Once again I found myself at the start line feeling anxious about how my leg muscles were going to feel.
Last week in Hanmer I'd been concerned after overdoing my hill training. This week's concern was due to running two half marathons a week apart and whether I'd had adequate time to recover. As such I knew the St. Clair Vineyard Half Marathon was likely to be a hard one for me.
A mad scramble to Seymour Square to catch the bus saw me getting there slightly late but they had three buses waiting and only the first was leaving just as we pulled up. The next was waiting for another 5 minutes so I was in luck. +1 for the organisers, they understand that people can be late.
The day was shaping up to be very pleasant, quite warm for the time of year with a gentle northwesterly breeze and absolutely no need for the thermals I'd packed. This autumn has been unusually warm but I'm certainly not complaining after the summer we had.
There was plenty of time to prepare after getting off the bus. The gear tent was great, letting me bring a bag full of stuff and have somewhere to leave it. Another plus for the organisers.
There was a small problem though, they needed more loudspeakers as you couldn't really hear announcements outside of the start/finish area. I realised this in time to make sure I was hanging about in a place where I'd be able to hear the call to the start line.
The start signal came a few minutes late after the briefing and announcements... and not a lot happened from my position. Once again I'd put myself a bit far back in the pack and with 1700 entrants it took a few moments for everyone to get moving. No big deal yet as we hadn't passed the timing mat, but there was a bit of a holdup as we crossed the bridge which would have added a few seconds to most people's times.
Just after the bridge we turned into the first section of grape vines. There were quite a few sections during the run where we were running between the rows of vines and this was really why I'd come to do the race. I was actually surprised at how tall the vines are - they'd be over 2 metres. They always look shorter than that from the road.
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| Imagine yourself running through this! (Photo: Dave) |
The first section of vines was pretty short, then we got to run along a closed road and this is where I had the space to put my foot down a bit and position myself better before we entered another vineyard.
This is about where I really noticed that nor'wester since we were running almost directly into it. My legs had been hurting just a little since the start and it was already becoming a bit of a struggle to keep my pace going. I was looking at the watch thinking "this can't be right, I'll be well over 2 hours at this pace!" It didn't help that a few people were starting to pass me as we run along the first stop bank but all I could do was carry on and not push myself too hard in case I had trouble later.
I later realised (after the race) that once again, despite having done two years of mathematics at university, I cannot do basic arithmetic while running. My pace was actually just fine and I was worrying unnecessarily. I'll chalk that one up to experience.
A few nice breaks from that head wind came as we turned into the vines several times so we were running across the wind while getting a little shelter. I was still really looking forward to the point where we turn around and have that wind behind us.
That point eventually came after what seemed an eternity. After 10km of struggling into that head wind my legs had warmed up and were feeling much better but the rest of me was still having a hard time. And I was still a bit worried about my pace.
At this point we were running along the side of a road which gave a welcome bonus of a hard, smooth surface. Most of the runners were on the grass verge but I kept on the hard shoulder for as long as I could. My pace had improved quite a bit with the tail wind and I wanted to make the most of it.
A few minutes later that lovely tail wind dried up which meant that I had to do work again. This was pretty disappointing but it was about the time I reached the Wairau river which provided some more nice scenery to distract myself from the suffering. The stop-bank we were running along was very stony and I could feel chafing in the soles of my feet. Not much I could do about that except try and find a slightly smoother line.
With about 3km to go I increased the pace a little. Just a little, enough to start reeling in and passing a few people. As I came closer to the finish I naturally increased the pace further, thinking back to where I'd be at that point in my training runs.
I was expecting to have a good fast sprint through the finishing chute like the Hanmer half marathon but it didn't quite come out that way. Maybe I was just a bit more tired but I did get a lift from all the people watching at the end and I did get the pace up, but not to the same extent as Hanmer.
I crossed the line in 1:50:03 and I'm very pleased with that time as it's a few minutes faster than any of my 21km training runs. I was expecting to be slower than the Hanmer race because that one had the nice long gentle downhill for most of the second half, but in the end I was about 4 minutes faster. But I felt a lot worse during this one as I was pushing myself a bit harder, especially during the first half with that head wind. It seems to have been worth it though.
I'd have gone "officially" under 1hr50 if I'd had a cleaner start so I'm really not bothered by missing any "milestone". My next goal is more like 1hr45 anyway and that should be achievable without much extra training considering how quickly I'm shaving minutes off my times.
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| The reward, every finisher gets a bottle (Photo: Dave) |
After a bit of a warm-down and stretch I collected my bottle of wine then realised I didn't have much time to catch the bus. No time to get changed, just collect my bag and go. There were delays at the gear tent while the helpers searched for bags; it looked pretty well organised but they needed some more people there to cope with the queue.
Overall I'd enthusiastically recommend the St. Clair Vineyard Half Marathon to anyone. It's run on a course which is normally closed to the public, through vineyards that are scenic at any time of the year but even more so during autumn.
I'd love to do this event again next year but I can't guarantee being there due to its proximity to the Hanmer half marathon and the time & expense of travel and accommodation.
That night I put in my entry for the SBS Marathon (well, the half marathon event). I seem to have been bitten by some kind of a bug. Do I have a full marathon in me? Well, maybe I do... but not this year.
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