I signed up for the Cheddar Gorge half marathon in 2017. It looked like a great event. Unfortunately, I was ill and couldn’t make the start line. Undeterred I signed up again in 2018. This time it clashed with the big England versus Panama World Cup match and I chose watching football and drinking cider over running. 

In hindsight I should have taken these setbacks as a warning. Somebody somewhere didn’t want me to run this Cheddar race. Maybe I should have listened. Instead I signed up again for 2019. 

To put the run into context I’m not at my fittest and have got a bit slower in recent months. My park run times are 2 minutes slower, 10K is 4 minutes slower and half marathon is about 10 minutes slower. I’m putting this down to a few niggling injuries and colds, life getting in the way of running, concerns about Brexit and Bristol Rovers sadly not getting relegated, and it has absolutely nothing to do with me getting older and slower.

I thought that Cheddar was likely to have a few gentle slopes and so wasn’t expecting a quick time, though I was thinking that I could try and run the race without walking. Clearly, I hadn’t checked out the course in advance. 

When I arrived at Cheddar, I saw Wendy and she cheered me up by saying the course had been changed because of the rain and it was now a bit easier. This was good news and I was feeling fine as Wendy and I, and the intrepid EGRC team, headed for the start. 

At the start area, I looked across the valley and was admiring a huge mountain. Just imagine having to run up there I thought to myself…..ha ha ha! My joy was short lived as I was informed that not only did we have to run up the mountain, but we had to do it twice. I looked across the valley again and could see the mountain stretching up through the clouds and almost touching the moon. I know it was daytime but that’s how it seemed. From then on, my only thought was survival. I have a habit of starting too fast in races, because I think I can win them for about the first 400 metres, and then suffering later on. I was determined not to this time.

The race start was delayed because there were clay pigeon shooters on the course. For a minute I weighed up whether being shot might be a better option than going up that mountain – twice.

The race finally started and I was in the second wave with Helen, with Wendy and Graham having set off in the first. The first couple of kilometres was fine and I was feeling great, although in fairness they were all downhill but now the mountain was here. I took out my rope, harness, crampons and ice axe and headed upwards. 

I reached the summit and planted a Bristol City flag, although by now I could really do with a little nap. I initially put my tiredness down to being at altitude so there was less oxygen getting to my muscles. However, then I remembered that I don’t have any muscles and so instead put my tiredness down to having climbed up a great big mountain. 

My hope that the rest of the race would be pretty flat sadly didn’t come to fruition. How could I possibly have guessed Cheddar Gorge would be so hilly? I remember Jack sprinting past me. In my mind I’m sure he was laughing and saying how easy it was and that he wished there were some bigger hills. He was soon gone, bounding off into the distance.

I saw other EGRC runners as I plodded my way around and this encouraging, although it seems they were all looking stronger than me. Brian and Nathan powered by, while Tracey seems to glide so easily and so quickly. At some point I caught up with Wendy. That was good especially as there was a slight incline and so we were both very happy to walk and have a little chat, mostly about how neither of us like mountains very much.

Emily came past me and I told her to smile as we approached a photographer. She was a few strides ahead and told me to catch up again for a mini team photo. Looking at those photos now it looks like we were happy. If anybody saw me exactly two strides after passing the photographer, they would know the truth. Emily ran off into the distance.

I was feeling better as I approached half way, but then guess what? There was a sharp, steep hill. It was horrible and I felt it in my calves, but worse than this I knew that I would have to do it again in 6.5 miles time. I wasn’t looking forward to that. 

As I approached the start point to begin the second lap, because there were people there, I pretended I was fine and I kept running. For lap two I ran the downhill bits and then walked pretty much everything that had an incline and that definitely includes Mount Cheddarest. 

Most of the EGRC team had gone past me by now, although I saw Rebecca as she came through while navigating one of the many muddy and rocky sections. She said that she had been struggling a bit earlier, but she was looking really strong now.

I kept looking at my watch and counting down the distance, looking ahead and finding landmarks where I would either stop or start running and basically cut the race down into little chunks. 

My mind kept thinking of the really steep bit to come. I hoped that perhaps somebody had built an escalator in the time that I’d been away or maybe there was a racehorse or a mountain goat all tacked up and ready for me to ride up the hill. As it happened there wasn’t. My calves felt tight as I started to climb. I wondered whether there was an alternative to going up this hill, whether crawling would work or perhaps if I started crying maybe somebody would take pity on me and carry me up. I got to the top. It was very slow but I’m pretty sure that I didn’t cry. 

From there on it was just a case of getting to the finish. I just tried to blank out everything and get into a rhythm. It was great to reach the end and while I didn’t have the energy for a sprint finish, I heard encouraging voices from team EGRC as the line came into sight. 

I finished in 2 hours 38 minutes and 30 seconds. The time didn’t matter. I was just pleased to finish. 

I found this race to be as hard as any that I’ve done. I normally recover from races pretty quickly. This time I went home and collapsed on the sofa for the rest of the day. On the bright side, I’m really pleased that I completed the race, the medal is great and I got 16 championship points, ok, there were only 5 male runners from EGRC, but I still got the points. 

If next year’s race clashes with an England match in the European Championship finals, I think you know what I’ll choose!