There were 4 start pens, I was in the fastest. I joked like a dick with the lady there that I may have put too fast a predicted time down She did then chase after me and say I could relegate myself if I was worried about it. Deserved that.
Oh I almost forgot - The Milton Keynes Half Marathon is a half marathon in Milton Keynes. It's called that because it's half the length of a full marathon which they also have in Milton Keynes and that's called the Milton Keynes Marathon.
I managed to start pretty neat the front though and it was very spacious from the off. The first 5 miles or so are on the wide dual carriageways of MK. I imagined it would be on the footpaths at the side of the road and going up and down in the underpasses. It wasn't though, even though the first 3 miles were uphill. The plan was to hold on to 6.30 minute miles for as long as possible. I managed this for 6 miles the other day in a training run and figured I could go twice as far if I didn't need the toilet.
I was thrown by the uphills, I felt like I was working too hard to keep the pace at 6.30 but after mile three when it all went downhill I bagged a bit more time.
Are you still reading this? My word it's going to be boring. Seriously all I do is run at pretty much the same pace and then get a medal.
Still reading? Your loss.
After about 5 miles of the big roads it cuts into a housing area and then at about 10k it splits from the Marathon course and I head right into a park. It was really nice.By then the runners were spread out nicely,
At 8 miles I saw Gemma and the babies, the first time I have seen them in a race 😃 That was nice and was impressed that I made it there bang on time, 10.52.
Soon after though I started to wobble. It wasn't much. I knew 1.25 was now out of bounds but I was doing the calculations in my head (my watch isn't that fancy) as to what I need to do to at least get a pb. I was trying to count the 6.30s on my watch but after an hour it stops reporting in seconds so I had not idea whether a mile took me 6 minutes or 7.
Although I was slowing, so was everyone else and I was still overtaking people. People who looked like actual runners too, in vest and shorts. I was as close to the sharp end as I ever have been in a big race, 20th out of 3000 (#humblebrag). My guess is all the good people ran London the week before.
All the time I was glad it was my legs that were the bottleneck, usually it's the lungs or heart. They are in pretty good shape right now and legs are easy to train. A few more months of Strava Wankery should do it.
