"Better By Half"

After months of waiting and following a tough five mile "Rainow Hill Race" in midweek the day finally dawned cool and misty for the long awaited White Peak Swift Half Marathon set on the High Peak Trail in the wonderful Peak National Park.

As well as running what must be one of the most picturesque half marathons around, it was also the chance to meet some of the UK's podcast community who provide many hours of listening and on line viewing to the worldwide running community. It was a great opportunity before the start to say thanks to the runners who put in many hours of work in addition to their normal busy lives to help promote the sport of running.

The photo shows -

Phil Moneypenny the mastermind behind http://www.runcast.tv/ (where you can also find a video of the race as it happened)

Steve Chopper http://amilewithme.podbean.com/

Petra http://petraruns.blogspot.com/

Gary Wall

The person missing is Toni Harvey http://www.drusy.blogspot.com/ host of and regular host/contributor/organiser of the excellent http://runnersroundtable.com/ I think Toni was off warming up. Which is something we should all have been doing!

I think everyone had a good race, the weather held, although at times there was a strong headwind. I ran 1.35.30 (7.18 miling) which is over a minute quicker than earlier in the season at Wilmslow and for a non distance runner these days one I am happy with. I think everyone else was also pleased with their performances, which after negotiating a predominantly uphill first 8 miles you were rewarded some extremely fast downhill miles towards the end. The only person to miss the large arrow sign pointing to the finish with only a mile to go was Steve who added an extra mile to his race and "popped" out of the crowd fifty metres from the finish having taken the unofficial route in!

All in all the second excellent race of the week, well organised and friendly. It is clear why this race fills up so quickly every year. It's now back to the fells for the final two races of the month after which the track takes over for the rest of the summer.

Weekly mileage 26. Annual mileage 505