Category: Stuff I love!

So after parkrun and delicious pancakes on Saturday, we got the train to Portslade- a few stops along the line, basically on the outskirts of Hove. We wanted to look in a flooring shop (as you do) and then thought a walk back along the seafront would be lovely. At first the weather was great, but as we got closer to Brighton the clouds were really rolling in.

It did make for some dramatic scenery.

Of course we found more Snowdogs- I could not work out why I had not seen this one last time, but a lady taking a photo (she had been looking for them all, and only had 2 more to find) told me it had been in London until a couple of weeks ago.

I also got a bit over-excited seeing the km markers up for the race.

I also thought it was crazy when we got closer to the old pier- so much of it has fallen into the sea now.

As the clouds were fast approaching we headed up into town to the shopping centre, and got there just after it started pouring. We then mooched around the shops for a bit, before buying a few snacks (we shared some hummus and carrot sticks, crisps and mango) as we didn’t fancy lunch, and went back to the hotel to have them as it was very wet outside.

As the rain eased off, we headed out for a wander around the lanes, and treated ourselves to a big pot of tea and some lovely chocolate mint cake in Catwalk Cakes- they do such lovely flavours in there. Our dinner wasn’t until late (8.15- that’s very late for us!) so we went back to the hotel yet again – I did my pre race prep of painting my nails, getting my kit out, putting my number on my vest etc. Dinner was so good- we went to Food for Friends as they do such good veggie food- I had lovely baby aubergines stuffed with various things and served with some sort of tomato and bean thing. I also had such a lovely drink, called a ginger zinger (maybe)- ginger and star anise and lime juice, warm, with probably some other things too (I think a slice of orange?)- anyway it was so warming and festive.

The race organisers had posted on facebook on Saturday about watching out in case the storm was bad, but I didn’t really think they would cancel. I woke up on Sunday before my alarm and saw I had a text message from them- it said it had been cancelled, but also it said more news to follow. There was a similar message on facebook, but I looked outside and it didn’t look too bad. I put my running things on, so I decided I would head out just in case- not sure what I was thinking.

The wind in town was fine, but as soon as I got along the seafront it was crazy.

Huge waves were smashing up over the marina and groynes, and the trees were flapping wildly.

I thought I would prove I went running along the seafront, although not for long! I saw all the marshals for the race out, turning away runners that had not heard the message. It must have been so hard for them to decide to cancel, and the poor volunteers were still out in the bad weather although luckily it wasn’t raining.

I ran along to the marina (seeing more Snowdogs) and then decided to cut in and run back through Kemp Town (where we stayed when I did the marathon). Normally I would not just make up a route, but I feel I know my way around Brighton quite well, plus I knew that I was heading back parallel to the seafront, and at each intersection I could look left and still see the sea.

I was originally planning on running for 6 miles but in the end I did 5 before calling it a day, stopping off at Pret to get us each a warm drink.

I looked on Strava after and could see where the wind was behind me- so much faster! (9.55 vs 11.12 minutes per mile!).

It was a shame to not run the race, as I don’t think it would have been harder than the crazy wind they had last year, but I got to go out for more pancakes which is never a bad thing!

They sent an email later explaining their reasons- the race has always been along the prom before, but because it’s getting bigger they had permission to close the road along the seafront. However, the police would not let them do this (I suppose because of access for emergency vehicles) plus the wind meant that they would not get the port-a-loos to the start/finish area (which would not bother me, but of course would bother a lot of people).  They have said we can get money off next years entry, as they can’t find a date to hold it a second time, and seeing as it’s fairly cheap (I think £14?) I don’t mind too much. Although I wonder what they will do with the medals, as they have the date on them usually.

After breakfast and a quick walk along the pier to see yet another snowdog, we headed to the train station. Another lovely weekend in Brighton, although not quite the result I was hoping for!

Have you ever had a race cancelled? What is your hot drink of choice? We went for Earl grey tea on Saturday, because tea goes very well with cake, but on Sunday morning I went for a chai latte (hooray that Pret do them now) because there is something more warming about that sort of drink.

