It was an emotional day.
Quite apart from my own personal trauma – lack of running, lack of sleep, injury, illness, absense of general fitness and shrinking self-confidence – there was a communal air of sobriety about our gathering. Bewl 15 was one of Moyleman’s favourite summer outings and we’d decided to honour his memory by running in his name.
My sense of foreboding over my own performance was enhanced when I boarded Ladyrunner’s Love Bus at the un-Godly hour of 08:20. Ladyrunner, Gary, Jeannette and Cam, Chris’s Sister, were already seated and to a man or woman looked lean, mean and ready for action. The ensuing conversation proved more reassuring as each person listed their own ailments, the most common being general shagged-outedness following the recent brutal South Downs Relay.
After a mini-adventure of the camper kind, taking in the scenic and at times far-too-narrow-to-confidently-navigate route, we arrived. The turn out from Brighton was formidable. Watching the red-and-black hoop-vested athletes going through their warm-ups it occurred to me that B&H might stand a fair chance of a team prize. The ladies’ team boasted Katy Moore amongst their number – individual winner last year and holder of the course record. Race organiser Albert Kemp called us under orders and spoke about Chris. He was in the middle of calling for a minute’s silence when spontaneous applause broke out, taken up by the gathering throng until the air rang with enthusiastic clapping. A brief period of reflection followed, then, in the non-nonsense spirit of my dear friend, we were off.
My race was something of a curate’s egg. Having joined my fellow Brightonians at the front of the pack to show respect for Chris I was horrified when without further ado the race started. I was swept along, a drowning man in a rushing torrent of garish Goretex and alarmingly tight-fitting lycra. At one stage I thundered past Julie and Gary, crying out in false bravado ‘Mind out: runner coming through!’ I glanced at my Garmin. Half a click in and I was comfortably on course for a 5K PB. I immediately threw out the parachute and what seemed like the entire race went hurtling by. I slowed, found a far more realistic – and comfortable – cadence and got down to brass tacks. A couple of miles in I spied Camilla coming back towards me through the hoards as she too was swallowed by the more ambitious, able-bodied runners. We hailed one another, cursed our foolishness at starting at the front and resolved to set about salvaging our race.
Right up to the start the weather had teased us with cloudy skies and a cool breeze. No sooner had the first runners lurched off down the mud-flint trail than miraculously the clouds parted to reveal a fully-risen, beaming sun bristling in a bright blue sky. Beads of sweat popped out at the first kiss of unveiled heat. I proceeded to leak profusely, dousing my RC vest and soaking my shorts within the first two miles. T'was ever thus for me in warm races. Sigh.
The course winds its' way around the banks of picturesque Bewl Water, a man-made lake whereupon weekenders water-ski, learn to sail, windsurf, swim and angle. The setting is beautiful. Great leaf-rich trees guard the trail, occasionally yielding to open fields. Whilst under cover we found respite from the heat. Sunbeams danced in the half-light, casting mottled patterns on the forest floor. Once free of cover those same light shafts burned into our heads, shoulders and arms; it was like turning up the gas on a summer's day. More than once I glanced at the postcard-perfect summer sky and muttered darkly under my breath.
‘I know I promised I’d do this but … it bloody hurts and it's hot and I don’t like it! I bet you're laughing your'e ass off where ever you are … ‘
Approaching halfway I felt … surprisingly OK. My pre-emptive Ibuprofen strike (for knees and sore ankle) appeared to have worked. I’d quaffed an energy gel after 6 klicks – I had another in reserve – and that appeared to be working. The outpouring of sweat had remained tolerable and my feet, clad in my beloved red Mizunos, were standing up to the heavy pounding. I relaxed a little ... just as a hand landed on my shoulder.
‘Hello mate!’ It was Rog – Rog-air, God-botherer Rog, co-veteran of Paris, Cape Town and erstwhile companion to Moyleman here at Bewl in years past, founder member of the Habbakuk Harriers. I was delighted to see him, and we nattered like old maids for the next five or six miles. 'Like Paris' I quipped, 'but without the streets, or crazed Parisiens flooding the course.' At some point we parted company with Cam – perhaps she’d heard all Rog’s terrible jokes, or most likely, with Rog being in good form, we’d upped the pace. The Garmin confirmed a slight quickening. I felt OK and we soldiered on, putting the world to rights and remembering Chris with tales rude and glorious.
By the time the 13 mile marker came and went it dawned on me we’d broken the Monster's back. With that revelation came a dreadful flood of fatigue. I dropped off the pace and Rog slowed, but I urged him on. At mile 14 he obeyed, bounding effortlessly away in his easy style. I was left to hang on in there, stealing one and two-minute walk-breaks on the inclines, ducking the merciless sun and, when breaking into a trot, running purely on vapour, desperate for the finish line. When the end came it was a blessed relief, brought closer by the encouraging shouts from Team Moyleman, most of whom has finished some time earlier. Mike Bannister loomed, impossibly tall, on the side of the road, grinning wildly and waving a telescopic arm towards me.
‘Come on Ash … Come on Cam!’
Cam? Blimey, she’d caught me up. There wasn’t time to worry as I looked up and nearly bowled into a marshal at the finish line.
‘Well done!’ ‘Thank God!’
Medal, goodie bag (a small rainforest of flyers plus a Lucozade drink), cake stall (water, rock cake), grass … aaaah!
2:21 – a PB (it’s my first fifteen miler) and, all things considered, I’m pleased with that.
It turned out to be a very good day for the ‘serious’ team.
Each B&H Four won their respective team races. Katy won the ladies senior individual – another sub 1:30 and a new course record. Turns out last year the course measured 14.2 miles; this year they cranked up to the full 15. Fi picked up a gong too. I’d like to say what it was for but in the most shamobolic awards ceremony in the history of amateur athletics all meaning was lost. Matt Bristow came second in the men’s seniors, a terrific effort that he celebrated by contorting himself on the floor of the leisure centre in an effort to drive out his lactic demons and restore feeling to his battered legs.
We lesser mortals gathered on the grass for a picnic. A generous spread unfolded – sandwiches, pies, giant sausage rolls crammed with pork and Brambley apple, crudités, dips, chips, pizza … the 5000 would have been dead chuffed. I unveiled 8 pints of freshly-drawn Harvey’s and proceeded to drink it with invaluable help from Soft Al and Dave. The cast included RC regulars MSilv, Gillybean and Simon, as well as a host of Hove Park & Sunday run regulars. We were a happy, self-satisfied bunch, laughing, joking, swapping food and stories, finally groaning like wounded troops as we tried to rise on stiffening legs.
Thanks go as ever to the selfless marshals and race organisers, plus Camilla for organising the excellent Run For Moyleman purple wristbands (a must-have fashion item avaliable for a modest sum) and to Ladyrunner for kindly driving there and back and for putting up with a lot of babble, banter and intolerable, misleading back-seat navigation.
A Grand Day Out, one to be repeated.
The harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph
