Weekend Warrioring Part 1

Snowdonia Marathon

"Whose stupid idea was this?" I said to Leon, as we huddled together behind a wall near the start-line in a rather ineffectual attempt to stay warm and dry.

"Yours," he replied. Sometimes my lovely husband is SO not a gentleman! He was right, though. The suggestion that we should try to scavenge some unwanted Snowdonia Marathon places barely a week before the race had been mine, and I'd done a lot of the active scavenging. The only reason we hadn't entered sooner and targeted the race was that we had decided we ought to support our home city's inaugural half-marathon the following day, but with the 10-in-10 to train for it seemed like a good idea to race twice in the same weekend and, for the first time ever, to run in the same marathon but not run together. I was hoping to be a bit faster than at Langdale, with 4:30 my aspirational time.

We'd set off from Birmingham at 5.30am. Until 20 miles from Llanberis, there had been no sign of rain or wind. A beautiful red sunrise had followed us in. Then the wind started to pick up, and by the time we had parked and set off to register it was obvious that the forecast rain wasn't far away.

Registration in the Community Centre was quick and simple. We met Steve Edwards (who holds the 10-in-10 world record), and several people from Fetch. I had a wander round and resolved to return after the race with my purse to buy some of the lovely offerings from the hand-made jewellery stall and Dilys the Sheep, as well as a souvenir hoodie. Leon had already descended with glee upon the Snowdonia Marathon buffs.

The race starts in a lay-by a couple of miles out of Llanberis and buses are laid on. We got on the first bus. Elementary error. The first bus got us there more than an hour before the race was due to begin, and the start area consists of a gantry and a few Portaloos. It was cold, it was windy, and it was starting to rain. Not only that, there was a sign warning us that there were perygls in the vicinity. Leon had told me some scary tales of perygl encounters from his days as an Outward Bound tutor. I was secretly a little worried about these tough little Welsh gremlins.

I was wearing tights, a merino wool baselayer, gloves, my JW Ultra buff and my yellow windproof gilet, having decided that my Montane windproofs would be distractingly rustly in the wind. We had forgotten to bring bin-liners to wear at the start.

We weren't planning to race hard, so we started well back. Starting off a race with numb feet and all the toes of my right foot raynauded-out was a new experience but I'd warmed up within a mile.

For the first few miles I felt a little sluggish, but still appeared to be passing people, even going uphill, without working particularly hard. Once we'd got to the top of the Pass at 4 miles, I was ready for the downhill ... wheeeeeeee! I coasted out four consecutive miles at sub-8mm pace. After that, the route undulated gently to Beddgelert. I was still running strongly - just under 9mm pace. "I'll regret this later," I started to tell myself, then remembered the Brain Training. "I'm nearly half-way, I'm about to go through the half-marathon split at Snowdonia in two hours flat, and I am showing no signs of weakening." That's better!

The two-mile drag uphill from Beddgelert was vigorously wind-assisted. I was soaking wet from top to toe, I was a bit chilly, the lovely views that we'd had at the start had been obscured by a falling cloud-base, and I was telling everyone I passed that I loved tail-winds. Trying to run downhill with the wind blowing me to a standstill was just as entertaining, in a perverse sort of way.

I must add that, in my part of the field at least, the atmosphere was calm and uncomplaining, even in the squalliest weather. That was good. What's not so good is that I have never seen so much litter dropped by runners during a race. And don't try to tell me that it was the grockles. Grockles don't eat gels.

Up to Mile 22, I'd have said that the course was easier than either Windermere or Langdale. There had only been two big updulates, both were runnable, and the gradual downhills were fantastic for banking saved time. Had the course continued to undulate in a civilised manner for the last five miles I'd have cracked 4 hours, even with a brief loo-stop, because I didn't hit The Wall or fade away and continued to overtake people almost till the end. The Waunfaur climb, however, put an end to my running-all-the-way intentions. I ran some of it, and was pleased with a 13.33-minute mile in Mile 23.

When the slope became gentler, the road underfoot became a muddy, puddly trail. The wind at that point was vicious, and swirled round in such a way that it was impossible to brace yourself against it properly. The slippery, uneven conditions underfoot added to the hazard. Several people were blown over and for once I was glad of my low centre of gravity.

The sharp descent into Llanberis starts with a bit of fell-running. Fell-running descents are not my strongest point, especially in Vaporflys, and I was overtaken mightily at this point. I did manage to claw a few places back once we were on the road again. Nothing - NOTHING - at either Langdale or Windermere comes close to this evil little sting in Snowdonia's tail.

The last mile is a relatively tedious drag around the roads into Llanberis. When I got to the Mile 26 marker, I noted that I had to do the wee pennies in well under 2 minutes if I was going to crack 4:10. I was ready to stop running, not to pick up the pace.

Sod it, the worst I can do is puke on the finish-line, and nobody knows who I am. I gave it everything. Didn't even look to see if Leon was among the few bedraggled spectators by the finish.

4:09:54, 495th overall, and if I had been running officially I'd have been 11th FV40. Not bad for a race I'd run at the last minute with a pacing strategy of "set off easy and see how you go" :o)

Leon, bless him, wasn't expecting me for another 20 minutes or more, so by the time he'd got changed and brought my clothes to the finish I was colder than I've ever been after a race despite having wrapped myself around a cup of hot tea. The hall was heaving with space-blanketed runners and supporters and all thoughts of buying handknits and hoodies were gone - we just wanted to get into the car, put on the air-conditioning, and go home.

There was a lot more water coming off the hills than there had been in the morning, but by the time we'd reached the border we had left all trace of the weather behind. And I didn't see a single perygl. I wonder if the rain kept them away?