So this weekend, on Friday evening after dinner at home, we got the train down to Brighton. The last few times I have been to Brighton, I’ve been to Hove Prom parkrun, mainly as it is easy to find (find the sea, and turn right and run along the seafront). But when I looked last time, it turned out Preston Park was marginally closer, and although I thought it would be complicated to find, Andy reminded me that it was where the marathon started, and basically from the main road near the Pavilion (very close to where we stayed) I had to turn left and keep going straight. Simple.

A Snowdog by Preston Park

It turned out to be a very good idea for many reasons:

• It was my 12th different parkrun (or 11 if we don’t count San Fran), so now I’m over half way to 20.
• It was very windy and running by the sea would be tough.
• I got to spot more Snowdogs on my way as we had not walked in that direction.
• They were having a pacing event (or maybe they have pacers there a lot? I was looking on their facebook page as I always check in case of cancellations, and there was a discussion about pacer runners as recently they had an event and had some uncomplimentary feedback about having a 37 minute pacer- for goodness sake if you are a speedy runner does it really matter how many pacers are running behind you???? Argh! Anyway, the overwhelming number of comments were about how great it is to have a range of pacers- I digress…)- so I could choose a pacer to follow and try to stick with them.
• I had forgotten to pack facewipes but I ran past a Boots so I popped in on my way back.

Saturday morning was beautiful- so frosty and clear, with such blue skies. As I took a little detour looking at more snowdogs, when I arrived I had run 1.8 miles, so I pottered up and down the path a couple of times to get it up to 2 miles, and to stay warm. I had worn a long sleeved top over my t-shirt, planning to take it off but it was so cold I kept it on the whole time.

The park seemed busy- of course when I first got there I had no idea where in the park it started, and ended up getting lost in some sort of maze bushes. I’d seen some runners in the distance heading for the top of the park, and luckily I found it!

They even have high viz jackets for their bollards! How brilliant!

The new runners briefing was friendly, although another person “won” (coming from a further distance) and then the full briefing was as usual- clapping for people’s 50th/100th runs and so on. All good.

It was so frosty, and the path was covered in a thin layer where it was still in the shade, but I knew the runners in the front would sort that out! They had pace posts (?- numbers on posts to help you line up in the right place), although I lined up by the 28 minute sign and behind the 30 minute pacer.

The route sounded a little confusing (and the new runners briefing didn’t totally help- in the end he said unless you’re planning on running sub 17 minutes, just follow the person in front) but in fact it wasn’t too bad- you started off facing anticlockwise, and ran half a loop of the park, before turning around at a cone (and a marshal) and running clockwise back to the start. Then you did two full clockwise loops, with the finish funnel being a peel-off from the main loop. I started off fairly steadily- as my watch had been running since the hotel I had no idea of pace, but I went past the 30 and 29 minute pacers just fine. I could see the 28 minute pacer up ahead, but on my second time running up the hill I managed to drop back a lot (I had a bit of a cold so needed to get a tissue out of my pocket which did slow me down). Anyway, there was a nice long gentle descent so I managed to catch up and then overtake him before the final hill (it’s only a small hill). I had seen my watch said 9.02 as we crossed the start line, and it was bang on 9.30 when I finished, so I was hoping for sub 28.

I got my chip scanned, and to my surprise the scanner didn’t keep my chip, she gave it back to me. I asked her where to put it, but she didn’t know.  So I wandered back to the finish line and asked another volunteer- they pointed out a table, a bit further from the finish line and scanners, with a parkrun banner. Here I joined a queue and people had to put their tokens into the right section of the token sorting box (e.g. mine went in the 190-199 section). Now, I have no problems with this at all, but it wasn’t totally clear. They actually put a message up on their facebook page saying they had lost a lot of tokens this week, but I am not surprised by this- if it was my first parkrun I may not have asked where to put it. I’ve seen this sort of token sorting at Wimpole Estate, but they had a huge board and it was pointed out at the main briefing, and then at the end the scanners were close to it, and you were directed over once you had been scanned. Anyway, a small point.

When the results came through I had managed 27.54 for my 85th parkrun- I feel like the 100 is now in sight which seems crazy!

I didn’t hang about as I didn’t want to get cold, so I headed back to the hotel,  running nearly 7 miles in total for the morning.

Cafe Coho was also calling- after a shower it was time for delicious pancakes with Greek yoghurt and berries.

