Day 309 - Hamsterley Forest Marathon

I decided to enter this marathon only a few weeks ago after realising Pamela and Emma were going to be in London for the weekend to see Mumford & Sons playing at the Olympic Park.

The Hamsterley Marathon is organised by the North East Marathon Club whose philosophy is to get back to basics with small, no frills events (I did their Newcastle Town Moor Marathon last year).

Because its a small event in terms of scale, though not distance!, in my head it was "just a marathon".....BIG mistake! The course is run on forest trails with a two mile Tarmac run-in followed by three loops, which include one, long hill. Spectacular views of the moors from the top, but in today's heat quite testing. Oddly, the hill felt much longer on the first ascent than the next two (though by loop three I was seriously flagging!).

I my mind I was thinking a 3:30 marathon would be good, but soon revised that to think 4 hours would be a miracle. Interestingly, I ran the first half in 1:55, the second only 5 mins slower. I think that was down to the second loop which just felt so much easier than the first.

I ran with 1.5 litres of Nuun electrolyte in my UltrAspire backpack but that ran out after 2 hrs 49 minutes and two miles from the top drinks station. Given that was two uphill miles I did panic a bit but made it OK and asked nicely if I could top up my Hydrapak (lots of runners seemed to be relying on the drinks stations, not carrying anything, which meant only six opportunities to rehydrate.........).

It was then a battle to keep going to the end and knowing I was dehydrated as my fingers were starting to tingle and then starting to go numb just as they did when I properly hit the wall in the Robin Hood Marathon a few years ago (Google it, hitting the wall is serious stuff, it's not just getting a bit tired.......).

Anyway, I survived, lost a few pounds (I'm lighter just now than I've ever been!) came in 13th, 2nd Vet 45 and added another marathon to the tally.

Not a bad Day 309 on the 365 challenge and, with 26 more miles in the bag the tally now stands at 1,751. 

Oh, I did I mention that this was a marathon just two weeks after the West Highland Way Race? Something I would never have contemplated, thought possible or indeed sensible a few years ago. OK, it maybe still isn't sensible, but powers of recovery are perhaps stronger than much running literature would have us runners believe....