When I signed myself up for this South Pole challenge I decided that I was going to take the training seriously. I really wanted to incorporate the Great North Run, but was unfortunately too late to enter so I entered myself in the hilliest alternative…the Great Langdale half marathon in the Lake District, where for parts we were running up hills of 1:3 gradient!
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| The beautiful Lake District scenery |
I got up early, put on my bright green Bowel Cancer UK singlet and jumped on a train at 4:35am, arriving in time for the start at 9am. I had to ask somebody to store my bag under her cake stall as there were absolutely no facilities, and when it came to about 9 everybody stopped milling about and someone said “shall we go then?”. So off we all ran into the rolling Great Langdale hills!
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| Crowds at the start line |
It was an absolutely glorious route, beautiful in every direction. We were periodically marshalled in the right direction until suddenly the group of runners I was with realised that we hadn't seen anyone in a while and that we had just run down a rather large hill…so eventually we spun around and ran back up to find a sheepish Marshall pointing in the other direction!
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| I was instructed to take a 'selfie'! |
Despite the confusion and dramatic nipple chaffing from my new singlet I had a fantastic time and would love to take part again.
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| Mid-run grimace! |
I'm now looking forward to the Royal Parks half marathon which I’ll be running on 12th October and following that I’ll be walking the route of Hadrian’s wall from Carlisle to Newcastle with a 35kg backpack. I’d best go and get my running shoes on!
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