Have you ever seen people running wearing crazy costumes? I ask because one guy was running the parkrun wearing chain mail. An actual top made of metal. Mental. How does your parkrun collect in the tokens?  Ellenbrook has little buckets and then the people empty them every few minutes and sort them.

On Friday, straight after work I drove to the train station and caught the train to Luton airport (note to self- next time just get the Eurostar both ways- we could not get a direct train to the Disney station late enough for me to make it, but getting out from the centre of Paris would have been much easier than the bundle for the bus up to the airport/ security/ delays/ the terminal being super crowded/ the 30 minutes it took for us to get through immigration….). Andy had bought some salads for us to have as dinner, and we bought a hot drink in the terminal. As the plane arrived too late for the trains, we had booked a transfer that took us right to our hotel.

We stayed at the Hotel L-Elysee, which was one metro stop (or a free busy ride) from the Disney area, and right by a large shopping centre with restaurants and a supermarket. It’s a great location as it is close by, but nowhere near the cost of the Disney hotels.

On Saturday we headed to the expo to collect our numbers and t-shirts.

This was very well organised. They also had some merchandise for sale (although none of the cool Disney trainers that they get in the USA), so I bought myself a t-shirt, headband and we each bought a mug. We had been sent an email saying that Paula Radcliffe was doing a talk at 12.00 in English (and at 4pm in French), but there was a yoga class going on at the centre part of it. We wandered around a bit, but could not even find a schedule, and there was no-where we could see where it might be. In the end we left it and headed to the parks. We spent the rest of the day in the parks- we had bought a ticket for both. A lot of the rides were closed which was disappointing, but we still had a good day. The weather was gorgeous- blue skies and nice and warm. We kept seeing people wearing their Ratatouille 5K t-shirts (and medals) from the Saturday morning race, as well as loads of the USA Disney race t-shirts- the Enchanted 10K was my favourite- a lovely green colour. Before heading back to the hotel we bought our metro tickets for the morning (the hotel bus wasn’t running at 5am!) and then got our kit ready.

Waiting in the start area

Sunday morning came around too soon! We had to get up at 5am (4am UK time) as the metro was not frequent at that time, and we had to be in the pen at 6.30, and it was a bit of a walk from the metro, plus you had to go through security. We got the metro at 5.55am along with many other bleary-eyed runners! I only had on my vest, and I was freezing! I had packed my Minnie Mouse tutu, but in the end left it at the hotel as I decided it would probably annoy me- I’ve only worn it for a parkrun before and I don’t think it was that good. I kept my ears on to show a bit of Disney spirit! We ate our clif bars in the metro station before going through security as it was a teeny bit warmer in there. Then we joined the starter pen. Luckily we were in pen B (there were 4) because the race started late, and each pen took an age to get through the start as they were only letting a few people through at a time, then stopping everyone and having another count down. We crossed the line at 7.25am, but I heard people talking later saying that the D pen didn’t get through until gone 8am. We thought our checkout time was 11am so that would have been cutting things very fine indeed.

A bit lighter as we were about to set off.

The start pen was a bit strange- there was a big screen and two people leaping about on the stage, but the tannoy system was no good and we could not hear them at all. At one point they showed Paula having some selfies with other runners, and it became apparent that she was actually running it! For each set of runners, different characters appeared on screen (we had the genie) and counted down. Then fireworks were set off from the little gantry that you ran under.

The start gantry

Then finally, we were off. We had a plan of taking things steady, running together and aiming for around 2.10-2.15. I wanted to enjoy it and not worry about time, but we wanted to be back at the hotel for a shower. The first part was through both parks, and every kilometre there was a queue of people waiting to have their photos taken with various characters. I felt it was too early to stop!

When we were waiting in the pen, I could not decide if I needed the toilet or not- normally before races I know it’s psychological and I ignore it because my fear of portaloos is very great, but running through the parks we passed a few of the proper toilets, so we decided to stop after a few km as beyond the parks there would only be portaloos.

Main street! (I was running backwards here so Andy could take the photo without us stopping)

After that we just enjoyed running through the parks- as a Disney fan running down the Main Street and later through the castle were particular highlights, and although there were no members of the public in the parks, all of the staff from the rides and shops were out cheering brilliantly.

