What goes up doesn't always come down




On Saturday I went to a Dinner party hosted by JtE. Mindful of next day's Garstang 10k I took care to control the drinking. However the food prepared by Joan, with JtE as a very innocent bystander, was so good that I committed the sin of gluttony. The result was that I had a poor night's sleep and a delicate tum next morning. So when, just before the race, I stumbled across an athletic-looking EtU resplendant in his RMI designer gear, my excuses for running poorly were in place. At least they made a change from the usual Runners excuses of broken leg, ankle, metatarsal, heart, strained ligament, cartilige, tendon, calf, thigh,relations etc.




We set out from Garstang School on a grey but warmer day than of late. Well before the mile marker, I heard a resonant voice issued from lungs, clearly with a surfeit of air, bading me a good morning. It was YJ galloping past alongside "designer gear". "Good morning, John" I managed to asphyxiate back, before returning to gasping mode.




For the first 3 miles the course was a mix of flat and slight uphill. I noticed with some concern that whilst I was working hard I was only 9 minute mileing. The course then became a long but fairly gentle uphill climb. I waited for the inevitable downhill where I thought I might make up some time, but it never came. It's a peculiar course. How you can start and end a 10k race at the same place and run uphill for so long without any downhill compensation defies logic. Well it defies me, which is admittedly, different. Logic and me are ships that pass in the night.




When I entered the school grounds at the end, EtU & YJ with icicles on their moustaches as a result of the long wait, were there to cheer me on, which spurred me to overtake someone right on the line. She must have thought " What a sad old git". And she was right.




YJ was 3rd out of 13 M65's, which is pretty impressive given that next time he runs this race he will be a M70, and that he'd been out running the previous day. In these times of stock market turmoil and low interest rates it might be worth placing a few thou on him winning next years M70.




EtU came halfway down his category and I was 4th out of 7 M70's. There were 458 finishers. YJ was placed 255 in 49m 11s, EtU was 289 in 50m 54s, and I was 347 in 54m 15s. This was a personal worst for a 10k. I have no excuses. I have a nasty feeling that a whole raft of PW's are to follow this year.




Here we are at the finish, or in my case "Here I am, absolutely finished!"







Sorry about this. Just testing for enlarging the photo