Time: 53:51 [Results]
Category Position: 199/970
Gender Position: 381/1836
Medal: Yes
I can’t really say I was looking forward to this race. My speed has taken a back seat during my ‘training’ for the Paris marathon, and this has been a pretty crappy week.
My grandfather was diagnosed with stomach cancer in October, 2011, and told he had 3-6 months to live. Our entire family went to visit him and my grandmother for two weeks over Christmas, when I started this blog. He wanted to make it to his birthday in February, 2012, which he did, as well as his next one earlier this year.
About 2 months ago, his health began deteriorating, and he was given weeks. My mother flew out to be with her parents, and kept us all informed about his condition. He went from being able to eat a few bites of food during mealtimes, to unable to eat, and finally, at the end of last week, to unresponsive. We knew that it was just a matter of waiting by this point. Early on Monday morning, however, my grandmother was hit by the news of her brother’s unexpected death. Just hours afterwards, my grandfather passed away. My great uncle’s funeral was on Thursday, and my grandad’s on Friday.
Obviously this has been a rough time for my family, and, naturally, nature loves to hit you when you’re down, because for the first time since pretty much this time last year, I’ve been sick. All of this has been a recipe for sleepless nights, and living on toast – absolutely not ideal preparation for a race that I had considered using as an attempt to break 50 minutes for the first time in years.
Unfortunately, the Baker Hughes 10k is not a cheap race to enter, despite it being just a 10k, and, since last year, offering no goody bag. It’s also literally a 25 minute walk from my front door, and just across the road from my gym, which makes it far too convenient to NOT run. Despite every fibre of my being wanting to stay in bed, I begrudgingly got dressed, drank a smoothie, and headed for the ‘event village’, where I met up with some friends:
Photo: Susan (always in purple)
We all took advantage of the nearby hotel’s bathrooms, and about 15 minutes before the start, headed towards the pens. I was not feeling confident, but Ronnie and Teri both dragged me into the 51-55 minute pen, while the others went to the 55-60 minute pen. We weren’t waiting long before we started moving forwards and then we were off on what I have got to say is one of the least interesting courses I have been on in Scotland. The fact that I run along parts of the route regularly may have skewed my opinion, as might the fact that this was the 5th time I was running the race, but there are just so many nicer parts of Aberdeen that could have been used instead.
Anyway, Teri, Ronnie, and I all set off together, but Ronnie, obviously regaining his fitness and speed, slowly pulled ahead. Although I was trying to ignore my Garmin, I caught a peek at my heart rate which was in the 180′s. It is usually not in the 180′s unless I am pushing myself to the limit, but I was just keeping it under 9 minute miles. I probably should not have been running.
Teri stuck with me until about 6k, but she was feeling good (probably as a result of the six – let me repeat for effect, SIX – coffees she had consumed before the start) and she sped ahead (eventually overtaking Ronnie). Meanwhile, I tried to ignore my heart rate, the three people I passed at the side of the road in a bad state, and a very persistent urge to sob, and trudged onwards.
At the 400m sign, I felt like I would struggle to reach the end. At the 200m, I sprinted to the finish line, overtaking around 20 people, and dodging some woman’s projectile vomit as I came over the timing mat. She looked how I felt, and I collected some water and my medal, found Ronnie, and had a bit of an emotional episode, which I can only apologize to him for.
Once I’d sorted myself out, we went back to the finish to cheer on people we knew, watched Carolyn win her age category prize (again – she’s very fast), and then collected our stuff before walking home.
I’m glad to see the back of this week. Dormire bene, Nonno. x
