The Cheshire 1/2 Marathon dawned bright and sunny. Only kidding. Worked out how to get the windscreen wipers on the new car to go at maximum speed, and set off for Arley Hall and Gardens in Cheshire, where the race was.
In an unusual turn of luck with the weather, as soon as we arrived, the rain stopped, and even if the sun didn't quite manage to join us, these were still great conditions for a long run. Almost missed the start as joined The. Slowest. Toilet. Queue. In. The. World. Made it with 2 minutes to spare, remembered to switch on watch to record this, checked had not lost the most complicated timing chip to fix to shoe from my shoe, and ran off with everyone else into the countryside.
Great run, loved the route. Two laps around the country lanes. The sun remembered it was summer in the end, and graced us with some rays. Quite a serious race, everyone seemed very focussed on their race, as well they might, this is a good course for a PB. I myself missed out on one by 36 seconds, but I can't talk about that too much, as I'm still quite upset by it.
The back of my left knee went again (pop!), after about 50 meters from the start, which was a good start, and made for an interesting (a.k.a. uncomfortable) rest of the race. Although I think that it might really have helped, as I was concentrating so much on that, I forgot to worry about all the rest of the things to worry about in a race, and I think this helped me run faster than usual. I did a 7:00 minute mile for my first mile, which I didn't even know I could do.
My parents had come along and were walking in the opposite direction around the lap, so saw them a good few times which was great. They seemed to get a bit of a following with the other runners as well, and I think they will really have helped a lot of people around the course. It was quite a quiet route, and the odd person (odd as in not very many, not odd as in weird) dotted around the course supporting the runners made a big difference! And I beat my parents to the end, which as until today, was a long held, but as yet, unrealised, ambition of mine. Even if it was only by a few small minutes.
Although the race seemed quite competitive, the car park at the end was the friendliest yet, met loads of nice people to have a chat with, and who asked about 100 Days! I even met someone else, Tony, who is running every day for 50 days! I've heard that many people do run each day (they're doing running streaks, but wearing clothes) but it was great to actually meet someone else doing it. He is on day 42, and is aiming for 200 miles before day 50, also in aid of charity, and is bang on target to reach it - so good luck with the rest!
A few people have now asked me, what am I going to do after this is over? Up until now, I've been quite blasé about it, after all 100 days is a long time, and I still have a lot to complete before the end, so I see no reason to think about afterwards yet. But now I realise with a bit of a shock that 'afterwards' is now just one week away, so when Tony asked me, I felt like I should have an answer, and my answer without thinking about it was that I was going to carry on running every day. So there you go, that was easy, it's decided. I'm going to carry on. Not 10 miles every day, but at least 1 mile a day. Just to see how long I can keep it going for before I fall over.
To celebrate completing the race, we went around the gardens at Arley Hall, which were very beautiful, and had ice cream, and so were the perfect place to relax after a hard mornings work.
Just in case you're interested, I did 1:39:02 which if it wasn't so close to my PB, I'd have been very happy with.
Those pesky few seconds. Now I'll have to do it again.
Stats
Total days: 93 days
Total miles: 952 miles
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