Dead Runners society race report
Four Villages half-marathon,
Cheshire, Sunday 22nd January 1995
With my
australian qualifying time I entered the 1995 Boston marathon. I
eased off my training for one of the fastest half-marathons in
the
country is in
NW Cheshire near my home town of Warrington and was one of my
favourite races when I was living up there. The January weather
was
always bad and
the times were always fast!
Morning
all
Here I am
back at work recovering from yesterdays 1/2 marathon race. I tapered off for
this race as I wanted a crack at my pb (set on this course in 1992), it’s a very
fast course. Before this race I'd run 52 1/2 marathons and my 3 fastest times
were all set on this course: 82.51 (1992) 83.50(1993) and 83.06 (1994). The
weather on saturday was awful, very c*ld with lots of str*ng w*nd and a lot of
r*in, fortunately there was no sn*w in our part of the world. Come sunday
morning the weather had improved a bit, the wind has dropped although it was
still a windy day it was nothing like as bad as saturday.
I arrived
an hour before the start, I travelled with my friend, training
partner, clubmate and
ex-workmate Bernard. Bernard lives near me and we usually travel to races
together, we decided it was his turn to drive this time. Eventually it was time
to warm up so I ran an easy mile or so, running back to the sports club was
fairly hard into the wind, it was going to be fun in the last mile :-( I then
reluctantly peeled off all my layers and put my vest on, I was going to tough it
out in vest and shorts today. Off to the start, a bit of jogging and stretching
before we all lined up, there were over 1000 runners so it was crowded but I got
near the start.
Bang and
the cavalry charge started, I decided I was going to go for it today, no messing
about with working my way through. The first mile is on a fairly wide main road
before we turned onto a narrow country lane, I wanted to pass as many as I could
before the course narrowed. 1st mile in 5.58, slow down tony! I eased off
slightly but I could see Bernard ahead, I kept going hard and slowly reeled him
in and caught him at 2 miles, 2nd mile 6.54? I didn't slow down that much.
On we ran,
my left leg was pretty sore by now but I hung on, by 3 miles (3rd
mile 5.38? Who marked this course?) I felt a bit better and now I was
sweating, glad I was just wearing vest and shorts now. On we ran along country
lanes to Thornton, the first of the 4 villages. By 5 miles (31.27) I was
struggling to hang on to Bernard but I was 26 seconds up on my 1992 5 mile
split, I hung on to Bernard until 5.5 miles then as we went round a bend a
runner in a green vest bumped into me and I dropped back. This broke the cord
and Bernard pulled away :-( :-( :-( :-( For the next 2 miles I was still going
hard but runners were coming past. At 7 miles we went up a gentle uphill into
Ince (village #2) and I passed a few runners, to show how stupid the mile
markers were I ran an uphill mile in 5.37! I was very tired by now but still
going hard, struggled a bit on a downhill through Elton (village #3) between 8-9
miles before we hit Helsby marsh, I passed a one-legged man on crutches around
here, he runs every year, they always give him an hours start, it didn't hurt as
much after seeing him. Down onto the marshes and I got stuck in a little bunch
as we ran along a narrow marsh road at 10 miles (62.55)
I was still 16s ahead of my 1992 time so a pb was still possible. At the 10
mile marker there was an official photographer and there was a sign which said
"smile, if you can!", you must be joking! Just after 10 miles the road ended and
we hit a cinder track and suddenly we were in a XC race, after all the recent
rain there were loads of puddles, I splashed on the best I could but it was even
more difficult to pass now as the tiring runners were weaving round trying to
find the best going, fortunately the XC ended at 10.5 miles and we got a bit of
paved ground I passed a couple more runners including the man in green who
bumped me 5 miles earlier :-) Soon back on a rather muddy farm track, it was
getting very hard by now but I could see 2 clubmates ahead, one was Bernard
about 150 yards ahead but another one was coming back to me. This was Alan, one
of the best V50 runners in the area but he has one method of racing, he goes out
fast and either wins a prize or blows up, today was the latter. I passed him at
11 miles and ran on along the farm track to 11.5 miles when we hit the road ;-)
and turned into the wind :-( I could see another clubmate ahead, it was Brian,
our club champion! Until 15 months ago I used to be able to beat him but he
improved a lot last year and set loads of pb's including a sub 3 hour marathon.
Over the motorway bridge and uphill back onto the main road we started on, very
tired by now and still 1 mile to go into the wind but there was now no-one
between me and the champ. Ran in as hard as I could and I
passed Brian at 12.75 miles just before we turned into the sports club in Helsby
(village #4 although its really a town) where we started, Brian soon came back
and sprinted past, I lost another place to Les(another clubmate) in along the
run in and I finished in 83.26 :-( 35 seconds slower than my pb. Going off too
fast and the bit of XC after 10 miles cost me a pb but it was still a very good
run, my 3rd fastest 1/2 marathon. Bernard finished some 50s up on me, if I'd
stuck with him I'd have got a pb. Into the drinks room at the
sports club for some tea and orange juice as we all told our race stories and
made our excuses:-) Fellow daresbury dead Robin appeared and said he'd set a new
pb of 87.04, well done Robin :-) I gave Brian the shock of his life when I
passed him, if I hadn't been a clubmate he would have let me go.
Well I
survived the race for another year, my 9th running of this race. A few easy days
to recover and then back to hard training for Boston.
bye tony
"sore legs" bell
--
tony
bell A.M.T.Bell@dl.ac.uk
crystallographer and marathon runner
(but not necessarily in that order :-)) engineering and physical
science research council daresbury laboratory,
daresbury, warrington, cheshire, UK. WA4 4AD.
previous race report next race report
Back to list of race reports
Tony's home page
Shelley's home
page