Kent Roadrunner Marathon

I wake up feeling surprisingly casual about the days events to follow. A few weeks ago I was quite worried about this race as I was determined that I obtain a respectable time. But as those weeks dwindled and I got closer to race day I thought more about the ultra training I have been doing. That means that I've been doing a lot of miles each week at a rather slow pace. That also means that I'm not very well geared up for todays marathon. Because today I'm doing my first ever official distance marathon and setting myself a shiny new first ever personal best for the marathon. You'd think I would have started with that but no, not me, I just went straight to the mountain trail races. So today is going to be different. 

I've been quite busy this week so came home in a rush last night panicking about getting ready for the day. Probably shouldn't have gone out for those three or four pints a couple of days ago either. Was that a bad idea? Is it going to slow me down today? A whole two days later? Oh well no point in worrying now. You see I'm quite...how do I put it?...anal retentive about race morning prep normally and with this being a speed race I'm no different. I rushed to pack my bag, cook a huge pasta carb load and then relax enough to get to sleep. But I did it so this morning all is well and I've woken up relaxed. I have a quick breakfast of four weet bix with hot water, milk and blueberries. It sounds a lot but I normally go for five so I'm restraining a bit. Believe it or not. I worry a bit though as my normal race day breakfast is two or three bananas on the way to the start, a protein bar just before and then a gel on the start line. I do this to avoid an upset stomach on the run. It's the bane of a runners life. And weet bix upsets my stomach. Although it is nice to load up on fuel and have the luxury of a race near home and the time to have a good breakfast. I then do my yoga routine to limber up. I should have got up early enough to do this at least twice and jump on the foam roller for a bit of one on one pain but oh well, I got a better sleep so that's got to be a plus. 

I then spend some time cutting out my pace bands. I entered the race at the beginning of the year as it's three weeks out from my first sixty nine mile Ultra so I figured I'd be in peak fitness to set a good PB for a road marathon. Normal prep for a road marathon is a twelve to sixteen week detailed and structured training plan so that you are in absolute peak fitness on race day. A lot of people will put everything into that one race for the year. Not me. I've gone about it completely the other way. In that training time I've done a couple of quite complicated hill marathons and an Ultra. So I've not done the interval training and speed work necessary for a speedy time today. So after finding out a fast colleague was a last minute entry to this seventeen lap race and aiming for 3:04 I started to worry that I was going to be lapped by him several times and lose morale. 

Course map. Image courtesy of TZ Runs.

Then as the day drew closer I accepted that I'm going to be slower, decided I could do another run tomorrow and put it down to being a bonus race for a bit of fun and a bit of speed training for the Ultra. Thus meaning I woke up on race day in a relaxed and casual mood. Perfect.

Jess is working today which is annoying as I'd hoped it was one she could come to when I entered. Being laps it's a good one for spectators so might have been more interesting for her than just waiting at a finish line for several hours for me to come home like the other ones. Plus it would give her the chance to see how much 'fun' a marathon can be. But she has to work. I wonder whether perhaps she asked to work after getting sick of my incessant ramblings on running these past months. I wouldn't begrudge her having done so that's for sure. It would be fair enough as my incoherent gobblings don't always tend to be very interesting.

She drives me down all the same and I'm two hours early. As the venue doesn't open for a while I go for a walk for twenty minutes to loosen up. Then I walk in and notice how even an hour and a half out there are already a lot of people here getting ready. I'm hit very suddenly by a very different atmosphere to anything I'm used to. You see, on a trail race everyone is smiling and relaxed and wanting to have a joke about. But here at a road race things are a lot more serious. People generally look very focused and determined. There are a lot of club runners here scouring and willing to scowl for a PB.

