Newcastle Town Moor Marathon

or Newcastle moorathon as we were calling it.

After dreading this race last year and then finding i enjoyed it i decided to revisit it and try and beat my time. After getting offers from 3 sets of people to take me down there i finally decided Alistair should be the (un)lucky one to have my company. nice to be so popular though!

Had a perfect Saturday morning then got home & spend rest of day ensconced on sofa. I'd had a sore throat since Wednesday and it got worse as week progressed to the point of me coughing my guts up every 10mins or so.Things wre not looking good for this race at all! Had some lemsip (disgusting stuff) and some paracetamol spent day watching football then had early night. Up at 5am and after bath a cup of tea felt not too bad.Not great, but not too bad either.

Alistair arrived at 6 prompt and off we set for Newcastle Got lots good luck txt on way down, people thought i was mad to even consider running it after way i'd been feeling but hey ho nothing ventured nothing gained. I could always pull out.Arrived in car park and it was raining, this set mood for rest of day. Hugs all round from loads of familiar faces and special hug from Phil who ive not seen in Way too long quite frankly. Popped down to bandstand where Lesley, Helen and few others had set up fetchpoint, hats off to them to stand cheering us in that weather!left bags and drinks there. Al decided he wanted to wear a tutu, so he got one off Helen and ran in it lol!




Wasn't too long before we were called to start and we were off.Yikes it was wet, huge puddles and a mud bath at certain points. The hill was only real part you run on grass and it was like a bloody ice rink, i tried running on side where it was less muddy but my poor wee adizeros were not coping well with it at all! Really wished i'd worn my roclites & my sealskins. My poor feet were soaked to bone!
Still i ploughed on. weirdly i hadn't coughed at all since i started running, wasnt complaining though!

I had my rain jacket on for first lap and Alistair's cap but i discarded both ot fetchpoint which was based at bandstand again. This was a 5 lap course so i could easily pick it up again if needed.I rather like the lap thing as it was great to highfive folk on way past and it kept you motivated when you saw folk all time. The rain was relentless, every time i got into most exposed part of the moor it got torrential, sideways in face and just awful. Heyho,i wasn't expecting great weather in middle of moor in November!

What i genuinely dont get is walkers in marathons, i dont mean people who take a walking break, i mean those fast walker folk. I think the guys doing it were part of the 100marathon club and i guess they were adding another notch to thier belt, i just dont get it. I cant see point in doing marathons for marathons sake, each to thier ow though...

The Marshall's were brilliant, really cheery and supportive. The hill got worse every time i went up it but i was on a countdown by saying we hey, only 4 times more, only 3... etc By time i was on my 4 lap i was starting to lap people! me, lap people!
By time i got to hilll for last time i was taking a few walking steps, it was so slidy i was convinced i was going to fall ,soon found out it was harder to stay upriht walking though so just ran again.

I also knew at this point i was going to PB so i reckoned it wouldn't do me any harm to walk a few steps.I was soon running again though and then powering back down hill, After looking at my spilts my last mile was at 8mm. woop!:o)

Passed fetch point for last time and headed up the river, sorry path towards finish line. Crossed line in 3.45.59 official time shows it as 3 secs later though so i guess its 3.46.02. Either way its a PB of around 12mins. Not too shabby for those conditions and my poorly body doing everything it could to scupper it! Not forgetting the Ultra last weekend.Got over line and started coughing like i smoked 60 a day i was hanging onto fence whilst folk looked on in horror.
Popped to bandstand to get my bag back and headed off to get changed whilst Phil got me much needed cup of tea. Took about an hour to start to thaw out everyone was in same boat though. After watching some of prize giving we headed off to pub for some lubrication, where it was all warm & cosy. Great to see everyone and many thanks to all those who stood out in the cold wet moor for hours upon hours cheering us on and handing out goodies and hugs. Huge thanks to Al for chauffering me.

Got home around 7ish exhausted. In bed early again with strange sense of foreboding. It would seem that once again I've been too trusting too naive and just plain utterly stupid. I should've learnt by now that people lie and will tell you what you want to hear.

C'est la vie.I should be used to it by now.

No more races this year.That was my first Marathon this year & I'd forgotten quite how hard they are! Give me an Ultra any day. Legs were really sore last night and i had dreadful sleepless night coughing and fidgeting. Feeling better this morning though and I'm glad i have day off to just chill out. although sometimes it's best to be busy and distract your mind from other stuff.

Next weekend I'm down at Old Trafford with Stephen, need to start my Christmas shopping too. Christmas lights go on in Edinburgh on Thursday, i love seeing them. so I'll probably go then and it might put me in proper Christmas mood.