Silent Hill…

Actually plenty of hills. 5 loops of 5 miles and on the beginning one small one. Nice route, some in the forest, some on the road. Very enjoyable course. Even with incline of (depends of application) 500 to 700 metres. That was another back 2 back for me. Second week in the row. This time I have run twice same route on both days – Saturday and Sunday. Starting at 8 AM in Avondale House Park in Rathdrum. Not too far away from house but still one hour drive. So it was early start for me on both days. First day I went there with Cezary cause he and his family was staying with us. To get there at 7:30 AM we had to leave house a hour earlier. We knew that there was a good chance of getting lost on the way down so we had make sure that GPS is working. Actually two GPS’s. Arrived there on time, still with some time to spare. Plenty runners there. Most of them have already run for at least one day but plenty had two marathons in their legs. Registration was quite quick. Got number 260 and then 262 for Sunday. Straight away I knew that I will amend my number and will run my 50th marathon with slightly different bib. Sunday, 50th marathon. On my bib I added up some small details. Instead number 262 I was running with 26,2. Marathon distance. Small other addition like ’50 done. Half way there’… Ok, back to important stuff.

During registration I have checked map of the run. It was really complicated. Sometimes same part of the road run one direction sometimes other way. There was very short but still part where you were running 3 times during same loop. Confusing? Yep. Especially if you haven’t run that marathon before. After start we had to run small loop. I wanted to keep my steady pace. GPS signal as we were informed wasn’t great there so I wanted to run listening to my guts. There was no sub 3 runners so from beginning I was in the front and… and had to stop three times on the small loop (1 mile distance) cause haven;t got a clue where to run. Lost probably 30 seconds. Small loop was really bad marked and marshals not very helpful. It just made me angry. Angry run… Grumpy rest of the race. Was trying to keep my pace. Little bit slower on the inclines and faster on the declines. Actually, I think that run went so well cause I was little bit angry and wasn’t running with GPS. My only checkpoint was an end of each lap where was watch and distance which I should have covered at this stage. Each loop was starting with downhill on the longer stretch followed by small incline and relatively flat 1.5 km part. After that longer part of incline on the tarmac with route turning back into forest down the hill. Another stretch in the dense forest slowly up to road which leads steep down and then steep up. Some flat in the forest again, followed by downhill and short steep up. And again steep up… Flat, up and flat to loop finish. After disappointment of the small lap the rest of distance – 5 loops of big ones – weren’t too bad. That part was marked ok. Saturday was for me little bit lonely day. I was in the lead from the beginning till the end of the race. I was little bit surprised when I saw my time. Just over 3:17. Besides track marathon that was my best time this year. How? No watch and my angry mood. Had to wait for Cezary little bit. He has finished well below 4 hours. Didn’t know that he had car keys in the bag left on the finishing line and was waiting and waiting for him. I was getting cold. Was happy to finish in such a time. And have planned to go slowly next day. Relax and enjoy my 50th marathon…

I wasn’t planning to do big fuss about my 50th marathon Not many people knew about that. Probably just a dozen of them. That day I was running alone. Cezary with family went back home. Same time of start so it was again early start to the day. Even that it looks that Wicklow is quite close to our house but still couple minutes of travel. So, I was there. Waiting for the start of my another back to back mararthon. I was waiting for my 50th marathon. Couple new runners on Sunday. Some of them run day before in Portalington, some of them just came to run that one marathon. And still many runners came back for the 4th run. I think that Sunday was that day were number of runners was the highest. This time I was prepared , I knew the route and was hoping that I won’t get lost or need to ask for directions. Just to let you know I made it without getting lost during the run. As I was mentioning before I didn’t want to race and started run in the group of three chatting away. During that talk I got that my two companions are trying to get actually great times. First one was treating that marathon as a preparation for Longford marathon, which he was planning to run in 3 hours. With my times I’m not even close to that result so knew that it doesn’t make sense to race against that guy. Second runner was trying to finish in 3:20 – 3:30. He was looking for someone who could pace him for that time. After 2.5 km I just let them go. Decided not to increase my pace just to catch them. I wanted to keep same pace throughout whole run. And must admit that I did that. On the laps number 1, 2 and 3 I could see that gap between leading two and me was getting bigger. I was happy that I wasn’t trying to catch them, that I was keeping my pace and was running my race. I felt great, wasn’t expected that on this back to back. Day before I was running quite fast on the course which had so many hills. Forth lap was a different story. Everyone was tired already. Have felt that my legs are tired. Especially when running up the hill. But have noticed that distance to two in front of me is getting smaller. I was tired as well but it looks that I was in much better shape compared to them. On the last hill of 4th lap I have passed both runners and comfortably continue my race. Energy levels were high. So last lap was a pleasure for me. Again I wasn’t running with my watch and again was really, really surprised when saw the clock at the finishing line. At first I thought that it has to be a mistake. But have check my watch on the wrist and it was showing same time – 3:14:28. Nice surprise. That was my best time this year. Better even than one I got during track marathon… 50th maraton, good time. Got couple taps on the back. I think I deserved these. Said thank you and went to the car. Was thinking about putting the results into spreadsheet. Excited? Yes. Ready for the next week chaleenge? Wasn’t sure about that. But you won’t know until you try…
At this stage I have competed 50 marathons or ultra runs. Run 50K, run 50 miles, run 100K. It’s time to face THE TIME not THE DISTANCE this time. Too much time in previous sentence but that what I will be facing next week. Am I crazy? No, I’m just ‘mad IT runner’…

Pictures taken by 7 marathons in 7 days challenge photographer: