250 parkruns and Richmond Park Marathon

Preparation (or lack of it)
I came to Richmond Park marathon 3 weeks after London, which was my third marathon in 2 weeks and second in 3 days.  London was OK and I finished stronger and much quicker than St George's Day marathon just before, but I still had serious issues with tight hip flexors and left hamstring and almost got leg cramps as well. Taking salt tablets helped to ward off the cramps, but I still think that injury and running mechanics issues are over-stressing things and giving me problems in races.

So, preparation for this race was almost non-existent and was more geared to recovery than
maintaining miles in my legs.  I had a very light week after London, just a Thursday club run and parkrun and then gave blood the Monday after, which forced me to have another light week - probably a good thing - with more stretching and yoga.

With a week to go before Richmond, I managed a comfortable Tuesday club run with the slow group doing a rather long 6.5 miles, had a massage on Wednesday, then did a good run at Windlesham Pairs Relay posting 22:20 for my 5 x 1km laps, though I got beaten by my son Alfred (11) who managed his 5 laps in 21:30.  Still, I felt really good on that run and enjoyed it enormously.

250 parkrun Milestone

Family photo with the 250 cake
made by Becky Wood (Photo: James Ball)

On Saturday we went to Frimley Lodge for my 250th parkrun and I had a great time. Lots of people had brought cakes and there were a lot of Sandhurst Joggers and Frimley parkrun friends there to celebrate with me.  It was quite emotional at the start when my name was announced and I had a lump in my throat for a few seconds listening to the cheers and applause.

I had decided to run with my daughter Elinor and we set off near the back and had a gentle run around and I got to chat to  people on the course.  We made it round in about 28 minutes to find Alfred had finished ages before in another PB time of 21:52. Another amazing run by Alfred who is really enjoying his running now and getting better and better.  I only have about 35 seconds lead on him for my PB and it could be he beats me over the summer!




Richmond Park Marathon 

Race HQ, the start/finish and mile 3, 12 and 19 point

After the parkrun celebrations I had a relaxing day and got my kit together for Richmond the next day.  Sandhurst vest, red shorts, new Injinji toe socks and OS1st ankle/calf compression from ING Source. I was in my Hokas again, this time sorting the lacing out to lock them onto my feet a bit better. I also had tape on my left hamstring after my Wednesday massage and decided to tape up my left knee following guidance on this on a YouTube video from John Gibbons.

I got picked up just after 7am by Leon Hicks from SJ and we made it to the park an hour ahead of race start to log in at race registration and find the loos.  Unfortunately there were only 2 portaloos for about 350 runners, so there was a bit of a queue.  It was cool and sunny before the start, which was not the overcast cloudy conditions the weather forecast predicted, so it looked like it was going to be a warm day.  I put some sun cream on just in case.

At about 8:45 David Weir arrived with his coach Jenny Archer. He lives locally and uses the roads through the park for training and was here to start the race.  I had a chat with him about his plans for the summer, which will be mostly geared to track events and his coach says he will definitely be back at London for another go at winning the marathon.

Leon and I wandered around for a while chatting to other runners before dropping kit off in Leon's car.  The car park was close by, so we didn't need to use the bag tent.  The start was at 9:30 and is located near Sheen Gate.  We got away on time, although from the back we didn't hear the hooter and I just noticed that there were people running, before we started to move forward.

The Course

Lap 1: 12 mile route

The course is undulating mostly and hilly in places and is run over 3 laps.  The last 2 laps follow the Tamsin Trail around the perimeter of the park and are about 7 miles each.  The first lap is actually a 3 mile short lap following the Richmond parkrun route in reverse and with a a different start point, followed by a 9 mile long lap along some of the Tamsin Trail and through the middle of the park. You get to see most of the park and also several steep hills three times over (yay!).

We started with a gentle trot alongside the road from Sheen Gate, then turning up Sawyers' Hill to Richmond Gate for a long steady downhill back to the start. Down the Sheen Gate road again then up the hill to White Lodge at 4 miles, then down around Spankers Hill Wood (great name!) to the Tamsin Trail to take on Kingston Hill for the first time at 5.5miles.  This is followed by a long downhill, crossing Queen's Road and onto an out and back section to the northeast corner of the park at Petersham Road. Just after 9 miles we crossed Queeen's Road again and headed up another short steep hill through the middle of the park back to Spankers Hill before heading back to Sheen Gate at mile 12.

Lap 2/3: 7 and a bit miles each

Then begins 2 laps of the Tamsin Trail going clockwise from Sheen Gate.  The path starts off gently sloping downhill and remains fairly level past Roehampton Gate and the nearby cafe which was packed with cyclists a lot of whom were cheering us on.  Then around Spankers Hill Wood (still fairly level) before our second ascent of Kingston Hill.  From the bottom of this hill we cross and then follow alongside Queen's Road steadily climbing Sawyer's Hill from the south to Richmond Gate again before the 1.5 mile steady descent to the start/finish and a repeat lap to the end.


How was it to Run?
The course is really nice with not much traffic and not much congestion apart from the first mile.  The park doesn't look over managed and doesn't have any playgrounds, just natural mature woodland, scrub grassland and lakes. If you don't know Richmond Park then it's very similar to the New Forest or Windsor Great Park.  It looks very picturesque and that's something to remind yourself of when you are struggling up another hill.

