First race

[molly1973]

... and boy, was it tough! Freezing cold at the start so I was in a dither about what to wear, ended up overheating, despite the cold wind. Was very, very slow, completing 5 miles in 1hr 16, but I did it! Sadly a load of people had dropped their distance so they had run out of medals with the 5 mile ribbon: they gave me a 10 mile with a spare ‘generic’ ribbon as a substitute. The price you pay for coming last! I learned a lot along the way: I should have trusted my clothing plan, I need to lose a load of weight, jelly babies dry my mouth, and I ran most of it on my own or with the longer distance runners lapping me, so a lot of it is a mental battle. There was lots of cake at the end but I couldn’t face it, which is most unlike me! Saving the chocolate and cider until later.

[SaskAlliecat Graduate10]

Congrats on your first race! It sounds like a tough one. Trying to figure out to wear especially when it is cold is so tough and many of us overdress (or at least I always do!) so you're not alone in that delimma. We've got to trust what has worked in our training runs but I find I second guess myself a lot. Fuelling is an art that takes quite a bit if practice, I find. I tried some gummies on my last long run but they were so chewy I hated it. Tomorrow I have another long run planned and I'm going to try some soft gummies in addition to some mini Cadbury Easter eggs and a Maple syrup gel (it is a 17k run, so lots of opportunity to try things out 😅).

That's some nice bling and goodies you got there! Enjoy the cider and chocolates later once the tummy settles 😋

[molly1973 in reply to SaskAlliecat]

Thank you SAC! I don’t think I really needed the jelly babies, but there was a long out & back section which I wasn’t really expecting, there were no mile markers so I was really flagging and didn’t really know how far I’d gone (it was a 5 mile loop and there were multiple distances, so most runners were doing multiple loops so I guess they wouldn’t need them that much). It turned outI had them at about the 4 mile mark. I have a lot of work to do (and weight to lose: it’s really holding me back) before my 10k in June!

[Irishprincess Graduate10]

Well done Molly! Great looking bling there! Your first race is always very special and you’ll always recall it with pride.

I don’t like jelly babies either, try dates as they’re not sticky sweet.

[molly1973 in reply to Irishprincess]

Thank you, I’ll bear that in mind. I don’t really think I particularly need fuel en route just yet but I’m not sure. It was only (listen to me: only!) 5 miles but that is well over an hour for me. I was glad I had three with me, but I think it was mostly psychological! Nobody else doing 5 miles like me carried water but I probably needed it. I certainly used the water stations

[Irishprincess Graduate10 in reply to molly1973]

You’re right, you don’t actually need fuel for anything just over an hour but experiment and work out what’s best for you. You could just carry a few nibbles with you and not eat them !

[JonathanP Graduate10]

Sounds a difficult one but well done for completing 😀

[Bridget007]

Well done! That is brilliant 👍🏻🎉 it doesn’t matter where you came and lovely bling 🏅 enjoy your chocolate and cider 😊😋

[Cloudbuster Graduate10]

Well done Molly, know what you mean about over dressing ! You did it though! Excellent 👍🏃‍♀️😁