Sub 3

Wardi

All the best for Sunday TGO & Menn.  My only advice should the damp forecast come to pass, don't worry about it!  .. it was chucking it down at the York marathon last year before, during & after the race.  Not ideal but I didn't mind it once I got going and it turned out to be my best run in a few years - maybe in a hurry to get out of the rain .  FWIW I wore a cap to keep the rain out of my eyes.

Padams.. that's a cracking run off low mileage, nice one!

Jools.. good to see you racing again & that's a solid run to build on.

Charlie.. good miles for a work trip, and good luck with the shoe surgery!

LMH/TR.. yes get it done tomorrow, might as well 'enjoy' it if you can. 

I'm ticking over while suffering yesterday and today with the arrival of either a cold or severe hay fever.  My head is currently like a wet sponge so just a matter of seeing it through I suppose.  Might pop down to Parkrun tomorrow as it's the only race distance I could cope with at the moment - plus I'm a great believer in trying to sweat it out!

Mennania

A weather warning from the race organisers isnt normally a good email. Seems Im going to get wet anf blown about a bit. Hey ho. My own fault for booking a race in sodding Scotland.
Another rubbish run tonite means I shouldve totally run out of crapness in time for sunday. 

Nice work Padams.

Cheerful Dave

Have a good one Menn. I'm just grateful you're not 50 yet because you'll be pushing us all down the rankings for sure!

I'll be at the Vitality on Monday, good luck to anyone else there.

Great run padams, well done staying ahead of LC!

Little M.iss Happy

Only if symptoms are all above the neck Wardi - don't want you making yourself proper poorly!

Oh dear Menn, not ideal - but nothing you can do about it other than run a blinder and then ponder on how much faster you could have gone if the weather had been better 

Mennania

I like the cut of your jib LMH. Sat on a train with other Mara types. Getting a bit of watch envy. Anybody use suunto?

Little M.iss Happy

Not too much time on your feet today Menn! Garmin all the way for me.

I took your advice and did my last 20 this morning Wardi - and then realised that it's only two weeks to go and I don't usually do a 20 that close...........not sure if i got confused or carried away. Must be my age. LOL.

TR

Menn - sounds like a tough day ahead. I feel for you, i realised at 5 or 6m that i couldnt beat the wind at Brighton and it makes it a tough 20m mentally from there. No watch envy here, i have a £20 casio.

I did 20 today too LMH, should be fine, esp as its saturday rather than sunday. I kept it easy though with no mp. Ive done 20 2 weeks out before, charlie did 22m 1 week out !

I replaced my old Saucony Rides and have worn them all week, so did the 20 in them today, they are a lot lighter than my nimbus, which i didnt realise are so heavy and might not help my mara hammy cramps. I had pretty achy quads today though, not sure if thats just tiredness from the miles reps and mp this week or shoe related.  l think ill stick with the rides for Yeovil though as they are a lot lighter.

Joe Blogs-BR

Just bumped into Menn on Princess street - sounds like he’s ready to rock, despite some slightly suspect conditions being forecast..

Meant to be running the half myself, but have been ill ever since before London and can’t quite get to the bottom of what it is. Been feeling better last few days, think I’ll run with the better half but drop off if I start feeling ropey (she’s aiming for ~ 1:27).

Good luck to all the other racers. 

Little M.iss Happy

Sorry to hear that you're still not feeling 100% Joe - have you been back to the doctors? Might be time for some of that actual rest stuff? If I recall correctly you took a whole, what, two days off after your fainting incident? Hope Katie has a good run. Forecast for the rest of the weekend improving here - hope your weather does likewise.

OuchOuch

Good luck to Mennania & TGO, will be tracking you and wishing you all the best. DBS. Love running in the rain. 
Good luck to you too Joe & Katie. 

Wardi

Menn.. the worst of the wind seems to be forecast for the afternoon so if you are close to 2.30-2:35 you should hopefully avoid the worst of it.  Keeping dry before the start is important as it looks a bit damp for the first hour or two.  Fingers crossed for you.

LMH/TR.. kudos for getting those last long efforts done, better now than in the windy/wet stuff tomorrow.

Joe.. hope you're over the worst of the bug, I'm sure your pacing will be appreciated tomorrow unless you talk too much of course.   

Quite a warm Parkrun earlier, ran to feel as I still felt fuzzy and hungover despite being off the sherberts last night!  Added a bit on afterwards to increase the sweat levels and I do feel better for it now.

The Green One

Thanks all. Hoping might not be that bad in Liverpool, as says it will mostly be over from 10. But wind is looking rough especially along the Merseyside for the last 5k. 

@Mennania nice to know there will be someone else out there racing in tomorrow’s tough conditions. Smash it

@Wardi regretting I didn’t pack a cap but may have lost it anyway looking at the forecast!  

I am consoled a little @TR that I would have had the same headwind problem had I started Brighton. It was my destiny!

Mennania

Go well TGO💪. 
Hope you’re feeling better Joe.
Going to stroll over now

Little M.iss Happy

Hope the weather is better than forecast for both of you and you get what you want - looking forward to reading all about it.

TR

Hope the racers are digging in.

4m easy peasy pace for me. 2 weeks til the b of the bang.

Mennania

If I ever say I’m going to run a race in Scotland again please come round my gaff and kick me square in the 🌰s. That was brutal. At mile 14 the first headwind appeared and dropped me down from 5.53 to 5.59 so I had reset my sites on just a PB The only good thing is that when you turned around at mile 17 to come back the realisation was so massive and instant that all thoughts of time evaporated instantaneously. 
Fortunately hooked up with another runner and we took it in turns for the next 8 miles but pace dropped from 5.59 to 6.25 in one mile, then down to 6.58 at one point but we still passed around 6or 7 runners who were out on their feet.
Other than that it was great!! 2.41.43

The Green One

I just got under 3 by the skin of my teeth. Tough course and that wind for the last 4 miles along the Merseyside promenade was a huge brake, lost at least 3 minutes in that. But just held on for 2:59:42. No one overtook me from mile 8 and kept my HR where I wanted it all the way so am overall happy to have stuck to the plan and got the best I could probably do given the course, wind, two injuries since March and lungs still full of mucas from last week’s cold. I have a faster marathon in me - but promised my suffering wife no more marathons till 2020 so it will have to wait until then!
@Mennania did you win? First Lady here was only 2:54. Regardless that is a supreme effort and result considering the wind today. Great stuff! 

The Green One

ps anyone following me I did NOT do the first 10k in 34 min. Frankly am p1ss3d about the location of the mile markers, it made it really hard to judge and they were clearly less than 1 early on and more than 1 in second half. 

TR

Menn - well toughed out, i certainly feel for you knowing how tough brighton was, the sad thing is that you cant wind wava your finish time. Manchester next April instead?

TGO - well done to you too, i agree it sounds like you have more potential. 

It will be probably a lovely still ay next Sunday, and then howling again the following week!

Little M.iss Happy

You can only do what you can do on the day Mennania, you know you gave it all you had and that with better weather things would have been different but the weather is one thing we can't control.

Well done for doing what it says on the tin TGO - shame you can't get your wife on board for a crack at an autumn marathon.

Mennania

Bumped into joe again wandering around Edi, seems he and Katy had a good day👍🏻

Quite happy with today, Ive learned quite a bit from it. I would’ve got a pb without the wind but it most likely wouldn’t be a 2.34, prob a 2.36/2.37. Was the wrong side of working hard at mile 14 when the first winds started eeking a bit of time away - wondering if we could’ve worked harder for the last 8 miles but we took a few places and no one got to us so we did ok out of it - not as good as Joes mate who only lost a couple of minutes which is pretty exceptional I reckon.

i definitely overtrained/tried to cram in too many miles before race trying to recover time lost due to toe. 

Right, just got to figure out what’s next for me now.

Nice work TGO - I’ve heard that Liverpool was proper tough today too so naked the sub 3 even better - defo more to come, maybe your missus would enjoy Valencia for a weekend later in the year maybe😉

OuchOuch

That's a pretty swift marathon and a huge bite out of your PB, congratulations Mennania.  Clearly, with better conditions an even better time could have been had. Great return considering the various injures you had in the build-up. 
Beautifully timed TGO, those 17 seconds in credit make all the difference.  As Menn, said tempt the wife with an overseas sunny marathon.  Can vouch for either Valencia or Malaga in December. 
Cracking 10K Padams on such low weekly mileage. 

TR

Menn - good that you are pleased with yourself. How did you find the VF4%?

Wardi

Nicely done Menn in less than ideal conditions, seems to be the British and USA marathons that usually cop for the extremes of weather!

Beautifully timed TGO, you must have been overjoyed to have a time beginning with a '2'.  Ta for the info on mile markers, one of my club girls just broke 4hrs for a GFA and her first 10k split was given as sub 3:10 pace!

Oh, and I agree with OO about trying the exotic/warm overseas suggestions.  Always works with Mrs Wardi anyway.

Mennania

No complaints with the shoes  TR except I did slide once or twice early on. In fact I didn’t think about them at all. I only saw one person not wearing vf4s when I was out on the road, so fair does to Nike’s marketing team. 

Guy who who won ran a 10 min positive split, in fact all runners with few exceptions look like they fell off a cliff with 8 to go.

TR

Menn - there must be very few at the front end bot wearing VF now, wonder how sponsorships with other brands like that. Not surprised on the +ve splits, tom fairbrother ran more even than most. But no point going deliberately slow early on in order to slow less. I reckon i lost 45sec to 1min mile in last 5 mile at Brighton, nd i can understand that as i live on the coast and sea front running can be brutal, so its really cruel when its the last 4 or 5m.

TR

Plan today was to do 2m easy and then 6m mp,  as it wasnt a commute i could get on my measured 2m out, 2m back. Unfortunately the wind direction meant 4 of the 6 was into the wind, so it wasnt an even effort 6m. Mp av came out as 6.37 but i probably worked a bit too hard for that pace. Still a good workout though and i limited it to 6m. Hopefully 6.45s is comfy in 2 weeks.

Little M.iss Happy

Better than me TR. I was so wiped out when I got back from walking the dog I went back to bed so today will be a rest day apart from a fair amount of walking.

Mennania

Tom and I ran together for the middle portion of the race, he and another worked through the wind quite well it seems. 
Nice mp TR. looking solid for yrovil

TR

Menn - they are two rarities though, you have to ramp up the effort so much for the late wind affected miles though to be able to keep pace that its practically impossible to plan for. Thats why the sub3 pacers finished alone at Brighton. How do you feel about your day looking back today. It pissed me off for a while that the wind cost me, and ive seen that quite a few have gone quite a bit quicker in maras since, but the weather is an uncontrollable.

LMH - well done for not forcing any miles out then.