I get my number and chip tag. I tie it to my shoe. I put on the sixteen bracelets that I am to remove one on each lap. The first lap is shorter at two point three kilometres and the rest are all two and a half. I go to the toilet and start to worry about my breakfast causing upset. I put on my race belt with my four gels. I stick a pace band showing the time I need to clear each lap in for a 3:30 finish on my wrist. I put three more for five minute intervals on my belt for when that time starts to slip away nearer the end. I rip them off again and decide to just go on feel rather than splits when that happens. I chat to a friendly other runner who is going for 2:45. He has drawn his lap times on his arm to avoid the paper ripping from sweat. I worry that mine will rip away. I worry this guy might lap me more times than I'd like. I breath. I relax. What will be will be. He can lap me and it doesn't matter if my lap times fall off my wrist. I'm here for fun.

Pace bands. Image courtesy of TZ Runs.

My mate from work finds me and we chat about the day. He's feeling okay but not sure. We talk about the weather and it looks perfect. It's warmish and overcast. Perfect weather for running a marathon. His wife joins us. We make our way over to the start. It's not the start it's the runners area to set up tables and put their drinks on. I throw my bag down with my jacket poking out in case it gets too cold. Should I have put a base layer on? The wind is picking up now and I always wear a base layer in Britain. We backtrack towards the start. We divert to the toilet for one last nervous wee. We then get to the start. There is a row of fast looking guys clutching their Garmins and checking they're ready to race. We move a bit further back then enter the throngs.

The organiser gives a speech that we can't hear so well but he's commending a few people and then a roar goes up around a woman near us doing her hundredth marathon. She's asked to the front for a trophy and a clap. It's a nice touch. It points out that this race is not just for the speed demons. I look around the back of the field and there are all sorts of people out. It's good to see. I comment jokingly that it's always on the start line I need the toilet again even though I've just gone.

Before we know it we're off. 

We cross the start line, press play on our GPS tracking as we do so, then get cracking. 

We start off quite casual. My colleague mentions it's good to start a bit back to warm up as he typically does the same thing and shoots off too early and regrets it later. 

Getting cracking. Image courtesy of TZ Runs.

Then it snaps and we gradually increase the pace. After five hundred metres or so I'm informed it's time and he's away like a rocket. I'm going quite fast and can't quite believe how fast he casually shoots away. But it was good to do a bit together as I had expected he'd be closer to the front on the start line and we'd be racing separately other than when he laps me. I put my earphones in and press play.

Then I start to panic. I've increased my own pace and my heart is thumping. I don't feel like I'm going fast enough yet I feel like I'm about to pop a frigging hernia and I've only gone a few hundred metres. Can I keep this up for forty two point one nine five kilometres? I doubt my ability. I start to think road running is something I haven't trained for and can't do. I start to tell myself to give up now and save face rather than bother with this race at all. The music quietens and my tracking app tells me my first kilometre was four minutes and twenty two seconds. I shit a brick. I'm aiming for five minute kilometres as an average. I can't do it. I've gone too fast. I'm a slow and steady plodder. I can't go this fast. Pull out. Pull out. Pull out!

Too fast. Too fast. Too fast! Image courtesy of TZ Runs.

The music comes back on. I breath. I slow down for a few steps. I can breath a bit better again. I remind myself that there is always a panic at the beginning when the rest of it looms. My calm returns. Partially.

The field thins a bit and we round a few corners. I start to notice my surroundings a little better. It's a tarmac route and described as flat so great for a PB. As we come down the back side of the course the wind hits a bit and I feel a bit cold. Do I need that base layer that I didn't even bring? This side of the course is more down hill so I'm able to catch my breath a bit. But I'm still worried as my heart is still thumping. There is a few sharp turns then we are at the far end of the course coming up to the final bend before the long straight through the start and finish line to the top end of the course.

We round the bend and are faced by a sharp hill. It wakes me up a bit. I pass a couple of people and am reminded that hills are my strength. Then I wonder whether they're a good idea on a day when you're going for a PB. Hmmm. Probably not. And definitely not after fifteen or so laps. I'll probably be resenting this hill later on. This hill that is absolutely miniscule in comparison to my last race over the top of Scafell, the biggest mountain in England, yet I know is going to be a problem to hit at speed later on. 

