To be honest, I’m slightly surprised and very chuffed to be writing this post. After all the ongoing issues with my foot I really didn’t feel there was much chance of me racing again. Although if you’ve been following my training over the last 4 months, it was something I held a hope out for.

The why

I’d picked Congleton as an event for several reasons. I’ve previously run the half marathon three times plus back in 2006 I ran the quarter marathon, a distance that you rarely see these days as it’s basically an over-enthusiastic 10km (6.55 miles as opposed to 6.2 miles). It was also in early October which gave me 4 months to drag my body off the couch and into some structured training. Timing wise it benefits from the generally OK autumn weather and being in Cheshire it’s not hilly, although it does finish with a tasty little climb. It always used to be called ‘the sting in the tail’ but it seems that moniker has been dropped now. Perhaps a marketing issue…….

Another course tweak

The course itself has changed over the time I’ve revisited it. The old route was a proper circular route which was then replaced with a lollipop style route. And it appears that since I last ran it in 2016, the start and end has been moved about a mile away from the High School, where the race HQ is, and over onto a new road near a new estate of new houses. So this is the third version of this race I’ve done.

But where is my fitness now?

Despite being well-prepared through a summer of structured training, I felt equally unprepared; back when I used to race, I could generally turn up to a half-marathon and run roughly the same time each time, really without thinking too hard. Sure as I got fitter (post 2015) these times got slightly quicker, but it was all quite predictable.

Whilst in training I did get myself up to 13 miles, I had followed the more current guidance of keeping the long runs slow and factoring in specific speedwork. As opposed to running at my HM race pace all the time. Whilst I’ve done significantly faster workouts this time around, the idea of stringing a load of quite fast pace throughout 13 miles left me with a definite uncertainty.

Too slow and I’d feel I hadn’t done it justice; too quick and the risk of imploding after about 9 miles was very real……

I genuinely went into the race with no actual idea how fast I would complete the race. Garmin’s race predictor was in the region of 1h31-1h33, but that always seemed a bit too optimistic, at least at this stage of my fitness rebuilding.

Instead, I settled on 1h35 as an absolute best-case scenario, or 7.15 min/mile pace. A far cry from my previous level, but I’m over 5.5 years older and more broken than I was last time I entered a road half-marathon.

I met up with some of my Lyme run leader colleagues at the event which again was a first as in the past I’ve always done this event alone (as I did with most of my races, because that’s just how I did things back then). I’d kept my race entry very guarded for the simple reason I was feeling very uncertain and self-conscious about the whole thing. Whilst it may seem odd given I used to race half marathons very regularly, but with such a long break, plus with the issues with my foot and loss of fitness,  as I’ve discussed in previous posts, my confidence was far from what it used to be.

Race day, event t-shirt and a wander to the start

Race HQ was exactly as I remembered it, although they had posted out the race numbers in advance this time around unlike in previous events. As it was something a bit ‘special’ I decided to order a race t-shirt although having received it I’m not that impressed as it barely mentions what the race is (it’s written in black font on the back) and is instead much more an advert for the sponsors (including Bargain Booze!).  And whilst the main logo was the number 40, representing the 40th running of this event, it wasn’t exactly clear what the 40th anniversary was of. It’s a shame as I’ve seen their t-shirt in 2022 which was basically the same format but prominently highlighting the event that it was in aid of.

We followed the signs to the start which was where I realised that my confidence on having run the route in the past was premature; clearly the lions-share of the route was the same, but I suspect the road on which we started was probably a field back in 2016!

There were pacers too which there weren’t 8 years ago, not that this was any help to someone who really wasn’t sure about their planned pace. My best-case 1h35 put me bang in between pacers and I decided to commit to this as a plan, being midway between the occasion I ran the race immediately after working a night shift (bad idea!), whilst accepting that the time I managed last time was out of reach. For now at least.

After a quick race briefing (of thank you’s) we were suddenly off and for the first time since 2019 I was involved in a road race. Weirdly I locked into a pace almost immediately which felt OK, but I was very conscious that running a HM was generally quite easy in the first 90 seconds, but get it wrong and it’s a world of pain later on.

Side note, I am aware of pace pro on Garmin, and thought I had that set up. But I couldn’t find it so decided that running on feel was the best alternative.

The first mile was fast, mostly due to the decent which we would be returning up at the end of the race. I clocked where it was so that I could manage my expectations in mile 12 and settled into my pace. Which, according to Garmin, varied a lot although I wonder how much that is GPS rather than reality. A few people pounded past me which was fine; they’re running their race, I’m managing my own. Interestingly they all stayed within sight though and in fact I ran the vast majority of the half marathon being able to see them; they hadn’t accelerated off into the great beyond.

The marshals on the course were brilliant. Really enthusiastic and supportive, just what you need. I do love races that are that bit smaller like this one, with less than 500 participants. The huge events tend to become (in my opinion) hugely impersonal and feel less about the running and more about how they can extract the maximum funds out of everyone involved. Which is the reason I stopped doing them back in 2013. The feel of the Congleton HM is very much a running event, for runners, by runners. They might have even used that term on the literature (or I might have made it up, I’m not sure) but I’m all for it!

The route was definitely not quite as it used to be. Around the 9 mile mark there was a series of switchbacks and running around a church that I don’t remember in the past. But the route was very pleasant all the same, on generally quite country lanes (the start/end was on closed roads but most of the rest was limited traffic) and felt very safe, which is always good.

Towards this point in the race, I started to catch up with the folks who passed me at the start, but never actually got fully away. I wasn’t running any faster, indeed I was definitely hurting by this point, but tried to focus on my form, my breathing and generally managing my body as much as I could.

In fact the last of those runners I passed was just before we headed up the final hill. Again, knowing it was coming and how long it was meant that I could focus on getting up without having a meltdown; always a good thing. I hadn’t been keeping much of a check on my per-mile splits in the second half of the race, it was all about getting around intact. At the top of the hill we were back into the open countryside but the finish line could be seen, off to the left.

The last half mile seemed to go on forever whilst I waited for the finish gantry to actually present itself. I passed a few other people on this last stretch as I tried to maintain form to the end (accepting I probably looked like a set of 4 limbs flapping around in the wind by this point) and got over the line without any idea of my time. It might have been on the gantry but I didn’t notice it if it was!!! But on stopping my watch it took me just over 1:36 to complete the race (official chip time of 1h36m7s).

Performance-wise I was happy with this. Of course it’s frustrating to have the  thoughts about my speed and performance relative to where I was pre 2019. The effort today was harder than I ever remember half-marathon racing in the past and that was to get a time ten minutes slower than what I could do back then.

But life has happened, my fitness has been allowed to drift due to all that has happened in the intervening period. And to be honest with the problems with my foot, I wasn’t sure I’d ever be able to do this again. Hence everything now needs to be considered as this point going forward, rather than moping about what a younger, fitter and more mobile me used to be able to do. As such, having gone into the race with no real idea about how it would pan out, it was nice to feel I’d run hard enough to get a good result but without blowing myself up out on the course.

It has been interesting looking at the photos taken on course as my body mechanics do appear to have changed, although I’m not sure why. I appear to over-pronate now whereas previously I was more neutral or even under-pronating. So I don’t know whether this is the cause of the foot issues, or the result of them!

Post-race thoughts

I feel now like I have a new benchmark time of where I am at with my current fitness. I do need to do a lot of work, mostly on S&C, over the winter but at least the work I did over the summer has paid off with a result I’m happy with. Yes it’s a minute slower than my “best hope” time, and about 3 minutes slower than Garmin’s race prediction time, but this is a real result actually achieved, rather than something estimated or extrapolated.

As always, I’ve enjoyed my race at the Congleton Half Marathon. I’d certainly recommend the race if you prefer smaller events whilst having all the great set-up courtesy of the race organisers.

And on that note I need to book a sport massage (and I know it’s going to hurt!)