The alarm went off at 0700, crawling out of bed I peaked out the window and saw snow!  That’s right 2 inches had fallen overnight, for those in the Northern US, 2 inches of snow does not sound like much but this is the UK. Rain, fog we can handle that and we get a lot of it, but snow…

A race spanning 20 miles has to many points to cover so I’ll break this down into, The Ice, The hill at 8 miles, The horse, The blowing snow and The hill at 18 miles. From there it was an uneventful day.

THE ICE:
We started the run in a local park, 458 runners showed up to run in a very organized event. Half mile down the road we made a left hand turn on to the side streets taking us out into the country when we faced the first challenge of a very challenging day….ICE.  And not just a patch of ice, the whole road was iced over. The streets for the next mile or more were covered with black ice and a thin layer of snow. Tip toeing alone at 11 minute per mile (mpm) pace all I could think about was “do not fall Brian, the pack will crash all over you.” I could just about see the headlines and Dan Rather reporting “100 runners hurt when Brian falls down in the middle of Bury 20, details at 11.”

THE HILL @ 8 MILES:
Why I keep signing up for “undulating runs” I’ll never know, what does not kill you makes you stronger?  The course profile (see below) showed a route having more hills then flats, but I was ready. Nearly 7 miles in, my breathing was good, pacing was good and I truly felt in great shape, until the hill at 8 miles.  This mini mountain, climbing nearly 40 meters in little over half a mile, this hill felt and looked more like Everest. The only thing it lacked were Sherpas to guide us to base camp, cause we had the snow and ice. I attacked the hill with a controlled paced; I did not and could not give up to much energy this early on. Half way up, I began thinking about power walking up the last quarter; I remembered my running mentor telling me this was a good tactic, even though it worked against my male ego wanting to run the entire route. “Okay legs...let walk.”

THE HORSE:
At 14 miles I had conquered the majority of the hills, controlled my pace and was beginning to feel confident about the run. I was running with a pack of about 4 others making good time when I noticed a gal riding a horse in front of us, maybe 100 yards out. As we approached the rider, I figured she would be able to position the horse so that we would not frighten the animal. At 20 yards, she moved the horse to the left side of the road and I felt we were safe. At 10 feet the horse nervously jerked around then stomped a few feet and moved our way. Now even though I was feeling good, if the horse wanted to stomp me, I did not have the ability to move out of my own way let alone a 2k pound beast. “Oh man…I’m going to be killed during a 20 mile run.” Some how I saw the end of my life a little different then this...  Escaping I headed on down the road.  Later on, I could hear the sounds of the horse coming up from behind me. “Oh great the horse let me get away and now it is coming back for his revenge.” Lucky for me the horse passed without further event and pulled over right in front of me. "Great, my luck this thing is going to pass gas or drop a load…what a great view!"

THE BLOWING SNOW:
After settling down from my brief encounter with death…and the south end of a north bound horse…we ran out into the open roads…when I noticed the white flakes blowing into my eyes.   "Man its snowing…I hate snow!"  The wind was picking up…the temps were dropping and the snow was blowing…what a good day for a 20 mile run.  Sign me up for more of these, let's just do them in Hawaii.

THE HILL @ 18 MILES:
At this point I had survived ice, the first of the many hills, an encounter with a horse and the driving snow. What else could go wrong?  Not much right, my pace was good, I had a real chance at finishing under my Marathon goal pace of 3 hours 28 minutes, and not much was going to get in the way. That was until I rounded the corner and got my first look at “The hill at mile 18.” All I could think was “at 18 miles how could they give us another hill to climb”… I tried to keep up my pace, “put one foot down and then other” became my creed, “breathe Brian,” became my next. Finally ¾ the way up I just could not keep up the battle...my run turned into running shuffle and had dropped from 9:41 to 10:30 to 11:20 mpm and ended in power walking the last quarter mile of this hill at 13:00. "Oh man I’m walking again"…outside of walking through the water stations (my plan of attack from the beginning) I wanted to run the entire 20 miles, but now I had walked up the last quarter mile of 2 hills. Cresting the hill I picked a tree along side the road that was my target, that was the mark I would us to begin my running attack again.  My body and now my ego had taken a beating…but the run was not over.

With less than two miles to go…I finally felt I was going to make it. I had conquered the hills, the hose, the snow and my own ego. With the end in sight I was able to pick up the pace and head for home….at 3 hours 15 minutes and 30 seconds I was done and nothing was going to stink up my day!

Run Hard…and keep an eye on the horse.
Brian