Gorgeous skies and runners in the park

Runners heading through the castle

After the 4th mile we left the park and initially ran around staff only areas, before heading into countryside. Here was a long and slow incline- probably for about 2 miles, which got a bit mentally tough. There were a few bands placed here and there, but not many, and it wasn’t as interesting as the park. There were some members of the public cheering (clearly some family members of runners with nice personal signs) but again not as many people as in the parks. We ran around an athletic track at one point but I have no idea when! At the top of the long hill (the end of mile 7) there were runners on the other side of the road heading back, so I kept expecting a turn around point. In fact we ran out and around a lake (the whole of mile 9 was going around the lake)- there were some cheerleaders here and a bit more of an atmosphere.

The lake we ran around- I just missed a pothole as again was running while photographing- not a good idea!

There were quite a lot of drinks stations (I think one after around the first mile), and some had interesting looking blue powerade as well as water. Later on there were “nutrition” stations which had Special K cereal bars (nutrition????) as well as packets of sliced apples. I had seen people the day before with Run Disney paperbags (there was a 5k on the Saturday) so I was hoping we would get some apple at the end. I didn’t have a drink (I hate that sloshing feeling) and probably could have eaten some apple but I’d never had an apple on a run before so I didn’t chance it.

Anyway, back to the run. I had been glancing at my watch and we had always been hovering around the 10 minute mile mark, but as we left the off-road surface of the lake and were heading back, we picked up the pace. I did tell Andy to run on as I could not quite keep up as my stomach had started to ache, but he slowed down and we ran together. We started to see people walking the other way with their medals and goodies, and it started to feel like the end was in sight. Mile 11 was around some of the Disney hotels (the theming is not a patch on the Florida ones) and then we were into the “Downtown Disney” area, running around the lake. Here there were plenty of crowds and I think I surged ahead a bit too early! The race had a km marker for each one, and then mile markers at certain points (I think 5 or 6, 9, maybe 12), so I was getting confused as to where we were. Plus (possibly because of our toilet stop) from the beginning our watches were beeping around 0.5km/0.3 miles before each marker.  We ran past the start area and I really thought that was it, but then we ran out of the village area and around into a field to a little out and back marked off area to the proper finish.

Look at the medal!!!!

I was very pleased to have finished and I felt a little bit weird. I saw Minnie Mouse at the finish line so I handed Andy my phone and asked him to take a picture- she gave me a high 5 and then one of the marshals told me off and said “no photos”. I can see why I suppose, but I didn’t see any signs and as people were having their pictures taken with characters on the way around I don’t know why they were there?

Anyway, we were handed our massive medals, a banana, some water and lemon powerade, and then a paper bag to carry it all in. I had the drink as I think my stomach ache may have been hunger? Getting up so early makes my stomach feel weird anyway. We took a few photos, and I was tempted by another t-shirt in the expo but I resisted, and so we walked to the metro and went back to the hotel.

A strava screenshot- it started in the middle at the bottom, before going to the left, over the long loop clockwise, around the lake at the far right, back to the loop and into the middle.

Because of the late start we got back at around 10.30 I think- we asked as we went past Reception “what time is checkout?” and they told us “for you, 12.00” (it was meant to be 11am)- which was so kind of them. This meant we didn’t need to rush our showers and packing, and we enjoyed a breakfast of a chocolate almond croissant (we’d bought them on Saturday).

These were the signs they had at each km, but the only one I managed to have a photo of!

Later in the day it poured with rain- we were so lucky as it was gorgeous for the actual race. We had a wander around the shopping centre, headed back to the Disney village for lunch, before getting the train home. This sounds easy but I was so shattered that I nearly fell asleep in the sandwich shop while Andy was waiting for them to be made. As soon as I got on the train I put  on a podcast and fell asleep right away (I listened to it driving to work as I had missed the whole thing!).

All in all I thoroughly enjoyed myself. It was a bit tough at the end, but it’s a half marathon and it shouldn’t be easy! The organisation was good, (despite the late start) although I still have no idea of my official time – apparently we will get them 2 weeks after the event! Strava says 2.12 something, but I don’t think that includes the toilet stop so the chip time will be a little more. Hopefully it won’t be the last one they hold in Paris, although I am hoping for a 10K next time.

I think that is my third race abroad ( to add to the Stockholm marathon and the Hawaii 5K)- I need to do a 10k somewhere to get a set!

Have you ever raced abroad? Would you be tempted by a Disney race?