That's the problem, I'm reminded. Speed. The Endomondo tracking app lady tells me my average pace has got slower. I'm now down to four minutes and thirty seconds. That's a bit better. But am I going to lose that long each lap? I didn't work out my maths before this. Where should I be? What should my splits be? I approach the finish line, I throw my first lap bracelet in the bin provided. I cross the line and the big timer tells me it's ten minutes and forty five, forty six, forty seven. I check my pace band and it tells me this lap should be eleven minutes twenty nine seconds. I'm around forty five seconds up on where I need to be. Is that good? Does it mean I've gone too fast and am going to pay for it later? I get a small boost from this but should I slow down?

Such were to be a lot of my thoughts for the next seventeen laps it seems. I approach the drink station and grab a cup of water. I try to scoop and drink on the run. I always, always run with my bag and take small sips as I need them. Without fail. I didn't bring it today to save a little weight and because I don't really need it. I choke on a mouthful, can't see where I'm going over the rim of the cup, only a few drops of said mouthful actually gets past this confusing concoction of calamitous mishap and the rest of it goes over my face. Some goes into my eye sharply and some goes just above to facilitate the drip of salty sweat into the other eye. I throw the cup aside, defeated. Fuck you, cup. Your come-uppance will come. Just you wait.

This is the first point I miss my trusty ten pound budget hydration bag. That price is including the bladder. Bargain. I've tried expensive alternatives but nothing has yet compared. I love you, crappy worn out bag. I miss you.

I dejectedly continue on this second lap and wonder how the hell I'm going to mange this thing without being able to properly hydrate. I can't restrict it to the seventeen times I pass that damnable table can I? I guess I'll just have to. Not long after this, as soon as I start to focus on something else, I reach for my hydration tube and find nothing their. Even my subconscious loves that bag. Damn. This is the second time in five minutes I miss it.

The wind hits again as we come around the winding stretches of the back of the course and I move from thoughts on my bag back to thoughts of my heart jumping in my chest. I forgot about that for a while whilst worrying about the water situation. It was nice. But now the looming demon arrives back to the forefront of my mind. So that's two things to worry about. Endo lady tells me the pace has slowed again slightly to four minutes thirty two seconds. My heart has a bit of a fit then realises he's not as pissed off at me as he was ten minutes ago. Maybe I can do this. Maybe I can keep it up?

Starting to get the rhythm? Image courtesy of TZ Runs. 

Finish line. Minus one bracelet. Check pace band. Should be twenty three fifty three. Look at big ominous clock. Twenty two thirty seven. One minute sixteen ahead. I'm increasing the gap. I wonder still if I'm going too fast and am going to pay for this later. I tell myself to stop worrying and just run. It works. 

I approach the dreaded drinks table again. This time I slow, grab a cup, gulp it down, throw the cup in the bin successfully and move on. Much better. I have bested the enemy and only lost a few seconds. I can handle that. Sometimes I think stops are a good chance to catch your breath so that you can then go faster and sprint off. I decide to use this methodology. It seems to work better for me.

At this point I lap a blind runner with a leader both holding on to an oversized bracelet like thing. I'm spurred on by this and want to shout that he's inspiring but also don't want to be patronising so hold off. I regret it straight after as this guy is obviously achieving something incredibly massive and deserves some kudos for it. Not long after I pass someone wearing a shirt saying he'd lost a hundred pounds. He's walking and has more to lose but I'm incredibly inspired by this determination also. A marathon is no easy thing even for those who've been able to train and it's inspiring to see someone like this making a positive change in life.

The wind hits me again on the back straight and I have warmed up sufficiently. I don't need the base layer. My pace is smoothing out a bit. My heart has stopped visibly trying to escape my chest. Lap three is a better time four me. I cross the line one minute and forty two ahead of schedule. I'm happy with that. I like having a bit of time up my sleeve and it means it's okay to bust up later on. I manage to get a drink again, this time from the table with the electrolyte replacement drink. It tastes like water with a faint hint of something. Like it's been sat in a plastic bottle in the sun then refrigerated for the runners. 

Sports nutrition still has a way to go on the flavour front but as that's not the point it doesn't matter. It's helping replace lost energy and will keep me going later on in the race if I take it in early on. I learned this the hard way on my first race. It was two laps of which the first I stormed, panicked, drank too much then ended up very sick and vomiting for the second lap. I wasn't going to make that mistake again today. No sirree. 

Lap four I cross the line two minutes twelve ahead and I'm feeling good. Endo lady as been keeping me updated well and the pace has stopped jumping as often and is smoothing out at around four minutes forty a kilometre. I realise that I'm currently increasing my lead on where I need to be by roughly twenty seconds a kilometre. That's a minute or so a lap. I like this. Banking time for when I bust up later and can't handle it. I decide that if I can keep the average under four forty five by half way then I could make the sub three hour thirty minute marathon. I cheer up and start to get confident. I pass the drinks table, chug the drink quicker and this time there are some Clif Shots Bloks. I grab one and throw it in my mouth and move off happily. Keep putting the fuel in now and I'll stave off the inevitable glucose crash later. I'm feeling okay now. What was I so worried about on that first kilometre? I'm even making friends with Endo lady pacing me.

Feeling okay finally. Image courtesy of TZ Runs.

Then at the back of this lap it strikes me that I might need the toilet. Just a little niggle but it instantly turns into a panic. If I go to the toilet I'll lose time. What if it costs me a minute and I finish a minute over my goal time? I'll hate myself. I can't handle it. What if I go then need to go again a few laps later? Would it crush my morale to have to go more than once? Or even just once?

I tell myself to stop being a baby and put into perspective that taking a small amount of time for the toilet is not going to be the final straw that ruins my year. Or even my race. My logical brain fights my panicked brain and arrive at the compromise that I won't go yet and see if I can hold it off until halfway. Then I shouldn't get uncomfortable again until the end. Is that acceptable, panic brain? Yes, I think I am willing to accept that logical brain. Both sides shake metaphorical hands and we move on together. 

I decide to, perhaps, go back to thinking normally and finish the lap. I'm ahead again. Get a drink, Shot Blok and move through the fifth lap. I even take the time to start planning my gels. I drop the first then decide to have the next after the eight lap. Then twelve. Then when I need it near the end. 

The toilet demon is staved off for a while as I pass the on course toilets. They seem to grin at me. It's like they're telling me to come take a little break. Relieve yourself. It'll only take fifteen seconds off your time, surely? I avoid it and carry on. Then I start to worry that it will get too much and I'll have to go half way through a lap. Acceptable on a trail race, sure, but probably not here to just stop on the side and wee for all and sundry to take a peek. 

I finish the fifth lap in fifty eight twenty two. Nearly three minutes ahead. I realise I'm nearly a third of the way through and it feels more acheivable. I get a drink and a jelly thing. I go to the toilet so that I can stop blowing it up further out of proportion to catastrophic levels. It's just going to the toilet. I feel good again. It was a smart move. Why didn't I just go when I first needed to two laps ago? Sometimes I wonder if I am, in fact, an idiot.

The photographers are now out at the 'showboating area'. I'd glanced over this in the race information but it now seems they have set themselves up nicely and even put an X on the spot they'll take the picture. It's a nice touch. There are a few of these nice touches already. I'm liking it. I'm feeling good. I jump up and click my heels together. The photogs whoop. I feel good. They say it looked good and try to give me a high five. I notice what he's doing too late on and reach back for it but miss. It's a fail but it puts a smile on my face so it's okay.

Showboating. Image courtesy of TZ Runs.

Lap six goes well. Lap seven goes well too. I'm getting a chance to focus on my playlist and enjoy the music. Endo lady pops in every now and then and informs me my splits are averaging well. I'm only losing a second or so every three or four kilometres. It's looking good. I cross the line after the ninth lap really happy and four minutes thirteen seconds ahead of schedule. Even with the toilet stop and the few seconds each lap to chat to my friend Drink Table I'm looking on target and that I will actually achieve my goal time comfortably. 

I smile for the camera once more and pop the jelly shot for lap ten in my mouth. I don't fully feel like it but learned a trick on my last race to just store these in my cheek. I do so now. It's handy. I can let energy in in tiny little amounts as I slowly eat it over half a lap. I round a corner. I inhale a small piece of said jelly shot that has made it's way into the main part of my mouth. I'm running a marathon and inhaling hard. The evil piece smacks into my throat and I can't tell if it's gone down or just lodged itself there. I choke, cough and splutter. Disaster. Is my entire race that has just started to look like it might be a success going to be foiled by a tiny fleck of hard jelly? That would have to be the most unmanly way to bow out of a race in the history of the world. I hate you Jelly. I hate you worse than Cup. At least he only stung a bit. You actually hurt. I can't even plot against you as you're now inside me.

Jelly bastard. Image courtesy of TZ Runs.

I regain control. I tell myself it's okay. I stop talking to the jelly. Keep calm and carry on. My pace hasn't even slowed. It's okay, Kissel, just carry on. Don't be an idiot. People inhale things they shouldn't all the time. It's fine. 

By the time I'm at the back straight I've regained my senses and my colleagues wife is again on the sideline cheering me on. She's been there a couple of times and it's a nice little boost. I start to wonder where he's gone though and whether he should have passed me by now. No point in wondering, though, run your own race.

The next lap he does pass me. He's still going at quite a clip and gives me a thumbs up to ask how I'm doing. I say I'm okay and ask after him. He just waves his hand from side to side. Even though mentally he may not be sure he's going pretty fast from what I see. The whole exchange only took five second before he was too far past me again. I wonder whether I could potentially go that fast if I trained more for road marathons. Then I remember that I'm running seventeen laps of an industrial looking cycle park and decide I'll stick to the trail.

A couple more laps go by and I'm close enough to the end to start the agonisingly annoying task that most runners do, of working out as I go where I need to be to stay on target. I try to work out how far I've gone rather than just on the laps. If in doubt, go back to the metric system. It's logical. Don't base it on random distances of laps. Or random imperial measurements for that matter. This works. At the end of lap twelve I'm around thirty kilometres through. I decide that I need to be averaging four minutes forty five at this point and can then lose around around one second per kilometre and still be under target. I'm still at four forty three and losing a second every couple of kilometres. And my maths is wrong as there isn't even the fifteen left that I worked that out on.

It's still looking achievable and I'm pretty late in the race. I start to imagine how far under my goal I can go. Two twenty five? Come on now, that's a bit unrealistic. A minute or three at best. But it still boosts me along.

Lap thirteen and fourteen come and go. By lap fifteen I start to falter. I'm losing a second every kilometre and am now still seven and a half kilometres or so. I'm over four fifty average pace. I can't hold it off. My glycogen runs out. My body has no more left in it. My mind starts to lose itself a bit from the lack of energy needed. Endo lady keeps putting the pressure on and I want to tell her to get stuffed. I want to shout at her to shut up. But I can't as the other people around me will think I'm mental.

I change my target as I realise the goal is not going to happen anymore. But I'm okay with this. I had never thought I could achieve it anyway. I like to set three goals for a race. One for a dream time which today is three hours thirty minutes. A second time of what I realistically think is possible which today is three hours forty minutes. Then the third is the outside time I'll be unhappy if I go over and that's three hours forty five minutes. Today I will comfortably still beat two of those and I'm still pretty happy.

But right now I'm in the hurt bunker. My legs are giving up and that panic demon I put to the side after a couple of laps is back. Then I come up on my workmate who has slowed to a walk. I call out to him and he tells me his groin has pulled. He's not feeling so good and is considering dropping as his time is now not going to happen and he's only here today to get a qualifying time for the London marathon which they cruelly dropped from three hours ten to three hours five after he did three hours five and six seconds this year.

