From Ash Winter…
With the Yorkshire Marathon fast approaching, the Vale of York Half Marathon is the classic tune up race. Always useful to see if those long runs are making a difference while there’s still a few weeks to tweak the training. Over a thousand runners too, so you get that big race vibe on the flat lanes around Wistow.
Last time I did the race, I got parked about 90 seconds before the race started, clomped over the ploughed parking field and over the start line with no warm up. Not my finest half marathon, not worth the extra half hour of sleep. However, my partner for this road trip, Mark Gill, is a self-confessed morning person and he was waiting for me at our Ilkley pick up point at 0710 to start the journey, ready for the 0930 start. We arrived with an hour to spare, allowing plenty of time to pick up numbers, warm up, discuss strategies and shed all excuses for a poor performance.
Thankfully, Mark and I were rewarded for our ability to wake up early and marathon training so far with half marathon personal bests! I even managed a negligible negative split as well, which I will be claiming was all part of the plan, thank you very much.
We were not the only Harriers present however, Matthew Thackwray came 2nd with an astronomical time of 1:08:49, which I think was also a personal best. Congratulations too to Samesh Chotai, Derek Oliver, and Sarah Marsden on great performances.
With all this confidence flying around, I’ll try not get too carried away at the start of the Yorkshire Marathon…