Yesterday I arrived in Armpit after a five hour train journey in the company of the Small Boy, dropped my bags and immediately went out for a run. I have been planning this for some time; in fact it’s my third visit to Armpit since I started running, but the first time I have brought my running shoes and not been suffering either illness or injury.
99% of you have no idea where I’m talking about, but I’ll tell you anyway. I set off from mum’s cottage towards the sea, then ran north along the prom all the way past the pub to the end that we used to visit when we first lived here. From there inland towards Cliff Road and uphill to the haunted house we lived in after the divorce. It’s still called Rhiannon. Crossed the road to the bus station, then ran through a back lane and up the road we first lived on. Continued up that way past my first boyfriend’s house, through the estate past the school, and round the corner to take me past mum’s first post-divorce house. Down the hill from there towards the house dad lived in with the stepmonster, round the back alongside the playground and behind the pubs, and then past mum’s house-before-this. Tried to get from there on to the disused railway line but the path was closed so headed back through the houses towards the police station, and took a little detour past the converted station cottages where granny lived for a few years before she died. Out of that road, past the amusements, and back to the prom. Turned inland towards mum’s and nearly back to her cottage made a precise 4 miles at a significantly faster pace than I could normally run for that distance. Was it the sea air, do you think, or the catharsis?
Also, and more impressively, Tom ran The Marathon.
I have not run for a couple of weeks, which is a shame.
But I did find this, which made me cry laughing: http://mytightswontstayup.com/running/
And I have a plan. To run. And sign up for some races.
I managed 7k in 42ish minutes & enjoyed it! Considering a race. These new trainers are powerful..
I’m currently limited to about 7 miles, but I’m now seriously thinking about giving a marathon a go…. I know I’ll probably need to change my mindset to “get around” rather than “go under 4 hours” if I’m not going to break myself, but I’m starting to think I want to give it a try…. if for no other reason than to do some fundraising for my people. One of my friends – who ran this year for cystic fibrosis – has encouraged / shamed me by saying that plenty of people with CF and much more broken than me do it, so why not? I’d really like to do London if I can, but who doesn’t?
BTW Tom – well done. That’s a great time and a fantastic write up. Good work.
I’m very tempted, too. Definitely half next year. But if I’m going to do a full marathon I dunno if it would be London; the crowds put me off a bit. Maybe I’d like to do Paris or somewhere exotic. A girl can dream, right? Also, if you run round with me, you won’t break; I’ll pace you nice and slow 😉
You need to pick your marathons carefully – Nottingham, my neighbourhood, is basically an extension of the half marathon with none of the spectators to encourage you along the way. I don’t fancy that at all. London at least is a MASSIVE occasion (albeit obviously pretty hard to get into as it’s so popular). Brighton is supposed to be good too. New York sounds great, but I hear it’s actually a really hard one!
I’m open to suggestions!
I’m amazed at how many UK marathons there are. How can we find out which are the good ones?
Ah… obviously, as the uborka! running club, our marathon should be……
Budapest.
Reckon I could work up some cathartic energy for that one.
Thanks for the mention 🙂
Brighton, from all accounts, is a good marathon to do and none of the runners I know who’ve done it have said a bad thing about it. Paris is, well, Paris – but there were about 50k entrants last week so in many ways it’s more crowded than London. A lot of people speak fondly of Dublin – my mother walked it a few years back – and say it’s got a good atmosphere too.
A consideration about that UK Marathons list though – some of the events listed (like the EnduranceLife ones) are trail marathons rather than road – although ones like the Essex and Halstead marathon are mostly road with some flat trail (but an otherwise flat-ish course and small field of entrants).
I’m hearing good things about Chester and Bournemouth, as well as Brighton.