Wandering the World

Another week, another half marathon. Could I edge closer to being a sub-90 runner again, and beat Copenhagen and Cardiff? I certainly wasn't sure, but I was going to give it a go.

October 13, 2024

The second of the Super Half series, and one as close to home as we'd get. Though maybe races being closer to home don't always mean they're going to be easier to get to...

October 6, 2024

My fastest half marathon this year, so far, was at the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in London. It wasn’t the flattest of courses, but it was the closest I’ve been to a sub-90 time for a while. It really has been one thing after another since the start of the pandemic back in 2020, and my race times have been severely impacted as a result. Now I’m in my 40s I realise it’s going to be more difficult …

September 15, 2024

After last year, I decided I wasn’t going to do this race again unless they moved it back to March - a time of the year when it’s usually cooler. It hadn’t been fun last year doing it in such warm weather, and I didn’t want to risk a repeat of that. However, Carmen’s had done a workshop with some young people from work to design the medal and t-shirt for this year’s race, so I then thought I shoul …

September 1, 2024

The entire point of me entering this race again was to force me to run a half marathon between Boston Marathon and Guernsey Ultra 36. So in a way, this was like the first of two tapering runs from my long run at Boston, before my actual target race. With this in mind I didn't really have a target other than to finish the race. Ideally though, the time for doing so should be between 1hr30 and 1hr45 …

May 6, 2024

For today’s race I would be a the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park for a RunThrough event, and that meant travelling across London from the west, and an outrageously early start to get there. When we got to Liverpool Street we found the Elizabeth line wasn’t running very well, so was then a 14 minute wait for a train to get us to Stratford. We thought the toilet queue in Westfields would be better a …

March 3, 2024

The Winter Half in Milton Keynes is quite often my final race of the year these days. I’d hoped I’d have done my 50th parkrun yesterday, and would be going to MK on the way home from London, but due to circumstances outside of our control that was not to be. I didn’t really feel like racing, but this one is one that I do like to do every year, so wasn’t going to miss it. I was up at 06:15 for br …

December 10, 2023

I knew going into this race that what I’d consider a good time these days would be a big ask, and my best chance would be to try and go for a sub-1:30, and not push for better than that. My left shoulder had however been a cause of pain since Llanelli Half last weekend, and was not only at times difficult to move, but had also been keeping me awake at times. So the chances of that sub-1:30 seemed …

October 1, 2023

When I entered this race I thought I'd be doing it for fun, but then I heard that this was a relatively flat race and so would actually be quite a fast one. It could perhaps be a good chance to attempt a sub-90 again for the first time since before the pandemic. However, about a month before race day Carmen let me know they needed a 1:45 pacer, and as she would be pacing 2:15 at this race I figure …

September 24, 2023

I last did this race just before the global COVID-19 pandemic began in 2020, although I'd wanted to do it in 2022 as well I'd had to defer due to it being my Dad's retirement party on the same day. This year I was back, the even was still in September instead of having been moved back to it's normal date, and it would be Sir Mo Farrah's last London race in his career. Today was unfortunately a 05 …

September 3, 2023

I've visited the northern parts of Wales several times in the last 20 years, but haven't been along the south coast since 1991. I have running friends that weren't born last time I was there. It felt safe to assume that it’d have changed a bit in that time. When I saw that Swansea Half is a good race I decided it'd be a good one to enter, and would take a couple of days to look around too. Though …

June 11, 2023

I was up at 06:45 for breakfast and got ready for the race day ahead of me. Weather wise it was forecast to be a repeat of yesterday although it didn’t look like it. An hour later I was on the road to Milton Keynes yet again for a journey that takes about an hour so hadn't been worth staying over after the Rocket 5K. This time the parking bays I’d used previously were coned off, except for one, s …

May 1, 2023

My alarm went at 05:15 and I took my time getting up. As I had breakfast I watched the sunrise, and thought not just about last night but the day ahead. The forecast looked promising for the race, but hopefully it wouldn’t then prove to be too warm. Eventually, it was time to make my way to the race start. It was a very short walk from where I was, and I once again bumped into Jonathan and Liz, a …

