Traditional as......

Almost as traditional as Turkey, Mince Pies & Christmas pud with jelly & blancmange ......it`s the Tadworth 10.

With it being held on 1st Sunday of the year it`s a good way to shift those festive gained pounds. Even thou it`s now my 3rd year on bounce I still love this race - a multi terrain, undulating 10 miler at Epson Down racecourse. The course itself was nearly 2 laps of 5 - being off set by about 0.5M and from doing this race before I knew where the course slow ups, basically from the start (0.5M in) the course is at the lowest point (about 110 M) and rises to 180 M or so in the next mile or so added to that the track / road is very narrow - a natural bottle-neck. The race plan was that I would start slow and get quicker - working on a negative split run rather than progressive as the course wouldn`t allow that.

So a steady start, out from the start along a narrow ish track & down the bottom of the hill, up the track - all going well and steady. Then the wait for the 4 horses (!!) - OK this wasn`t in my plan - was it in their plan to disturb the race...who knows but if it was then someone didn`t tell the last horse rider - she look petrified !!! So the 1st mile went to plan - a slow start, speed up a little in the 2nd mile. Mile 3 and unto road it was quicker still. Mile 4 was much of the same - which was strange as about the course moves from downhill road to uphill & off-road. The final mile of the 1st lap is uphill & on a sandy uneven track. Back past the start but on road and through for another lap, then down the hill........

This time, where the horses were, it was much faster but still 60 seconds slower than the previous mile - somehow I manage to get boxed in (what a rookie !!!) plus I had a `breather` - I`m sure he was much closer than he was (ok course I would have minded if it was a lady runner but it wasn`t so grrrrrrrrrr ) !! Anyway picked up the pace when onto the down hill road section. Generally I was passing loads of folks which is always good & helped pushed me on. In the last 1/2M or so I had targeted 4 or so runners but as we closed in towards the finish they kicked a bit quicker than I thought they would and I could only pass one of them.

Still a pleasing run and gernerally mission accomplished.

Thanks goodness I had warm clothes and hot coffee in the car - I didn`t realise how cold I got esp after the cool down.

Route & Elevation..

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/61558832

Previous Results -

2009 - 01:24:03
2010 - 01:22:52
2011 - 01:21:03

Split Summary
====
1) - 1m - 9:50(9:50/m) - 136cal
2) - 1m - 8:28(8:28/m) - 143cal
3) - 1m - 7:35(7:35/m) - 142cal
4) - 1m - 7:35(7:35/m) - 141cal
5) - 1m - 8:07(8:07/m) - 140cal
6) - 1m - 7:58(7:58/m) - 142cal
7) - 1m - 8:51(8:51/m) - 142cal
8) - 1m - 7:54(7:54/m) - 142cal
9) - 1m - 7:57(7:57/m) - 137cal
10) - 0.89m - 6:49(7:38/m) - 124cal

Next up - Winter Tanners 30 (or maybe a 20 or 40 if I get lost) - a LDWA event