Well, the day dawned bloody confusing on the weather front. BBC seemed to imply that while it was cold now, by lunchtime it would be sunny and getting warmer. After much to-ing and fro-ing about what I was going to wear, I opted for a short sleeve shirt, capris and no coat (and a fetching line in goosepimples at the start line).
The start times are getting later and later for the slow wave in this race, it was 12:20 before the last wave got under way, with the usual pointless warm up 30 minutes before the start. The usual shuffle over the line, getting funnelled into the narrow starting gates. Once over the line, everyone exploded off like champagne corks, with a few people regretting it almost instantly and having a breather outside the Rain Bar. The route was the same as last year, with a lot of the pinch points removed, but less scenic.
Fun things spotted en route:
- a girl dressed as Rose Tyler carrying a cutout of David Tennant.
- The Bupa Boost section with a guy proffering vaseline on a gloved index finger (well it made me run faster).
Bad things en route:
- Running out of jelly babies before the pink wave went through.
- Cherry powerade at the start making me gip.
- The giant 30 ft long caterpiller that ran me into the barriers 200m before the finish.
So in the end I finished in 1:19:12 a new PB for me, inside my target time of 1hour 20 and 3 minutes faster than last year. (Beat my race number too ;-) )
MrKitty finished in 55 minutes and the two guys from work managed to get round in 1hr5 and 1hr11, slightly outside their target times, but still feeling very proud of themselves.
Apparently the fat walker factor was high in the Blue wave (target time 1hr) MrKitty was going mental at all the people who were walking by the Rain bar, when they were in a wave where you expect people to be at least jogging.
