There was a real buzz at the start, and I managed to say hello to Ironman legend Chrissie Wellington, who was also taking part – starting a bit further up the field than me! We set off in perfect running weather, bright but cool, bang on 6 am, complete with a piper to send us on our way. Steve’s plan was to drive to the finish at Tyndrum, go gravelling and wait for me to arrive. I guessed I wouldn’t be at my best after missing a few weeks of training through Covid, but was happy to give it my best shot. I knew that the first quarter or so would be pretty runnable, then the hard work would start after that. The race follows the first half of the West Highland Way, so covers 53 miles from Milngavie (just outside Glasgow) to Tyndrum with 2,330m of ascent. It’s an early start for this event – 6 am – so we tried to get an early night but for some reason I was paranoid about oversleeping, so didn’t actually get much sleep at all! The alarm went off at 4:15, and it felt bizarre to be applying sun lotion in the dark and cold, but the forecast was set to be warm and sunny. We were then issued with a race number, a timing ‘dibber’ and a wristband. All runners had been asked to provide evidence of a negative lateral flow test taken that day, which had to be presented before registration was allowed. After a carb-loading tea from the local chippy, registration took place at a nearby pub. Free long term parking was available for participants at the local rugby club, just ten minutes’ walk from the start, so we parked our motorhome there for the night. Steve and I travelled up to Scotland last Friday, as the race was taking place on the Saturday. It turned out surprisingly OK and was actually a great event, so the Fling was on! I really wasn’t sure what to do, so at the beginning of April I took part in the It’s Grim Up North Roche Abbey Marathon as my longest run before the Fling, and I told myself if I got through that I’d go to Scotland. I didn’t run at all for about ten days, and it took me another couple of weeks to feel normal again. All was going well until I (ironically!) caught Covid at the start of what should have been my biggest block of training. I had been scheduled to take part in 2020, but the race didn’t happen for the last two years due to Covid. I cut down my mileage and increased my strength work over the winter and then felt able to take part in the Temple Newsam Ten and the Snake Lane 10 – both great local ten mile events which helped to restore my enjoyment of running.Īs an ultramarathon, the Highland Fling at the end of April had been slightly hanging in the balance for me, but I decided to start training for it in January and see what happened. I won’t bore you with all the details of how I’ve got to this point, but luckily I’ve never actually had to stop running, which is great. The reason I haven’t posted much since last autumn is that I haven’t actually done much! But what I have done is learned to manage my dodgy hip, which had been bugging me for ages. Well hello! It’s been a while since I’ve blogged.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |