Take to the Hills (1) - Dentdale
During the week I made one of those stupid decisions. This time it was to do two scenic but hilly races this week and next week. So far I've only really done one proper hilly race, the Guy Fawkes 10 back in November. Other than that I've always tried to choose the flattest courses I can for my races. But on the basis that I wanted to do some longer races more for training than to get good times, I decided that some hills wouldn't be a bad thing. At least the scenery will be better than running round council estates in Hull, for example, and the hills should give me a bit of an incentive not to go off too fast and try to race it.
So today it was Dentdale which is, apparently, about 14.3 miles. It's not a standard race distance, just the distance it takes to get round the loop round the dale. A guaranteed PB! There were quite a few other people from running club doing it, which was actually almost a disincentive - when people I know are also racing it sometimes makes me run harder than I would do if I was genuinely treating it as a training run, because my pride won't let certain people beat me. But it gave me people to chat to before the start.
The weather was horrible. On the drive up there the dj on the radio was saying what a lovely day it was. Maybe in London, but in the Cumbrian corner of the Yorkshire dales it was grey, windy and rainy. Lovely. I suppose it was better than overheating. I took a rather scenic route along back roads because it look quicker on the map, I did wonder where I was going when I got to roads where you had to get out of the car to open and close a gate in order to drive through it. I also worried about the wisdom of the "scenic races" plan when I was driving up and down slopes that required me to change down to first gear. Luckily, those weren't part of the course...
Actually, it wasn't that bad. There was a nasty hill in the first mile, and a couple of nasty stretches in the last mile. Other than that it didn't do much more than undulating a bit. OK, it was constant undulation, but none of the hills were particularly nasty taken on their own. I found myself settling into a pretty decent pace, about 30 seconds per mile slower than my half marathon pace from Blackpool, but for a slightly longer, much hillier, race that I wasn't meant to be racing I was pretty happy with that. If I could run the marathon at that pace I'd be a very happy girl indeed.
At Brass Monkey one of the things that made my day was beating the main co-ordinator bloke from running club. I know he's not the fastest runner at the club (the bloke who is the fastest runner came 9th overall!), but he's also not bad, and he's a useful measure of my progress. His girlfriend is faster than he is, so he tends to start with her at a faster pace and then fade towards the end particularly on the longer runs. They overtook me in the first mile (on the hill, in fact), and I didn't spot him again until the last mile. When I first saw him I didn't think there was enough time to catch him before the end, but with a couple of nasty hills that I coped with better than he did, I managed to just about catch him, and overtake him, on the last corner less than 100m from the finish. Good job! I was also pleased that I beat one of the girls who is doing FLM. She's kind of what pushes me on from behind. There are people who I want to be as fast as, and there are people who I don't want to catch me. If she improves during her training for FLM, I want to be improving by a similar amount. It's nothing nasty, she's really nice, but I need motivation running behind me to push me on. Anyway, I finished about 7 minutes faster than her, so I was pretty pleased with that.
And at the end there was free food. A cheese sandwich, a scone and a slice of fruit cake. Better than a t-shirt any day!
Now, bring on the Welsh hills next Saturday. And 6 miles more of them too...
So today it was Dentdale which is, apparently, about 14.3 miles. It's not a standard race distance, just the distance it takes to get round the loop round the dale. A guaranteed PB! There were quite a few other people from running club doing it, which was actually almost a disincentive - when people I know are also racing it sometimes makes me run harder than I would do if I was genuinely treating it as a training run, because my pride won't let certain people beat me. But it gave me people to chat to before the start.
The weather was horrible. On the drive up there the dj on the radio was saying what a lovely day it was. Maybe in London, but in the Cumbrian corner of the Yorkshire dales it was grey, windy and rainy. Lovely. I suppose it was better than overheating. I took a rather scenic route along back roads because it look quicker on the map, I did wonder where I was going when I got to roads where you had to get out of the car to open and close a gate in order to drive through it. I also worried about the wisdom of the "scenic races" plan when I was driving up and down slopes that required me to change down to first gear. Luckily, those weren't part of the course...
Actually, it wasn't that bad. There was a nasty hill in the first mile, and a couple of nasty stretches in the last mile. Other than that it didn't do much more than undulating a bit. OK, it was constant undulation, but none of the hills were particularly nasty taken on their own. I found myself settling into a pretty decent pace, about 30 seconds per mile slower than my half marathon pace from Blackpool, but for a slightly longer, much hillier, race that I wasn't meant to be racing I was pretty happy with that. If I could run the marathon at that pace I'd be a very happy girl indeed.
At Brass Monkey one of the things that made my day was beating the main co-ordinator bloke from running club. I know he's not the fastest runner at the club (the bloke who is the fastest runner came 9th overall!), but he's also not bad, and he's a useful measure of my progress. His girlfriend is faster than he is, so he tends to start with her at a faster pace and then fade towards the end particularly on the longer runs. They overtook me in the first mile (on the hill, in fact), and I didn't spot him again until the last mile. When I first saw him I didn't think there was enough time to catch him before the end, but with a couple of nasty hills that I coped with better than he did, I managed to just about catch him, and overtake him, on the last corner less than 100m from the finish. Good job! I was also pleased that I beat one of the girls who is doing FLM. She's kind of what pushes me on from behind. There are people who I want to be as fast as, and there are people who I don't want to catch me. If she improves during her training for FLM, I want to be improving by a similar amount. It's nothing nasty, she's really nice, but I need motivation running behind me to push me on. Anyway, I finished about 7 minutes faster than her, so I was pretty pleased with that.
And at the end there was free food. A cheese sandwich, a scone and a slice of fruit cake. Better than a t-shirt any day!
Now, bring on the Welsh hills next Saturday. And 6 miles more of them too...
posted by YP at 7:03 PM
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