Marcothon, Mojo and Music

 My cold(s) and injury, combined with the terrible weather and demands of my new job had curtailed my running in November.  In fact I hadn’t run, cycled or swam since the Movember Run on Sunday, 20 November.  This isn’t a disaster as I’ve had a good year and I probably needed a rest before starting my London Marathon Training Schedule on 18 December.   

I wasn’t able to do the Marcothon last year as I was in transit between Thailand and Glasgow for over 24 hours and wasn’t able to run whilst flying.  The challenge being to run a minimum of 3 miles or 25 mins every day in December.  I’m not sure if I agree with the whole Ron Hill concept of running every day, arguing instead that rest is an important part of any training plan.  However I had lost my mojo in late November and was prepared to use anything to motivate me to get the trainers on and head out for a run in the dark and wet winter nights of old Glasgow toun.  So on Wednesday 1 December, after returning from a meeting at Ayr College, I donned my trainers, leggings, long sleeved vest and gloves and headed out for a slow 3.63 mile run in 32:23.  Of course I rewarded myself on Thursday night with a few pints in Sammy Dowe's, where I had the pleasure of chatting with percussionist legend RayWeston after he performed two numbers with host band Independence. 

Unassuming Ray Weston @sammys

Friday was a holiday to mark St Andrew’s Day and I headed out for a similar run, although this time I increased the pace for the middle kilometre and completed 3.74 miles in 31:30.

I had wanted to support the Glasgow University Hares andHounds 5 mile race on Saturday but didn’t feel that I was ready for it and settled for the Glasgow parkrun’s third anniversary instead, my 75^th .  I didn’t want to push myself too much but found myself sandwiched for much of the race between Martin Myant and Killie Women’s captain, Liz McDerment, Bella Harrier Jennifer Clark, having overtaken me at the 3k mark, much to my relief as she was making me work too hard. I took the foot off the gas for the 4^th k but increased it slightly in the last kilometre to cross the line in 68^th position, with a time of 22:42. 

After sharing mutual congratulations with my fellow runners, I introduced, first woman, Paula Wilson to Jennifer, who plays in the band Horse, which Paula is a big fan of and was actually going to see on Saturday night.

A short warm down and I made my way to a packed Burrell to get changed into some dry clothes and enjoy some post race chatting, a hot cup of coffee and some birthday cake.  Congratulations to John Gilhooly, who won the men’s annual points league and his female counterpart, who’s name I didn’t catch.  In fact I didn’t catch much of, Race Director, Richard Leyton’s speech and I’m sure that I’m not the only one, as although he is a self confessed geek and does a power of work for parkrun, I’m afraid that public speaking is just not one of his strengths.

I would have loved to have gone to Garscube to support the 5 mile racers, or even make the trip to Rugby Park to watch the famous Ayrshire Killie, I thought it was probably better that I headed home for brunch, a hot bath and a well earned siesta.

I had run my third run of December, my 61^st race of 2011 and my 87^th parkrun and, of course, I have another run tomorrow.