Bath Half Marathon

I arrived in Bath at 9.30am and went to a little car park near the leisure centre which went well as I thought Id never get a spot, I kind of made my own one like a few others.

So I was there, relaxed and apart from the £6 charge to park I was happy. I saw Dave Norman on my way to pick up a number but we soon lost a lot of time trying to find the elite tent, we ended up walking around asking officials for ages but no one seemed to know what we were talking about. Then, thinking it must be by the start we headed there and saw Ladbrooke who told us it was back down where we came from.....well, we couldn't sit it anywhere just a load of toilets! So we gave up on that idea as we needed to start running, but then Dave saw someone he knew (or I thought he knew him) and the guy said he could look after our bags and said he would be in a specific tent in 20minutes with our bags.

So a little warm up jog for 10-15minutes and then back to the tent, problem was the guy with the bags wasn't. With 10minutes to go Dave binned the idea and went to the start but I wanted my racing flats, when another guy working in the tent got hold of him for some reason he thought he would go to the start....with our bags! I still don't know why after agreeing to be somewhere you would then move, how did he think we would know where he was?!

Anyway, 5minutes to go and I thought about just running in my 'big trainers' and then he came around the corner, I chucked him my kit and trainers and popped the flats of and ran to the start line. I did my trainers up on the line, rolled my calf gaurds down (forgot I had them on) and had about 1minute spare which was probably a good thing as I didn't have time to think I hadn't exactly done a decent warm up. BANG....we were off.

Martin Williams went to the front and I settled in the lead group. At the first mile I remember a Kenyan tried to cut up the Irish runner and was given told in no uncertain terms to "Watch where your fu*king going you t*at"....he didn't do it again! Haha. The group went up the first hill in the centre which seemed to put everyone in their groups and ours was about 8 I think.

Fair play to Martin who stayed at the front for the whole of the first lap and with help from Bugden kept a very good pace. It was actually a very nice group, sometimes you get idiots clipping you or making noises, elbows flying but they are all quality runners and it was also a help that they are all big fella's that helped in the windy parts.

Going into the second lap we were on around 65 pace and went through 10k in 30:51. then I could sense a move coming. As we hit a couple of hills again in the city that's where it came, Bugden and Sean split and I made a quick decision to stick with Martin thinking it was still 5/6miles to go and Martin is a machine so knew he wasn't going to slow that much. Then Kairn Stone went, so we now had about 4/5 groups of 2 guys as we past lapped runners.....talking of which I found it amazing we started passing people at 6miles but they had only done 1mile, I can only imagine how annoying that would be when people pass you being lapped on a 6mile lap!

The crowds of runners where very supportive though and was nice to get support but Martin was trying to lose me, I think! I knew it was windy on the backstraight so knew I couldn't do it alone. I had to keep telling myself to make sure I don't lose him.

As we hit the windy road back I offered to help Martin for two reasons...he had done a crap load of work and it might break it up mentally for us both and keep the pace good. After about 3 turns at the front I was taking longer to get around him and at one point he waved and I thought 'I'm trying!' HaHa. I like Martin though so I offered a couple more turns before leaving him to maybe try and push for a 65.

I lost contact with Martin a few times between 11 and 12miles but kept digging in to claw him back as once you lose someone you can lose a bit of time and hard to get back on.

I had no intention of sprinting him for the position but fair play the Scot, he shot off at the last corner anyway. I crossed the line in 65:36 on the clock and was happy to get a half done after 18months to the last one! With the target of sub 65, on reflection I think it was optimistic to think I would go straight into the distance and run that time, you need a couple of 10milers or 'halfs' to get a feel for the race but it's a personal best time for me and going in the right direction.

Simx