The first day of November just so happened to be “World Vegan Day”. It was a Saturday and after a bit of decision making, I decided to go to Bartley parkrun, near Totton. Clare would drop me off and I would run back to Totton to meet up with her for coffee and cake afterwards.
The warm up run didn’t feel particularly good. There were lots of friendly old faces I knew from Vegan Runners there. It was nice to catch up with a few of them at the start. I was wearing my lovely new, bright orange Vegan Running Club vest which I think, stood out nicely.
It was a muddy course, with some unavoidable puddles. Off we went. The guy leading went off like a rocket as they say. I dodged a few puddles to begin with and overtook a buggy runner. I was about a mile in when I realised I was in about 3rd of 4th place. I’ll go for a position I thought. Keep pushing! It felt very tough and not very fast today. It’s a 4 lap course too, so can be a bit tough mentally too.
After 2 laps I was chasing down this kid who looked about 12. He seemed to slow a bit and I managed to overtake him. Wait there a minute, is that the leader up ahead? He looked quite far ahead to be fair but I caught him on the 3rd lap and he was struggling. I kept pushing as I overtook him. Wouldn’t P1 on World Vegan Day be amazing in my new bright Orange vest? Get on with it Dean, I said to myself. Stop dreaming and run. I kept pushing while other runners and walkers shouted encouragement to me and I did the same as much as I could and thanked the marshals.
Anyway, I went and got my 2nd P1 at parkrun. My 1st one only coming in September after 13 years of parkrunning! My time wasn’t fast at all at 20.10. P2 was in at 20.40 in the end and the little kid was actually an under 11 running on his own, looks like he really blew up with a time of 22.28! He was a nice kid though.
It was a great start to the month as I ran back to Totton smiling away to myself to meet my wonderful girlfriend. My legs caked in mud.
I hadn’t been climbing as much but managed to go a couple of times with Clare at Golden Gecko. Always great fun and I love watching her push beyond her limits. The marathon the previous marathon had taken it out of me a bit but nowhere near as much as I thought it would. I was impressed with my recovery this time around.
This month I bought some new dumbbells and have been working on ankle flexion and hip mobility which I think it has been vital to the longevity of my running. Also I seem to have relieved a lot of piriformis pain with a lot of stretching, especially doing the painful pigeon pose., which isn’t so painful anymore.
Sadly, it has been a month of weight gain too, which I will be addressing in December. This is pretty common with me post marathon I think though.
November the 15th saw CC and myself volunteering again at Itchen Valley parkrun. We like to marshal and shout stuff at the runners. We think it’s the most you can be involved and give something back. It’s so nice to have the catch up in the cafe afterwards too and talk about the event. It was my 8th time volunteering at Itchen. I have volunteered 35 times for 28 credits, which isn’t a great ratio for me but at least I’m not picking up the easier junior parkrun credits or pacing ;)
Marshalling at the Saturday parkruns makes me a superior being of course :D
The next day was the day of Gosport half marathon. I hadn’t run this race for 9 years! It’s a fast, flat course and should be a PB for most but as I had only finished a marathon 4 weeks ago, I knew it wouldn’t be worth pushing for a faster time. I was hopeful of 85 minutes and got 85 minutes. It wasn’t easy though as I had to dig in after 9 miles. At least I only had to suffer for 4 miles I suppose! It was nice to run and chat to Josh Murray of Hamwic Harriers for about 10 miles, until he dropped me for a big PB of his own ;) Well done Josh, hope your marathon goes well.
A big thanks to another Josh (Chivers) for the lift and great to catch up with Paddy Connors too. Really enjoyed the day. Happy enough with 85 minutes but know I should be running around 82 I think.
We’ll see what Solent half brings me.
6 days later after running Gosport, I lie in bed wondering what parkrun to do on this rainy, miserable looking morning. Bartley or Ganger? In the end, I decided I’d stay in bed a bit longer and just go to Southampton parkrun for the 119th time. I really don’t like the congested start and always worry that I’m going to get tripped with my long legs, so I often go out way too quickly with a shorter stride length. The aim was to run around 18.30 or sub 6 pace. This would be great training for Victory 5 miler in December.
I ended up running an 18.03 despite slipping on the mud on the final corner and almost stacking it. This is my 2nd fastest time and only by 3 seconds! I was a bit surprised really. The sub 18 should be well within reach if I can lose a couple of kgs and do a few more track sessions. Exciting!
In other news, CC and myself have been house hunting, which was, at first, quite exciting. The process is still ongoing and proving to be quite stressful and a big challenge but we must stay positive as I know we’ll achieve what we want to in the end :) I won’t go to much into it.
The last parkrun of the month was a stormy one with torrential rain and strong winds. It was my first time to Victoria park in Newbury. A “V” for the alphabet and my 107th different location.
The reason we were there was because of John Pelligrini who was running his 100th different location and his 300th parkrun on the same day. Picked a nice day for it John! It was lovely to see the other VR’s too and our VRC chairperson Mike Harper too who gave me a lift home as Darren who drove me there, had to dash off for his singing at Romsey Abbey. I do like to car share where I can ;)
I didn’t really warm up much and couldn’t wait to start. It was a very complex course of muddy fields and it was a 3 lapper. Despite the trail shoes, it got very slippery on the 2nd lap with a couple of swans to navigate around, which one of them disliked and made it known by hissing at me.
I was in 10th place. That’s the great thing about running around a field, you can see where you are in the pack. I decided to see what position I could get to and target one runner at a time. I knew there was no P1 today though as there were clearly 2 speedies way out in front. I managed to overtake this kid near the end who was taking shortcuts along the way, as were many others, by choosing to run on the concrete and not on the grass course. They were cutting out a bit of distance by the fountain or was it a pond? Anyway, I overtook this kid which took me into 5th place. We were now running on the last bit of concrete and I could hear him gaining on me, so I decided to sprint to the finish. I don’t think I’ve ever sprinted this hard at the end of a parkrun before. Anyway, the little git overtook me despite my hardest efforts. We turn right onto the grass for the finish funnel and he slips and falls, I step over him and regain the P5 position and take the token as he gets up and tries in vain to claim the position back. I asked if he was ok and unapologetically apologised. I felt bad for about 10 seconds and then proceeded to tell a marshal how I had made a 10 year old kid cry in a sprint finish at Cosmeston lakes parkrun to take the p4 token a few years back.
Thanks for reading. I currently have a crappy cold but hope to do Victory 5 on Sunday. My last race of the year. No doubt I’ll be parkrunning still though. Stay youthful :D
Here’s a couple of pics of good books that I read this month too..
