Happily Ever After
Life in The Rural Retreat with a beautiful wife, three cats, garden wildlife, a camera, a computer – and increasing amounts about running
Earlier posts can be found on Adventures of a Lone Bass Player, where this blog began life. Recent entries can be found here.
York 10k 2021
by Russell Turner - 12:36 on 03 August 2021
It was a long weekend, and my legs are still stiff – yesterday’s 385-mile drive home didn’t help, although it was much better than a trip down plagued by roadworks, bimbling drivers and heavy traffic. And more roadworks. So finding no-one home at the York Airbnb was a nuisance. I’d missed an email telling me the keysafe location and code number. All was sorted eventually and the day ended with a curry five minutes’ walk from the Airbnb. I was in the city now.
Saturday was more relaxed: a morning catching up with family in Wakefield; an afternoon doing little apart from a brisk venture into town to buy a water bottle I ended up not using; an evening playing host to UltraPaul (who was also running) and Triathlon Cathy (who wasn’t) with beer and pizza. Most satisfactory.
Race day began rainy but had cleared by the time I walked a mile to the start on Knavesmire where I was joined by Paul and Cathy and 2,660 other runners, more than 1,000 more than in Leamington two weeks earlier. Conditions were mild with no wind. Perfect. There was the usual over-excited raving from the warm-up compere before we assembled in our pens – not crammed, but social distancing forgotten – then we were off.
My race face – I blame being chased by Batman.
The initial climb wasn’t steep but enough to suggest what was to come – lots of energy-sapping (for me, anyway) small undulations around a course that was a run down Memory Lane: past the road end of my first digs, my house, the former newspaper office and several Still Dancing gig venues, plus the Minster and other York landmarks.
I’d like to say I ran it all with a smile but the effort was greater than I hoped. The first three miles were all under nine minutes, then I stuttered while picking up water at halfway – the humidity was greater than I’d realised. Despite that I kept running to the end where Cathy and Paul cheered me towards the finish line. I’d feared not breaking the hour although I’d hoped for something close to my 52min PB. In the end I finished around where I’d expected, with a 56:36 chip time. I was happy with that.
With Paul at the end of the race.
Paul, who’d finished 15mins ahead of me, seemed less satisfied, remembering his halcyon days of 30 years ago when he could have run faster with less effort. There’s a lot to be said for making a late start to a running career – I still have hopes of further PBs.
Half an hour after I finished I walked the mile back to the Airbnb, part of it along the 10k course where runners were still at least 2k from their medal. Some (usually gaggles of brightly dressed women) ambled along as though enjoying a day out; others walked and tottered, exhausted. Chances are that their effort and sense of achievement were both greater than mine and Paul’s.
It’s all relative (although I’m pleased that I finished 50th out of 150 in the M60 class – and on my 63rd birthday). The last man home (also an M60) finished in 2:31:52 and the last woman in 3:46:04, although clusters of surnames and similar times among the final finishers suggest that friends and family were sticking with struggling runners to keep them going.
Later, after I’d cleaned up and recovered a bit, I joined Cathy and Paul for a farewell lunch before they returned home and I walked back to the Airbnb. My various perambulations had added a further seven miles to the 6.2 I’d run in the morning. A lazy evening ensued.
Yesterday, the good news was that I found a route home that missed most of the roadworks. I even dodged an accident hold-up outside House of Bruar by using local knowledge to take a back road. Travel time was not much different but much less stressful. The bad news is that today my legs are still feeling the effort, which is unexpected. Immobile miles in a car are probably to blame.
Was it worth the miles, the cost and the effort? It must have been – next year’s City Limits diary is filling quickly, August 7 weekend is free, so I’ve signed up again while I have the chance. Next time I’ll know what to expect. Although by then I’ll be 64 and my halcyon days may be behind me too.
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