Daffodil Dawdle

Another week, another marathon.  It is something that I need to stop thinking most weekends.  I am aware that there is only the one marathon in the next three weeks which is nice.

The Daffodil Dawdle is one of those delightful challenges organised by the equally delightful Long Distance Walkers Association.  And for the first time this year, the weather was delightful to go with it.

My one mistake was one of organisation.  The morning after the clocks go forward is not the ideal time to commit to an early race a couple of hours from home.  A night spent waking, looking at the clock, trying to remember whether it was the actual time or if it should be an hour forward or an hour backward before dropping back into a fitful sleep until finally having the alarm drag me from the deepest sleep, much to my regret.

Between this point and race start everything was as usual.  I was slightly behind the plan leaving the house, the journey was slightly faster than the plan, parking was well signed and organised and I was quickly registered, bathroomed and ready to go.  On arrival I had met Graeme, a fellow ultra runner with a penchant for these types of events and also a member of the same athletics club.  I had known that we both planned to be here, but sometimes these things do not quite work out.  We were informed of a last minute route change due to snakes being found in one of the fields near the end of the course and we were off.

I would love to explain more about the event but here things begin to blur for me.  We moved a little quicker than either of us probably would have alone and having two people working through the route directions in parallel made things smoother in general and meant that the rare mistakes were rectified more swiftly.  Three checkpoints were less that the LDWA usually put on for these events but it was plenty on this occasion.  As ever, they were beautifully well stoked and prove a tempting respite but I had already decided to stick to minimal provisions, it is something that I want to get used to during these low intensity runs.  I stuck to two 25g servings of honeyed cashews, one at the half way point and one at the three quarter point.  It worked well for me.  I did get tempted into taking a little ginger beer at that third checkpoint though; how could I not?

Graeme and I ran together from start to finish.  My expectation was to canter round this in five hours to five and a half hours but with Graeme as wing man we clipped around in a little over four and a half.  With three marathons earlier in the week, the lack of agonising pain and the fact that my engine was still ticking over at the end, I was pretty happy with this.

I would like to say more about the course but other than being flat, picturesque and very runnable, not a lot of specifics stuck with me.  But there were a few lovely churches.

I would make an awful travel agent.