I feel bad for him but he picks up on seeing me and decides to run with me for a bit. I don't want to dwell on how he feels bad at not getting there as in my eyes he's still running an incredibly impressive time and far better than anything I can do. He asked how I'm doing. I explain I've now busted up too and exeunt a few ineloquent expletives. It's nice to have someone to run with again and I'm even more glad to take my headphones out and shut Endo lady up. She's not my friend at this point. I'm hurting but we fall in and chat about working in sports and how it's nice to work in an area you're interested in outside of work as well after having done years in a terrible call centre it's been a good positive change this year.

He starts to go a bit fast and I tell him I'm going to fall back but he apologises and says I helped boost his morale again so falls back in with me. I tell him he's welcome to go on ahead but he's happy to stay with me so we go on like that and I'm genuinely happy for the company taking my mind off the hurt. We pass the line. He throws his last band away and I throw my second to last. A loudspeaker shouts from right next to us his name and that it's his last lap. It scares the crap out of me. 

We stop for water and I indulge in two cups this time. We continue on at a good pace and I'm glad to have a faster runner to stop me from slacking off at this point. We get through the lap, he peels off  to the finish and I continue.

I really throw my final bracelet in the bucket. I'm happy for this. Mentally it's a big step. The last one. Up yours, final pink bracelet, I'm better than you. I beat you. You may only be a little piece of rubber but you've been a cruel barrier these past three and a bit hours. I dislike you. Not as much as Cup and Jelly, but still quite a bit. I eschew the final chance to say goodbye to Table. He's been nice to me but he'll get over it. 

I round the final bends and I'm flying this last lap with abandon. I don't have to hold back anything anymore. I can drain the tank. I do. It feels amazing. I let loose and I'm grinning to myself. The wind is nice on the back straight again. Endo lady says I'm over my goal just but I knew that last time I passed Clock. I don't care anymore it's still a good day. And I notice here that's she's not been fully accurate anyway.

I come up to a guy who's flinging his arms about and throwing a tanty. I shout jollily that he's nearly there as I lap him. Then I notice he still has five or so lap bracelets on and I'm that prick who flys by patronisingly offering positivities. It's not intentional but I bet he still thinks I'm a prick right now. Oops. Not much I can do, though, so I carry on.

Sprint finish. Not particularly elegant. Image courtesy of TZ Runs.

I round the final corner. I climb the bastard of a barely-hill that, you guessed it, I've now grown to love and hate in a sadomasochistic sort of manner and approach the final straight. It's looking good for time and I've got a bit in there so I muster up a sprint finish to go under three hours thirty five and there is a lot of unexpected cheering at my doing this. It gives me a grin, someone throws a plate of a medal so heavy I nearly fall over round my neck, a photographer congratulates me on a strong finish and asks to take a photo and I sit down to have my timing chip removed.

That medal is HEAVY! Image courtesy of TZ Runs.

I'm done. I achieved a time that I never really thought was possible and I'm over the moon. I couldn't have expected anything better and considering I'm a trail runner completely out of his element I'm surprised at how I feel about the race. I expected to enojy setting a PB but to hate the race. The pace I can't keep, the tarmac hard on my knees and the boring ugly laps. I expected that. But it didn't deliver. There was support all round which was lovely and a lot of happy people achieving all sorts of inspiring goals. There was a race director who is obviously absolutely loving what he's doing. And somehow the laps didn't bother me. They were nice and I didn't even mind the view. It was a very different day to all the other ones I do but it was in the end absolute genuine fun. I'm surprised. 

I sit down with my workmate who's seeming in better spirits which is nice. The guy I met at the start finds me and informs of his third place which is great as he seemed a nice guy. A woman who has just finished comes over and cramps up to high heaven. We help her a bit. I tell her it will pass, I've had it happen, and just stay positive. Turns out she was the FV40 winner so good on her. We move off and head home and it's been a good day.

Overall splits. Gun time (chip time a few seconds faster). Image courtesy of TZ Runs.

But now I have to move on to my next bit of training. Tomorrow I aim for a second marathon. In as many days. Yup, I'm going to try for the double. I've no idea if it's possible but I have to try as I need the training before the big one in a few weeks. We'll see how that goes...