runner, imagine taking the last steepest bit of the Rhayader 20 climb, stick it at 13 miles and make it last for 3 miles. That gives you an idea. As we went up we could see people working on peat bogs and cutting out bits of turf, and there were little piles of turf dotted all over the hillside. I could also see a view emerging over the bay. The combination of the blue sky, sea and gold silvery beach from such a height made for a view that was really amazing. Never seen anything like it. Beats a Caribbean island any day.Thankfully it was a few degrees cooler at the top of the climb. It has been a lovely day here but by 11am it was getting a bit warm.

I do like to be beside the sea side... for 26.5 miles

Of course we all know, what goes up must come down, and after 16 down we went. You would think this is good, but it was a downhill so steep it is actually quite tricky to run down with any speed (or maybe I just don't have the technique) a real quadricep masher. Suddenly the uphill didn't seem so bad. On I carried. It seemed to get warmer and warmer, and I was very thankful for the roaming lady marshal that kept appearing with water top ups. It is a self sufficient race with a water stop at halfway, but I needed those top ups today. I passed lots of fields with cows, sheep, even a few chickens. To me it seems a lot like running in the Lake District. So pretty.

Pretty soon I saw the signs for Culdaff, and after having photos taken of me by some random holidaymakers on the edge of the village (bad times if I am the most interesting photo subject!) I was there. I could see the finish down the road, and something within me still wanted to belt it for the line so I did - my legs still worked. It had started to drizzle which provided some welcome refreshment, and after doing the obligatory arms in the air over the line I sat on a wall with rain drops running down my arms and legs scoffing as much kit-kat / banana as my stomach would let me. 4.43. Pleased I hadn't wrecked myself. However it was by no means easy. My average moving pace was 10.34, if you take out stops to re fill bottles etc, and the course was long so went through marathon point in 4.39 and a bit.

Today's medal

My hotel is 100 yards away from the finish, so I went and checked in. Disgusting I know, but I literally just pulled a clean top on and went back out, I thought it important to get as much water / food in me as soon as possible after running and worry about being smelly / covered in my own salt residue later. The event had put on a buffet at the pub and I went and stuffed my face. All good stuff, the Irish races really know how to do post race food. Came back and had a bath. Ahhhhhhhh. Nice :) 

At about 5 I went back out to watch our man in a wheelchair finish. It took him the best part of 8 hours to do the course. How the hell he got up those climbs I will never know, at times he had to have someone behind him to stop him from rolling backwards :-0 and I thought I had "hill problems"! Sat and chatted with him at dinner - he must be in his 60s, and seems to have done every marathon everywhere in Ireland and a lot more besides. He thinks he has it easier than the runners because on a downhill he can freewheel, although today he had to have someone holding on to the chair on the down hills because they were so steep they were dangerous and the chair would have been out of control.

The man who thinks he has it easy - after the finish

My legs at the moment feel OK. There is sometimes that moment of dread when you get up out of the chair after a long run, but no aches and pains, no blisters or funny toenails and I feel fine. Cold seems to have gone (So I've found a cure scientists have been working on finding for years!) Bacon and Cabbage (and a huge pile of potato) for tea, thought it would give me salt, bit of protein, carbs and my mother always tries to make me eat more cabbage so she was pleased. What it will be like when I try to run tomorrow I have no idea, but I intend to take it super easy to give my legs a chance to warm up before getting in to any sort of pace. Not that I've got a plan, because I think with things like this you can't really have one.

Onwards. :)