10 Things I Think About Running

10 Things I Think About The Rathcormac 4 Mile

1. A Very, Very, Very Cunning Plan

I think that the most important part of being a local elite level club BHAA runner is that you learn from your mistakes. The second most important part is to pick the race the day after nearly everyone faster than you has run in the BHAA race. I really like the Stryker 4 mile route but I figured there was a good chance that the Wednesday race would be more popular given the weather forecast so I kept my race effort for Thursday in Rathcormac.

2. Cross Country Weather

I think that it was great to get a reminder of what the cross-country races will be like in a few month’s time. I hadn’t run a race in the wind and rain since the Kinsale 10 mile which was one of the coldest wettest, windiest races ever. Rathcormac in August is generally sunny and warm but this year it was wet and almost cold. Perfect weather for a fella that loves the misery of a cross country race in November. Not perfect weather for all the poor volunteers like Graham who had to stand around in the pouring rain.

3. Park Life

I think that Rathcormac has a great setup for a road race. If you were to design a place to hold a road race you couldn’t do much better. It has a lovely half a mile warm up loop a short jog from the start with lots of parking beside the warm up loop. I warmed up with Liam O’Connor who Kieran McKeown had sent to beat me and Chris from Norway who fixes all of the broken runners.

4. James McCarthy

I think that it was inevitable that someone from East Cork would show up in Rathcormac. It is in their territory so they’d have to send someone, thankfully that someone was James McCarthy and not Tony Forristal. I haven’t been anywhere near Tony in races but James has had to work hard to beat me so I wasn’t too horrified to see him on the startline. There was no John Meade.

5. My Lovely Horses

I think that the Rathcormac race should use the horses in the race for advertising. It is a very nice route with horses running alongside the course for the first few 100m. Once we had passed the nice horses I started to concentrate on beating James McCarthy. I figured that given the way the race in Churchtown South unfolded there was no point in running with him to the finish as he would destroy me if he was even within sight of me once the finish was visible. So I set to work trying to run as fast as I could for the whole 4 miles which is the point of the race in the first place I suppose.

6. Just the Two of Us

I think that it took a bit longer than I thought it would to get the race down to just me and James. Liam O’Connor and Keith Kelly were hard to shake off. It took until the right-hand turn in Castlelyons to be free of them. I was particularly worried about Liam as he has been running 16 flat for 5k and will probably beat Viv soon which means he will probably beat me too.

7. Never Beat Your Heroes.

I think that when I started running races about 16 years ago, I never thought that I would end up in a battle with James McCarthy in a road race. James used to win everything, especially in East Cork, he is miles and miles better than me, a different species of an athlete with a proper 5k PB on the track before magic spikes came along and made average runners like me reasonably annoyingly fast. John Meade tells a great long story short about the time he beat James in the Ballycotton 5, never did I think that I would get the opportunity to do the same albeit in Rathcormac about 10 years later.

8. The Sound of the Vaporflys

I think that the great thing about Vaporflys is that you don’t have to look behind you to tell if you are getting a gap on someone or not. With about a mile and a half to go I suddenly started to hear that the Vaporflys of James McCarthy were getting less loud. The sound started to get fainter and fainter, then with a little bit more effort there was no sound just my own Vaporflys splashing the water from the road. I couldn’t believe it. I dared not look behind for fear that my ears were deceiving me.

9. Fear and Loathing in Rathcormac

I think that leading a race is terrifying. It is possibly one of the worst feelings ever. A feeling of complete terror. On the very rare occasions that I’m leading a race close to the finish I have a large Michael Herlihy head on my shoulder laughing at me. I was utterly terrified for the last mile and a half. I ran in complete fear. I knew that I had to keep going all the way to the line as if I wasn’t at least 10 seconds ahead with 400m to go I was in trouble. As luck with have it Rhona and Billy were standing about 400m from the finish. They didn’t say anything about anyone behind so I relaxed a little. I didn’t look back because that’s not allowed.

10. Complete Stranger to Winning Races

I think that the guy calling out the names at the finish line gave me too much credit. A man who is no stranger to winning races is not how I would describe myself. A man who is no stranger to coming fourth would be much more accurate. Anyway, it was wonderful to finally win a race especially as I ran faster over the same distance than both Michael Herlihy and Viv did in the BHAA race so it was almost a double victory. After a warm down in the rain with James and Keith Kelly around the best warm up loop in the country it was back to the hall with the impressive spread to collect first and not fourth prize for once. It was a good plan.