After my half marathon, and quite a lot of lunchtime runs and cycles to work, I thought I was ready for this 16 mile race. I wasn't. But anyway, RunKingston had been paid for, so there I was. (Kingston Running Festival)
The weather was fairly perfect, and I got a good position near the front of the starting line for the 8.30am start. I knew I needed to beat 8 minute miles, and felt this would be doable. The first 8 mile loop (of two) began with a nice run along the Thames on the gravel path. I felt fine, and took it fairly easy - there was a long way to go after all. I was under 7 1/2 minutes for the first mile, and easily under 15 for the second.
At around mile three, the route goes over the Bridge at Hampton Court. Then it's a 5 mile return trip to Kingston along uneven footpaths and crossing side roads. This part I didn't enjoy. However I managed to keep up a good pace and hit the half way point at just over 1 hour.
Back along the nice Thames path, and even though I was feeling a bit of a stitch in my shoulder, some steady, focused breathing helped. However, by the time I reached the bridge at mile 13, I was really struggling. My ankle hurt, my left knee hurt, and worst of all my thighs really started to get painful. I still thought I was on for 2 hours, but I had to stop for a short walk at the final water station, and even though I pushed on I realised with 1 mile to go that I'd missed it.
I still finished with an official time of 2:00:27 - which I'm really pleased with. What I'm not pleased with is how sore I felt at the end. I've never experienced this kind of aching during a race - after a race, always, but never during. Maybe it was the distance, and I'm just not trained for 16 miles. This hasn't given me a huge amount of confidence to do a marathon (btw, I lost the ballot for a London Marathon place, so am on the hunt for something else).
But taking something positive from it - I have gotten much stronger aerobically and mentally. It really hurt, and I pushed myself on to do a negative split on the laps (2nd lap faster than 1st). And I wasn't actually that tired - the only thing slowing me down in the final 3-5 miles was my legs, the rest of me was OK.
[Update from 2019. Results online here say 2:01:12 - this is most probably the gun time. 144th place out of 627 finishers).
It's interesting that I forgot about this pain, and that in my London Marathon a few years later it was the same thing that prevented me from going under 3 hours]
