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Malvern Half Marathon - Edward Collier - June 2010

There are several similarities between the Malvern Half Marathon and the Tewkesbury Half Marathon. Both are mainly rural, for a start, but my startling realisation is that both races turn uphill at five miles. As I began the long trek up from Upton on Severn through Guarlford to Barnards Green I mused idly on how both races could be improved by instead turning downhill at five miles. The problem with attempting this at Malvern is that in order to accommodate this the turn would be more or less at the Wych Cutting, and most of the competitors would be dead from exhaustion.

Silly idea. But then I often find the most fatuous notions ambling through my brain in longer races (which, for me, is anything beyond 10k). Diet, for instance. I thought about my preparation for the Malvern Half - a week of warm weather training sounds good, on paper. In practice, it was a week of surfing in North Cornwall, which is fine - "active rest", the coaches call it. I don't think those same coaches would advocate a daily diet of Cornish pasties (protein and carbohydrate mixture - good. Generous helping of lard - bad), not to mention the hot chocolate and donuts that are absolutely essential when surfing. Well, obviously not when actually doing the surfing, as the chocolate would probably spill and the donuts might be a bit soggy. But after half an hour in the Atlantic - even in a wetsuit - a hot drink and a sugar hit are less like luxuries and more like lifesavers.

So, it was an older, fatter and somewhat more stupid man sitting in a traffic jam on Saturday somewhere around Junction 25 of the M5, rather too conscious that the two rather half-hearted runs in the previous week in the lanes around Chapel Amble didn't really constitute "tapering" so much as "scarcely being bothered". Nevertheless, the weather was pleasant enough on Sunday morning, when I was awakened at 0530 by my youngest insomniac son looking for his Lego figure. I lay in bed, rigid with the desire to fall asleep again, for only another three hours before it was actually time to get up and make my way to the Three Counties Showground.

The start of the race couldn't be faulted, unless you count starting five minutes late as a fault. Or seven minutes, in my case, as a last minute pit stop deprived me of a place at the front. Once I'd crossed the timing mats I had to weave my way through the spectators who had drifted onto the course, all of whom seemed determined to follow the race, possibly to its conclusion. Once I'd caught the back of the pack it was the usual case of overtaking without getting in people's way, which meant a lot of careful manoeuvring, jumping on and off the verge and generally wasting energy. Still, I got to the first mile marker in 6.17 on my watch, which was probably a tad faster than I meant to. The course was bumpy and lumpy rather than hilly, but mainly angled down and I felt I was making good progress. This was helped by not knowing the road at all, a situation that changed at the aforementioned five mile marker, when we joined the main uphill drag from Upton to Malvern. This is a road I know far too well, and familiarity has, in this instance, bred something akin to contempt. Well, indifference, certainly.

Once the race reached Barnards Green it turned left back towards the Three Counties Showground, and one was then on the home straight. Still a bit lumpy and bumpy, but with the whiff of home in the nostrils it didn't feel too bad. What didn't float my boat was having to run past the entrance to the showground and round a bollard a hundred metres further on in an unwelcome 200m out-and-back extension to the course (think Bourton 10k).

At the end there was a medal, a banana (not ripe, so for me inedible), a selection of not very nice sugary "fruit and cereal" bars, a small bottle of Malvern water and a short trek back to the car. I'd recommend the race more or less wholeheartedly - for the main part it was well-organised, well marshalled, and the course was pretty and flat enough - save for one thing. The water stations. At two of them I missed getting any water at all. At one the cup was almost empty, while at another the woman seemed genuinely reluctant to let go of the water. Well, actually she didn't let go - instead she gave me a look that said "Say please!" It was a hot and muggy day, and I was well hydrated so I wasn't that fussed, but I know from the Tewkesbury Half a few years ago that for some runners poorly distributed or non-existent water can be a real pain.

As I write this on Monday morning, my legs as stiff as an Etonian's wing collar, I wonder if I'll be able to summon the energy for a decent run on Wednesday at the Cleeve Cloud Cuckoo Race. Doubtless there will be yet another report on that race too.

Watch this space...