Beauty & The Beast Half Marathon

This was the race of the year for me, I wanted to enter it last year but due to it falling on the same day as a family wedding I had to wait a whole year to tame the beast (their words not mine)

After recently obtaining a grade A pass in my sports psychology exam you would think that I am rather good at building up my confidence and gaining knowledge on my races...wrong! The night before I started googling details on the race and found a few things out that maybe were best left unread.
Point 1 - The beast is the large hill at the end of every lap (I had to do 3 laps) I already knew this.
Point 2 - The Beast was created by the same people that organize Hell Runner! ( If you don't know what hell runner is google it, I did and wished I hadn't)
Point 3- I read a blog from the previous year which admittidley was from a different venue but it still didn't fill me with much confidence.
Point 4 - The beast is deemed as being the toughest off road trail marathon/half marathon in the UK.

On this note I went to bed ready for the 6am start for the 2 hour drive to West Wycombe to tame this so called beast. Waking up at 6am and the fact that I had packed a towel, I must have been worried to do that? I considered not going but then came across a motivational video and listened to it, it made me cry as I realised my years dream had been to run this race and run it well. I realised that in sports psychology most athletes have a coach, I'm not an athlete and I sure as hell don't have a coach, the voice in my head is pretty damn useless at the best of times and needs to be sacked so I ripped the audio from this video and put it on my phone along with some new songs including the rather appropriate Katy Perry ROAR!!!! If you would like to listen to the video that I used to help get me around what is the hardest race I have ever and will ever do here is the link. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g-jwWYX7Jlo

Arriving at West Wycombe Park I made my way to the tents to get my race number and I spotted a load of signs with motivational sentences on them. They were dotted around and I could see a line of them going up

a smallish hill..Is this the beast? I wondered.
At 10am I was ready chip timer around my ankle which I wasn't too keen on and the warm up started. I was pleased it wasn't a silly jump around dancey warm up but a proper runners warm up. Does this mean I'm a proper runner. It was led by some woman from Sky sports 1 I have no idea who she was but she seemed to know what she was on about. With a field of around 300 runners some doing the full marathon (6 laps) the half marathon (3 laps) and team events there was a wide range of runners. I got my watch ready and we were off........... running up a hill!

me at the start, check out the size of my calf muscle!

No way a hill already! This hill came to a climax with a massive sqeulchy mud fest.. I was not impressed and then we took a sharp right to...another hill on gravel and mud. I ran up this hill and at 0.6 of a mile I stopped running, sobbed abit and thought this is it, it's going to be my second DNF. I simply decided I couldn't do it and got myself in a panick. I had already started walking at less than a mile in I wasn't happy with myself at all but I just gave up. I continued to walk then got a little trot on and we were soon into some woods with a muddy track around 8 or 9 inches wide half way up a slope so you had to be careful with footing as if you slipped a little to the left you would fall down a hill. Did I just use that word again.. hill hill hill! I was quite worried I would be holding people up as you simply couldn't pass on this part I was jogging and was pleased to see a line of runners infront of me battling their own way through the branches and nettles. Out of the woods and onto more muddy track and fields we then took a sharp left into a field and I was faced with a ridiculous hill... was this the beast? It can't be it's less than 2 miles into the course.

It seemed to go up stop then veer up even higher it was around 85 degrees at the top. I was very glad when I saw everyone was walking up this one. It took me nearly 4 minutes to walk from bottom to the top and my legs were like jelly. I did a little run out the field took a left into another field then at mile 2 there was the water station. I had decided not to run with my camel bak or any form of drink for this race so was pleased to get a bottle of water. After the water station there was another hill and another, at one point i tried to physically lift my own leg up as I simply couldn't move up the damn thing. The rest of the course went through a large field with tall hard grass that hurt to run through then we came down an incline that was so steep you had no choice but to put the brake on which hurt the front of my thighs. I then ran past my car! and then thought I was going to die. This part is not a joke.. you read stories of runners suddenly collapsing after/during a race.. I actually thought this would be me. I had the worst chest pains I couldn't breathe I was holding my chest where my heart is and the only thought that went through my head was "There wasn't anywhere to write emergency contact details on the back of my race number and I don't recall being asked to give any on entering, I am having a heart attack how are they going to call my mom" I then started crying and trying to breathe and came up to a marshall. I was going to ask for a medic but something stopped me. Come on Sarah pull yourself together if you have to walk it walk it but do not give up and most of all do NOT die! I walked past the marshall and was then faced with a lake. I was directed to run through it. What? This wasn't in the programme. Good job I had put my old stinkers on.. I ran straight through the middle of knee high icy cold water and absolutely loved it!

It sorted me right out and I decided I had nearly finished the first lap I knew what to expect and I will walk all the hills. The later part of the course was lovely we ran past a large lake with swans and little bridges with waterfalls to run over and came back to the tents where supporters were clapping and cheering. The only problem with finishing the first lap was tackling the beast. The small hill I mentioned earlier with all the motivational signs running up it. Small hill more like mount Everest. It was mocking me I walked up the first part got to a brow then it went up and up and up so steep I was breathing like a 90 year old. Where was my inhaler... at home! The only good thing about the beast hill is when you have ran up and around a statue of a man on a horse you got to run straight back down and you get to see the grimace of the runners coming up the bit you've just done. First lap done, from there it went something like this for the duration of the second lap, 20 seconds feeling good, 2 minutes of feeling crap. This is a lot of feeling crap when you add it all up. In the route through the woods I got a stinging nettle caught up in my ankle tag and couldn't get it out so left it. I thought running through the lake the second time around would free it. There were many people walking at this point and my aim was just to finish, I had set out with the hope of a 2 hour 30 - 2 hour 45 min half which would be the worst half marathon ever even worse than my very first half marathon but this wasn't a race this was an endurance event. At mile 10 I got to the first big hill again and phoned my sister for a bit of motivation I only had 3 miles to go and was on the last lap all was good.

my finish picture on top of the beast

My legs and bum were burning like hell on earth I knew this race was knocking me about abit but I was almost there. I put my motivational pep talk on had a bit of a sniffle decided I was going to quit running you know the usual rubbish. Then came to the lake again and was slightly dissappointed it would be the last time I would run through it. Coming to the beast for the final time I had no energy my legs felt like they didn't belong to me, I was walking at -5mph or so it felt but my pep talk was still playing... as I got to the top of the beast there was a sneaky photographer and I shouted to him "make sure you get one of me smiling!" He didn't do a bad job and neither had I. I tamed The Beast in a personal worst of 2 hours 57 minutes! I felt a mixture of things, I was so happy to finish I was proud I guess but I had done a rubbish time and was giving myself a telling off. It wasn't until the official results were released that I was actually rather pleased of myself. In the solo half marathon event I finished 107 out of 122 runners male and female and in the solo female category I finished 28th out of 38.  We'll ignore the fact that some of the male runners finished the marathon, a whole extra 3 laps than me in just over 15 minutes more than my time.. bloody men hey.

Two days on I'm still walking like a penguin and is it any wonder looking at the elevation from the course.

I will never go back to the beast I will never do another off road half marathon but I am however building some proper hill training into my training plan. I went, I tamed the beast and got the medal, tshirt and sore quads and glutes to prove it.