What an amazing weekend ! Started off with dinner on Friday night with a dozen or so of my fellow AYE Club members at the Roamin’ Nose (Eyre Place). Sadly, I was late and missed speeches but still enjoyed great company, good atmosphere and delicious food. Fascinating chat with our guest of honour, Neil Kilgour (EM Race Director), on the technicalities of race course design.
Saturday took in final kit preparation and a move from West Linton down to my race base camp on the prom at Joppa (aka my mothers house). This has been a bit of a tradition and I always love being beside the sea though I have to say that things always look very wild on the beach at 6 in the morning on race day.
The day itself started with AYE Club pre-race photo-shoot. Some bright spark had the idea of doing it on top of Calton Hill – it was so dreich that it could have been anywhere but great to see a number of folk able to make it for the photographer.
And so to the race itself. Well firstly, the Met Office forecast I looked at showed heavy rain for most of the day. Okay, so it was a wet start but by the time the race started, the rain had stopped. There was a fresh breeze all the way, no rain and even a fair amount of sun – near perfect. And as for my run, well it’s taken me a fair few years to realise that ones chances of success climb dramatically the more one gets to know oneself. In other words, if you are naturally not fast and have done little training, run slow and steady and you will get there – eventually! Most years, I feel as if I have done about two thirds of the training I should have done. This year was definitely down to a third. Still, I did make it to the finish line, stress free and delighted to be wearing my Penicuik Harriers shirt. I also met Susie M, not once but twice en route – fantastic support – how lucky am I? Marathon number 15 in the bag !
Congratulations to all the fellow EM runners from various running groups – the AYE Club, Penicuik Harriers and West Linton.
Finally, all this means that not only am I still in the AYE Club but I am now President of the Club – hurrah! Results are still provisional but we were 32 in number last year and it looks like we may only be two down.
The future? Just about to enter next years EM but just as importantly, the training will now move up a gear or two and onto the hills – looking forward to a calendar with ultras in it again in 2015 !
I can confirm that the rain for the half marathon was indeed miserable. Awful. But it did stop, and it never ceases to amaze me how quickly you warm up when out running 🙂 Honestly, I think I’d rather rain than the blazing sun that emerged for the marathon!
Thanks Mark – I only wish I was as swift as you – congratulations on a truly impressive time 🙂
Great effort Chris.Quite a bit behind you but enjoyed Edinburgh marathon number 3 yesterday. How lucky were we with the weather….the rain for the half marathon however…….ouch….