It was the day of the Marple 10k
trail run which I have participated in for the
previous three years. It’s my favourite
of all the routes but I wasn't in the best of spirits. My chauffeur had been grumpy while driving
me here and I didn’t have high hopes for my recorded time. Since peaking at 51 minutes on the
first attempt, my times had become steadily longer. This year I’d not run for months at a time
while struggling with heel issues and an injured toe. I registered my entry with the organisers and listed
my predicted time as just under an hour for which I was put in the last but one
batch of runners for the staggered starting times.
Factoring in the start time plus
the period that will lapse before I was given the green light to run, I figured
I had enough time to walk to the centre of Marple and buy a bottle of water.
Going against the tide of runners arriving for the event, my spirits
lifted. It was a bright day and there
were lots of smiles. Then, after
buying some water, I was asked by an elderly lady if I could help her walk to a
hairdresser’s where she had an appointment. ‘I must start walking some more’,
she said. I was happy to help. I took her arm and relayed the places we were passing: Cherry
Tree café and the tattoo parlour (‘No, I’m not going there’). Doing this dressed in
runner’s yellow material gave me a virtuous feeling which felt in tune
with the Olympic spirit. At the
hairdresser’s entrance, she and a member of staff waved me off and I thought
‘Yep, that’s the right send off’.
As I stood in my group prepared to run, the
organisers gave us a run down on matters relating to the run. ‘Have you heard
about the horses?’ we were asked. No, this
hadn’t been revamped as triathlon type event where we were to consequently also alight
on and ride a horse then part swim through the Macclesfield canal; we needed to be mindful of our equine friends on the first part of the trail. During the run, I would let at least one of these pass first through one
of the rails when it’s rider explained ‘Charlie’ was quite headstrong and committed to going
first.
The first part of the run was on a
trail path. Sometimes this was exposed to the hot sun depending on the tree
cover. A drinks station heralded the half-way
point where we were then directed onto a transitional route to the canal path.
Much of this was across the field around churned up, half dried mud. A ‘V’ turn
heralds the fine canal side path with an occasional rise and droop over cobbled
path bridges. We would pass the odd dog walker or cyclist. Looking to the other
side of the water were some gardens which, on a day like this, made living in a
canal side house here look rather lovely. The gardens were all well-tended and spruced
up with water facing patio boards or ornamental features. Some had their own anchored boats
The finish is just before a bridge. Up and over this it led round to the adjacent
‘Bell O Roses’pub whose beer garden contained a concentration of completed
runners and their friends. There was
some applause for me and the cheers rose over time in proportion to the
length of time later people took to finish the run.
It was now lunchtime and runners got a goodie bag, a drink and
sandwich and hung out around the beer garden. The sun was shining and all
felt good. Someone, a walker, who I
overtook around 2 kilometres into the run eventually strolled past the
finishing line and got the biggest applause although with no visible number I’m
not wholly sure he was an entrant. In this spirit, other walkers subsequently got
loud applause.
The perfect end would have been
family waiting by the finishing line at which point my boys would have come
running towards me where I would somehow have carried them aloft. But in other ways this had all I could hope
for. I was happy with my time of 55
minutes and 12 seconds which arrested the decline of my finishing times. And there were a lot of things to make it a
good day: sun, scenery, good deeds, (firefighters) charity, atmosphere and
winding down with a cold beer. http://www.manchesterfire.gov.uk/updates/news/11september2012_marple_10k.aspx
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