Hose was hard and lessons learnt

Sunday now seems a long time ago, but my legs still seem to be remembering it!!

The day was overcast with the promise of rain - the usual dilemma over what to wear was had, but in the end I went for the trusty short sleeve long leg option.

The run itself was very different to that in Reading, almost no supporters on the route, only water to drink, and the run was on undulating country lanes in the middle of no where - or the Vale of Belvoir to be a little more precise - and it rained!

I found it really hard going, instead of the miles falling away they seemed to go on forever. They had mile and half mile markers which I don't think helped, especially towards the end - knowing you've got to 12 miles is great, but then seeing you're only at 12 1/2 miles is quite demoralising

When we got to Hose I discovered that my Garmin (GPS thingy I can use to check my pace) had a low battery - you'd have thought I'd have learnt after Reading - but no! So Sunday's lesson was - when it says low battery, you have something between 8-9miles of life left in it! Unlike the Nike+ not enough for a half marathon!!

It was around this point that I really started to struggle - I checked my Garmin half way up a hill to check that my pace wasn't as slow as I felt it was only to discover a blank screen - had to give myself a bit of a pep talk to keep me going - I felt like giving up and walking and that would have been fatal as there was still a long way to go

Getting to mile 10 was the highlight - into double figures and only 3 miles to go - a walk in the park distance wise!! Here we had to run past some travellers - at the start we'd been warned they had dogs, but were reassured that they would be chained up - we approached their caravans but there were no dogs in sight just some friendly looking ponies having their breakfast wondering what on earth was going on - almost disappointing!

From there is was 3 long miles via mile 11 and the last water station - felt miraculously better after my last cup of water - like having a whole new pair of legs - then realised it was because I was running down a gentle slope - but it cheered me up enough to get to mile 12, hideous mile 12 1/2 and then spotted the finish - saw my dad peeping out from the top of the hedge - time for a quick photo and then a race to the finish - I managed to overtake someone on the final corner, got my name called out by the commentator man and then saw the clock - 1:58:something - I knew I'd got a new PB, but no idea by how much - had to wait until I got home to find that out

A very nice man cut my chip off, went and picked up my memento (no medal this time), had a lovely stretch and it was time to head home via Tesco Express for some bacon and floury baps

By the time we were back the results were up - 1:58:16 - so 1min 7sec faster than Reading!!

2 of my lovely friends have offered me and extra £70 in total if I can get my half time down to 1:50 by the end of the year - seems a little unlikely now, but fingers crossed I can make it (especially as I did get easter eggs)

http://www.donatetomyrelay.org/emmarossruns

Oh, and my Nike+ isn't calibrated right - it thinks I only did 11 miles - certainly untrue......