I signed up to run the Ealing Half Marathon about a month
after finishing my last full marathon – a delightfully flat course in
Manchester. One of the very first things that came up in conversations about
the Ealing Half was: hills. As someone who has never really liked running up
hills, this was not reassuring. So in the last few months, I have made a point
of attending as much hill training as possible, as well as sticking
semi-successfully to a training plan.
And the result? Well, either the training has seriously paid
off, or someone was overselling the hills!
The Ealing Half Marathon took place last Sunday, and I can
only praise it. From the course itself, to the organisation, to the support
from the crowds, it was brilliant. Not to mention that it was close enough to
home that I not only got to sleep in my own bed, I also didn’t have to get up
any earlier than on a normal work day – always a benefit!
We headed off under a slight covering of cloud just after
9am, and spent the next few hours visiting Ealing as the sun gradually burnt
them away. Spurred on by my brother, I had pushed myself as close to the start
line as I felt I could – a few feet behind the 1:35 pacers, with the purple 1:30
flags in sight. Working backwards from my last marathon time and trying to
factor in my training, I felt that 1:35 was a realistic goal, with 1:30 an
ideal.
As usually happens in races of any size, it took a little
while – nearly a minute in fact – to cross the line. That done, the pace
started to pick up, and I let the crowd around me carry me forwards. In my
experience, this means that I end up going faster than I initially plan.
Certainly, the quick glance at my watch told me that I was moving at sub-7
minute miles, which made me a little nervous. But the pace felt comfortable and
sustainable, and I decided to follow my usual race plan and race by effort
rather than numbers: if it felt like I could hold it, I would.
By the second mile marker, I’d caught up with the 1:30 pace
group, just in time to hit the first significant hill. And don’t get me wrong,
it was definitely a hill. It just wasn’t as terrifyingly steep as I’d been
anticipating (which is almost certainly down to doing some hill training in
Richmond park – the hills there are a lot more daunting!). It helped being with
the pace group at that point, because they helped drag us up the hill at a nice
steady pace.
Then we hit the downhill and something happened that I
certainly hadn’t expected. I sped up and started pulling away. The speeding-up-on-the-downhill
part wasn’t too surprising, as I’ve always liked running down. But pulling away
from the pace group was. And it made me nervous. I seriously considered reeling
back the pace and staying with them, but I still felt so comfortable that doing
so would have seemed like a cop out. After all, this was a race and the idea
was to run as fast as possible, right?
And the rest of the race went much the same. I was ahead of
where I expected to be, and felt like I could hold the pace I was at, for most
of the race. I started to feel it more in the last two miles, and that’s when I
had to buckle down to hold the pace, and try to focus on my surroundings rather
than how tired I was. One advantage of running close to home is that there were
plenty of member of my running club out to support us – and the cheers made a big
difference in the last painful minutes!
End result: a time of 1:28:32, which is significantly faster
than I’d ever hoped. It’s a new PB (though as I’ve only every run the distance
as part of a full marathon before, that’s hardly surprising), and it sets the
benchmark for next time. Because yes, despite the hills, I’m pretty sure I’ll
be back next year, as long as I can fit it in!