The fact there were laps and you went over the same ground up to 3 times didn't detract from the experience of running it. It did mean that you knew what to expect on the 2 last laps and it broke the run up into mentally manageable chunks.  Later into the run I knew at 14.5 miles and 21.5 miles I was going to be going up a steep hill and so I was going to have a walk break followed by a drink at the aid station at the top and then I could get back into running on the descent on the other side.

Getting through a marathon for me has recently been about how my body copes with carrying a series of niggles and Richmond was no different.  I had previously had issues with my left hamstring tightening and almost cramping, I have had long term pain in part of my left patella tendon and I have some pain in my right hip flexor, possibly a small tear that hasn't been given chance to heal.

Leon and I started off at a gentle pace at the back of the pack with the miles passing at 9:15 to 9:40 pace, but also stopping to take a drink and eat at the aid stations.  The first few miles were a bit painful in my right hip/groin and left knee but, apart from the steepest hills, we weren't walking. We made it through the first lap together to 12 miles, but just beyond 13 miles I noticed that Leon was dropping back.  It was at this time that I think the heat started to take some toll as I started to get tight in my left hamstring.  I actually found that running a bit quicker helped me along to the hill at 14.5 miles, where I took a salt tablet and had a couple of cups of water.  That seemed to cure the cramps for a while, but I had lost touch with Leon.

The last lap was where I really slowed down.  I told myself that I at least wanted to get to the start/finish area at 19 miles in reasonable time and I was there at about 3:10.  I took another salt tablet (my last) and went on my way walking for a few hundred metres before jogging on.  At 20 miles the hamstring cramps came back and I tried going a bit faster, just to change my gait.  It worked enough to get me to Kingston Hill for the last time, but getting going again from the aid station was painful.

The Lead Gorilla - showing the fast guys
the way round

I reassessed my aches and pains and found that my left knee was feeling fine and somehow felt better than at the start, my left hamstring was still a bit tight, but improved after each aid station and bit of banana, but my right hip flexor was really slowing me down.  I could walk OK, but every time I started to jog it was really tight and painful.  I had a long stop at the last aid station at 24 miles, then another long stop to chat with Sasha Kendall-Woods from SJ who had come out to support and supply Leon and me with Percy Pigs and more water before the last 1m steady downhill to the finish. I discovered that I just needed to get going very slowly to loosen my hip up and then keep going before I could slowly pick the pace up to a jog.

The last half mile saw a few more supporters and runners walking home to cheer me on and there was still a decent crowd to cheer me across the line. I collected a medal, Tshirt and bag with magazines, mini Mars bar and a pen and then I stood around and chatted to some runners I had met on the course, particularly Ghanaya Talewar from Sikhs in the City who I saw a lot of as we jog/walked the last lap.  I finished in 4:46:46 and thought I might have a long wait for Leon, but he arrived only 10 minutes behind me in 4:57:02.

Splits were a bit all over the place, partly due to spending a lot of time at aid stations (I was really getting my money's worth) and chatting to Sasha at her Extra SJ Aid Station.

9:45 9:12 9:17 9:33 9:34 10:21 9:04 9:49 9:33 10:31 9:40 10:20 10:02 9:51 12:16 9:21 12:50 9:23 9:10 12:01 10:48 15:45 9:30 15:57 18:50 10:52 3:29 (0.39m@9:00/m)

There were 341 finishers with times ranging from 2hrs34 up to 6hrs50.  There were a few milestone runs as well with David Lewis' 600th marathon, Janet Cobby's 300th, Piers Keenleyside's 100th and Denys Baudry's 400th, I think.

That was a hard marathon, but I would call it a success just for the fact of keeping going through pain and not it defeat me.  Developing some mental toughness is going to be important for Endure 24, which is my next big race and my target for the year.

This is Getting Ridiculous - Injuries!

I decided that after London Marathon I would need a chance to rest and recuperate and booked a treatment session on the Thursday after hoping that my legs would be on the mend and it would be a less painful experience.  No such luck, but I managed not to cry on the table!  I did learn a lot more about the state of my legs, which is not that good:

• Right hip flexor strain is restricting right leg movement and giving pain in lower abs area also.
• Both calves gastrocnemius is tight, but especially on right leg which is pulling on the Achilles.
• Left hamstring is very tight restricting forward movement of that leg.
• Left patella tendonitis, not causing pain while running but discomfort at the front of the knee while sitting or standing for long periods.
• Both knees ITB tightness leading to minor pain on the outside of the knee while sitting .

I think it's important to find the original injury and work out what caused that.  In my case , I remember the hip flexor pain being around for the longest and it was probably an overuse injury of originally weak and inflexible hips.   As I have done more marathons the hip flexor issue has been getting slowly better (I have been doing some stretching of this) but it's obviously time to get a bit more serious about this.

All this is making me really unbalanced when running and the odd biomechanics could well lead to serious and long term injury.  I need to do something about this and the first thing is to cut back on the running miles, do some cross-training (cycling/swimming) and really focus on getting over these niggles.  So the plan is to get a rehab programme together to target the injuries, improve flexibility and strength and get some balance back.

I have a bit of down-time between marathons (3 weeks between London and Richmond Park) so I have time to give blood, which I manage to do three times a year and still fit in several marathons and halfs.  It also gives me an excuse to not do any fast runs for a week or so, so I can concentrate on getting fit.