I did it! For my third consecutive year, I finished the Cardiff Half Marathon: 13.1 miles of beautiful scenery and incredibly supportive crowds. Ok maybe only 10 of those miles were fun, but the support and sheer determination got me through the other three!
It all started out as a beautiful Sunday morning, crisp and clear with the forecast of sunshine for the duration of the race. After arriving at the race start, I met up with some of the guys from Stroke Association (I was running in memory of my nan, Joan, who had suffered a stroke before her passing, and my next door neighbour Doreen who also suffered strokes prior to her passing). Then after some waiting, caught up with my good friend Clotilde. We started the race and that was the last I saw of Clotilde, who eventually finished in a fantastic time of 2:01:19.
My pace was fairly slow to begin with, 5km in 33 min, 10km in 1:06 which was consistent and I didn’t want to push as I had only run a 5lm the week before, but nothing for months and months beforehand! No training isn’t the best idea to go into a half marathon if I’m honest!
The first 10km felt really good, the pace was fine, felt comfortable and managed to get some energy gels at this point. I pushed on through miles 7, 8, 9 and arrived at mile 10 – the dreaded oath park section. As beautiful as this section is, and despite the crowd being the most supportive of all the course, this section is what I fear the most. Knowing that you have to run up the hill at the start of mile 10, then another at just before mile 12 is daunting being so tired already. But most people powered through and got themselves onto the last mile, at which I saw Elen and Genevieve! Elen plays in a brass band and they played the Ghostbusters theme as I was passing, so after a quick hello, off I went toward the finish. The crowd during the last 500 metres were really great, shouting and chanting to get the runners to the end, and with a what little engird I had left, the sprint finish is a must!
There is no feeling quite like running across the finish line of a half marathon, knowing that you’ve raised much needed funds for a very good charity, but achieving that personal goal of having run a long distance race, in a decent time! Heres to a new PB in 2017 (Target=2 hours!)
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