Brass Monkey Half Marathon.

It was ideal conditions for the race today and I was prepared to give it a go. Cancelled races and bad training weather created self doubts early on - even before race day. This was only to be a hard pushed tempo session but still as close to max as I could go without blowing up; often called threshold pace. Everybody was in the same boat with the bad training weather so I really couldn't use that as an excuse today. Runners were telling me that they were clocking 60 miles a week on treadmills and others out running on the snowy pavements in trail shoes. No bad weather, just bad excuses.

The early race pace felt good and I seemed to be averaging about 5-45 minutes per mile and still within site of a group, which included team mate Kevin O. This was very close to recent 10k pace and with hindsight was too fast too early on. I stayed with this group for approximately 3 miles. After 5 miles runners were passing me in droves and then it was a case of hanging on to the end. After 8 miles the legs were starting to hurt, my pace then slowed and more runners were overtaking, Some I recognised including Marc T who stormed on for a Vet 40 prize and PB. Will k coasted past me late on too. Fellow blogger Simon A stormed passed just on the line to pip me at the end - well done to him.

I finished in 1-20-28, well down on last year but a useful session and something to build on for the coming season.