March 19, 2023

It took me most of yesterday to decide whether or not I was going to bother going to Milton Keynes to run this half marathon. I wouldn’t be racing it so soon after the marathon, but I would still run it - I’d have been running 8 or 10 miles today in the cold anyway, so I may as well do the race I paid for, even if it means spending out on fuel and parking for it too. I was up at 06:00, and then af …

December 11, 2022

After a RunThrough race in Leicestershire was cancelled, I transfered my place to the only other race that really fit in with my calendar for this year, and that was a half marathon in Battersea Park, London. I'd visited there earlier this year for a 10K and had decided I'd want to run there again in daylight sometime as I felt it was a good route for a 10K PB attempt. That never happened, but I w …

November 12, 2022

This is a race I like doing as it's fairly local, and usually means a relaxed start to the day. It's also around the time of year where it can easily be cold, or wet, or both, so it can be very difficult to predict what the conditions will be like on the day. For the week leading up to this day we had a lot of rain, but we also had days where there was also sun that was uncharacteristically warm f …

October 30, 2022

I didn't really feel like racing today, but decided I may as well try, to see how things went.

October 16, 2022

This is one of those races I entered for fun, with very little thought going into it. I knew it'd be a three hour drive to Denbies for this one, but what I hadn't thought about was the start time. I'd thought it'd be 09:00, or even 10:00 which would mean I wouldn't need to be up too early. However, the race start would need to be no later than 08:30, and even then, that'd mean leaving home no late …

August 29, 2022

This was a bit of a last minute race entry for the Easter weekend. I did parkrun yesterday, my fastest since the start of the pandemic, and today was for getting some miles in. With shorter races for the next two weeks it'd be my last chance to get some decent miles in before Guernsey, and how better to do that than with a friend. I perhaps hadn't had the best night of sleep, and was having breakf …

April 17, 2022

My first race of 2022 was the Watford Half Marathon. Could it be a return to form, or would those days now be behind me?

February 6, 2022

Not my best half marathon, but not my worst either. Somehow I finished 92nd out of 1,471 runners with a time of 1:28:53. The best bit was getting to see friends again though.

December 12, 2021

With two more marathons now behind me, was there any chance that a half marathon could be anywhere near what I'd done before the pandemic?

October 31, 2021

My first time racing again since March, it was never going to be pretty; but seeing people would be nice…

October 18, 2020

Time for another go at running a fast half marathon… hopefully

March 1, 2020

This would be the third time doing this eace in the space of two years. With my half marathon goal achieved in March, and another PB attempt scheduled for March 2020; I decided that this race would be just for fun. I'd raced on Thursday and had put around 80-85% effort into that. As it was only a 5K my legs had mostly recovered; but I knew I couldn't go fast for the entire race. When I got to Wil …

December 8, 2019

Another year of doing this event, though this year treating it as a training run for Amsterdam marathon

September 29, 2019

My first half marathon in the year in conditions that were forecast to be bad. Perhaps I'd get lucky anyway.

March 9, 2019

One last race for 2018, and one last chance for a second half marathon PB of the year.

December 9, 2018

I've done this race four times, well, I've done the half twice and the full marathon twice. So when entries opened for 2018 I automatically entered it without thinking. Then I got into Chicago Marathon which would take place just one week after this. So this went from a PB chasing attempt like it was in 2017 to "should I even be running this?" as the time drew closer. Even on the day of the race …

September 30, 2018

A half marathon in Cambridgeshire, and another chance to chase that sub-90 time. How much would the UK heatwave affect the result?

July 1, 2018

My first trail half marathon, but in difficult conditions. It seemed the weather was making people run about 10% slower than normal, but despite this and a bad knee, I finished it!

