1:18

“It’s not about the legs, it’s about the heart and mind”

What goes on in your head is the only thing you can really control when you hit the start line of a race. The training was already done, I’d already had breakfast (porridge, you already know), I can’t control the weather… but I can control the mind, right?

Eliud taught me that. Not in person, but on film.

The reason I start with that because it’s basically all I was thinking about going through the race. We were lucky enough to watch a preview screening of the Breaking2 film the day before the race, and it really stuck with me. Pain is temporary, and you have to remember that when you’re trying to run fast.

There’s also the fact that runners are judged on their time. I know that not everyone is running for time, they might be running for something else. But if I turn up to the start line, I’m there to race. Not to have fun. I don’t actually enjoy races, you see.

Controlling the mind really came down to owning my target time. When I sat down with Tom ages ago talking about my current PBs and where he thought I could go… if I’m being totally honest I didn’t necessarily believe it, I was more curious and wanted to see what I could do. When I won a 10k I though that ehhh, maybe the speed was a fluke and losing that over a half marathon wouldn’t happen. Hell, when I broke down hard during a 15k tempo run deep down I thought maybe I wasn’t quite where I thought I was. Luckily Tom had a word with me soon after that and said it was meant to be that hard. But still. It meant when people asked me what time I was aiming for I’d fob them off or just say it was to beat my PB, which was 1:25:25. I hadn’t even attempted to race a half marathon in two years, mostly due to marathons.

Barring me simply not finishing the race due to a freak accident or granola based distraction, this was a certainty.

Thing is, I knew with this training I’d settled into a target time between 1:17–1:19. To be precise about it, my training pace was solidly under 6 minute miles. So I knew where I should be, but I wasn’t owning it.

The week of the race, I began owning it. If you asked me what time I was going to do, I said it. And the more people asked, the more I had to say it, the more I believed it.

Yet, seven minutes is one hell of a jump.

But then again, I took 3mins from my 10k leading upto this. Earlier this year I took 12mins from my marathon time. This wasn’t impossible.

Getting to the start line was a cinch. I hadn’t really positioned myself where I wanted to be but I was close enough to the front to have a relatively clear run to get to my target pace and settle from there. And so the flames went up (yes, they had flames to start the race) and the gun sounded and I started. No drama. My pace was fine and I began to settle.

The thing is, sometime after the 1k marker I looked at my watch again… I hadn’t actually pressed start. Typical. Once again I wouldn’t have a correct Strava effort for a race and if you’ve heard me talk about Manchester you’d know how much that would annoy me. Having no idea about what time I was doing had it’s benefits, however. It meant I could only focus on maintaining a good average pace and just hope from there. Thus, the first 10k was a breeze, despite me having zero idea what my split was.

The next 5k, mind, had me digging deep. In training the session I screwed up on was a 15k tempo, so my only experience of running that distance at this pace was (relative) failure. It was really a case of believing in my training and sucking it up/focusing on the techno banging through my ears. That said, the 2k of pain I felt was nothing compared to a particularly grim Kenyan Hills session I’d done with Sam a few weeks before, we’d spoke about how anything we’d feel in a race wouldn’t compare to that, so it was a good memory to hold on to. Well, ‘good’ might not be the word, but it works. This all meant that the second (and I mean second) I hit the 15k mark it was relative relief. Mentally, the unknown of the last 6k was far easier to deal with than the known of the previous 5k.

That, and my playlist was set to switch to hip hop the second I was estimating I’d finish 15k. Stormzy rode me through that next kilometre. I also managed to find someone who was running at a stable pace that I could sit behind and use them as a windshield. Don’t get me wrong, I returned the favour a couple of times but he led most of it.

Yet with 2k to go he slowed dramatically. It was a choice of dropping pace with him, or coming out in front of the wind and going for it.

I went for it.

And finished in 1:18:08.

You better believe I was beaming as I was crossing the line to ‘Big Pimpin’ by Jay-Z. Obviously I was trying to time that perfectly. I’m really fucking happy and I still don’t like races.

Muchos gracias to the number 1 training partner Ben Mayo and the idiot who said yes to foolish hill sessions, Sam McNamara. To everyone at RDC pushing me to go the extra mile, especially the Elites. Manny for 3 years ago saying I might actually be able to go faster if I focused a bit. And obviously Tom & Rach at RunNamasteEat. Their coaching works, and now I know to trust in the process.

Couldn’t have done it without ya. Peace.