As a boy, I remember sitting out at the front of my mum and dad's house on Green Lane - a stones throw from he finish - and watching the runners go by. As a young kid, I knew then that I would love to take part one day and have a go myself.
When I finally did do - just before my 21st birthday, I knew immediately that this was something which I would come back for and do again the next year. And the next, and the next. And the next, until hopefully one day I was good enough to win it. It has become something of a holy grail to me!
Last year I managed to run my strongest performance yet at the event, and came home in second place. I must admit, part of me had hoped that this year maybe, just maybe I could push that little bit further.
It wasn't to be, and every credit to Dave Rigby on defending his crown and running very strongly in gruelling conditions. He is one of the finest distance runners in the area, and has again showed that at Freckleton. Regardless of the heat, he would have taken some stopping today.
I gave it a go, and knew that I was up against it and struggling when Dave began to put a push on and pull away from me at about 4.5 miles in. Up until that point, I had dug in fairly well and was just about keeping myself in the game, but once that gap opened up, it opened up quickly. I was already struggling with the heat, and my splits were conclusive proof of the fact that I was quite quickly finding myself in some trouble.
From being toe to toe with Dave through the first third of the race, within a mile he was out of sight. I actually thought about jacking it in as early as mile 6, but what with still being in second place, I felt a bit of a duty to try and stick at it and hope that I got some sort of second wind from somewhere in the second half of the race. From averaging 5:21 pace through 5 miles, mile 6 was a 5:50 and mile 7 a 5:57. It wasn't to be, and when the inevitable happened at mile 7-8 and Rob Affleck caught me, I was down to little more than a jog. There was no way I would have been able to tag on to the back of him and I knew the game was up.
I eventually stopped just before the mile 9 mark, as my pace had dropped further to a 6:18, and took an orange from a spectator and a drink of water that they had brought in a bottle. I was offered a lift back to the sports field, but elected to try and jog it in. Around a minute and a half after I stopped, the now 3rd place runner Gary Pennington came passed. I decided to run along with him for a bit and that got me to about mile 10, when I stopped and had a shower with a spectators hose pipe!
I eventually stopped completely at mile 12, knowing that I was completely zapped of energy and wouldn't want to accept the time anyway!
I am pretty down about things, and will beat myself up for a few days now - but I know that conditions on the day were just out of my hands, I didn't cope with the heat and there is no allowing for that.
But looking at it from a different perspective beyond just myself, I think it is time for some serious questions to be asked of the organisation of the race itself. I know members of the committee and understand the amount of hard work that goes into putting on the event. I count one of the organisers as a genuine friend and so don't want to be too critical in that respect. But questions have been asked time and again about the continued decision to put this race on at 2pm in the afternoon on what is traditionally one of the hottest weekends of the year. If a runner that is fairly experienced and regularly clocks up 70-75 miles a week is struggling to get around the course, then what about the fun - runners, first timers, and those that are out on the course on the hottest part of the day for in excess of 2 hours or more?
As I say, this goes beyond thinking of myself, this is me trying to make a serious point about the risks and potential for serious illness or harm to others. The amount of runners that I saw coming in way and above their usual times, and the state some of them were in as they crossed the line said a lot for me. It was brutal.
I know it can be argued that nobody can predict the weather, but it doesn't take a genius to make the presumption that at 2pm on a mid June afternoon the weather is going to be hotter than normal. How many other races can people name that starts mid afternoon, not just in summer months, but year round? And then, how many of them are half marathons were people are out in the heat for a length of time? I can't think of any, and there are reasons for that.
I know the Freckleton committee probably want to avoid a clash with the church service - so why not move the race back to Saturday evening, or knock the start time back to 4pm to avoid the hottest part of the day? As a minimum, surely there must be money in the kitty to at least provide decent quality bottled water, as opposed to the plastic cups? It may sound petty, but at £18 a head, this is not a cheap race. There has to be a duty of care for the runners, surely?
Freckleton has become something of an annual pilgrimage for me, but if things don't change, I seriously question whether I will be back to participate any time soon. That would be a massive shame for me personally, as it is a race that means so much to me.
Fortunately by stopping when I did, I am fine, and feeling better already - barring a bruised ego! I will just have to get straight back on it and find another event to get this bad one out of my system.
During the week, it had mainly been much easy running in the build up to this race - barring a bit of an effort at the latest interclub race at Preston on Wednesday night. It wasn't a particularly quick pace, as the main opposition had both raced in the previous day's running up to this one. I ran around in 5:15s and felt nice and comfortable all the way around.
Total mileage for the week: 64
Average pace for the week (m/pm): 6:29
Total mileage so far this month (June): 181.5
Total mileage for 2017: 1611.5
Average miles per day 2017: 9.59