April 22, 2018

Read my race review for Milton Keynes Winter Half Marathon, starting and finishing at Willen Lake. It was a fast course, and I found myself unintentionally coming out of it with a new PB, and being depressingly close to that elusive sub-90 as things didn't go entirely to plan

February 18, 2018

If you’ve read my previous blog posts then you might know that I’d got a few ambitious goals for 2017: sub-19 5K, sub-40 10K, sub-89 Half Marathon, 3:15 marathon, and to complete my first 100K event. My first attempt at breaking the half marathon goal was off the back of a minor niggle that had resulted in reduced training at the start of the year, which then led into a marathon PB – but missi …

September 24, 2017

I’ve not had a brilliant track record with attempting this race. In 2015 I wanted to do this, but it clashed with another race I was doing. In 2016 I actually entered the race, but couldn’t train at the time the race happened due to flu which was at it’s worse around the day of the race. It then looked like this race wasn’t going to be going ahead in 2017 after there was talk of the race organiser …

March 19, 2017

At the start of the year training had been going that well that I’d got a shinny new 10K PB during a training run and had been doing 10 mile runs on consecutive weeks in a little over an hour. It felt good, and I was confident of finally getting a sub-90 half marathon time so entered the Coventry Half. However, this is where my attempts at half marathons took a wrong turn. I never got to try the C …

October 23, 2016

I’ve seen the Great North Run a few times on the television, and a friend has raved about the atmosphere but others have also been cautionary about how crowded it can be and how unlikely I’d be to get a PB there. For me this race wasn’t about trying to PB, it was one I just wanted to enjoy. I’ve known about the Great North Run for a very long time, seeing it for the first time when at school (at t …

September 11, 2016

My original plan upon returning from my trans-Siberian adventure was to run a 10K and then do the Shrewsbury Half Marathon. I didn’t really know what to expect from this race; but after missing Coventry Half due to illness, and barely having recovered enough to run the Milton Keynes Half,  this one would be my first proper Half Marathon of the year. However, whilst in Moscow I managed to slip on …

June 19, 2016

I had planned to start the year with Coventry’s Half Marathon, but due to having the flu I didn’t manage to run it. It had been that proper, can barely move type of flu that isn't just a bad cold. Instead, at short notice I decided to run the MK Half Marathon a week later even though I could barely run yet. I knew it wouldn’t be a PB, and it’d be a case of just trying to get around as I still wasn …

March 6, 2016

Two half marathons in two consecutive weekends felt crazy. Sure enough though it was the sort of crazy that’d I’d be up for attempting. In some ways it would be like a practice run for my Spring 2016 plan, but with shorter distances. Although after the Great Birmingham Run my cough and cold lingered on – threatening to make this another struggle. Fortunately by race day though it wasn’t bothering …

October 25, 2015

Racing hadn’t been going great recently, and neither had training. After what I perceived as a failure at the Robin Hood Marathon I wanted to start getting back to where I was with running back in March. For October my plans included two back to back weekends of half marathons, the first of which would be this hilly one in Birmingham for the Great Birmingham Run. I had some idea of what I was get …

October 18, 2015

I felt incredibly under prepared for this half marathon – since the London Marathon the farthest I’d run was 11 miles, twice, but both times at a far slower pace than what I’d been running around London at. I knew a personal best was out of the question for this race so my goal was to just get around it. After all, it’d be nice to increase the distance again and would hopefully help with the marat …

July 12, 2015

After the Donington Park HM I'd planned to have a break from running for a few weeks before starting on training for the London Marathon. This didn't quite happen and instead I found myself working on an Advent running streak instead - this streak consisted of 24 runs in 24 days with none of them less than 4 miles, but some being around 13 miles. I then took about a week off from running over Chri …

March 15, 2015

This is a race I wasn’t sure whether or not I wanted to enter or not. It was one month since I did a marathon, and only a week since I last did a 10K race so I wasn’t that sure if it was a good idea or not. Since the marathon I’ve barely run, and my longest distance since then was only 10K – so I felt a little underprepared to do my second Half Marathon. When I did the Robin Hood Half Marathon it …

November 23, 2014

Although I still hadn’t run a race at the time I entered for this Half Marathon in March 2013, I thought it would be a good idea to have what seemed like an ambitious goal to aim for. I also thought that if I wanted to try a full marathon then this would be good training for that. So on the lead up to the 6 mile run for Sport Relief, my first event, I started to plan a programme of training for th …

September 28, 2014