Well chaps, the fact I'm writing means at least I'm here to tell the tale ...
After deciding to do the Great Eastern HM despite no real training due to life getting in the way, I managed to get round in 2:38 ... I had to run/walk from 13k but I got a couple of km further than my longest training run so decided to accept the fact and finish at least on my feet! The weather was dry and warmer than ideal (stop moaning!) and although my running companion deserted me at 5k with another colleague who joined us on the spur of the moment with allegedly no intention of aiming for a time (they completed in 2:20, no walking, so it is clear that she is actually a whippet, not a beginner as she claimed when she said she was REALLY slow ... hmmm) I somehow got through. At one point, the 2:30 pacers reached me and I thought I could stick with them and equal last years time but it was not to be ... and at one particularly low point I was overtaken by a mobility scooter, but I have to say, she had her foot down *ahem* ... anyway, made it home, medal collected, can barely move today with hideous sciatic pain in both hips, buttocks and legs but at least I got up and gave it a go ... I shall prepare properly for my next one, and yes, already I know there will be a next one, which is something to celebrate. Hope anyone else doing the mad things over the weekend fared well and isn't too battered and bruised!
Ironically enough, walking back to the car park with hubs and brother in law, I had to utilise my nursing skills (rusty as been a midwife for last 17 years) to assist in another mobility scooter related incident ... walking along and heard an almighty crunch then crash noise behind us coupled with human wailing noises ... some poor sod who was behind us on a bridge, trying to cross the road at some traffic lights had been mowed down by another scooter without a hooter ... the 'driver' proclaiming wildly that she hadn't seen the pedestrian and he had 'come out of nowhere' ... I checked he was alive, hadn't broken anything or bashed his head, checked his not insignificant injuries, retrieved his lost shoe that had been yanked off in the tussle with her front wheels and helped him call for assistance from his mate as luckily he lived a few hundred metres away ... I helped him limp home as his mate carried the shopping bags (they were loaded with beer so probably precious cargo judging by a number of other things I noted and feel that some of the distress was due to a couple of broken ones in there!) and then I was able to go home. I hope he didn't mind being scooped up by the sweaty mess that I was at the time but guess we can't be too choosy sometimes