Stroud half marathon 2023

On 29th October, my husband and I ran Stroud half marathon. It was my fifth Stroud half marathon and my husband’s third.

We parked in the road near the start line at Marling School in Stroud. There was about 12 toilet cubicles available, including a men’s urinal block (keeping men out of the main toilet queue is always a good idea!). The queue was reasonably short until about 8:30. Then it got very long indeed. Bag drop is in the school sports hall, which was very easy. Unlike previous years, there was a starting funnel on the field at Marling School. This meant runners didn’t go onto the road for the start until about 8:57 for a 9am start. Remarkably, the race started dead on time.

The forecast was for sun and between about 10 and 12 degrees. At the start it was cloudy, windy and quite cold, but it soon warmed up. It was perfect running conditions.

I wrote recently about feeling positive with my running now I’ve turned 50. My husband was completely convinced we would both get a PB at Stroud. I hoped to run pretty quickly, but wasn’t sure about a PB. We got back from a short break in Budapest three days earlier. I ate a lot of food which isn’t suitable for me and my stomach still wasn’t feeling 100% in time for the half marathon. My legs were also aching. I have no idea why!

But I was wearing ‘magic shoes’ – expensive Nike Vaporflys, which make you run a bit faster. (There’s a lot of people wear Vaporflys and other similar carbon running shoes these days.) I’d also run my first ever sub-22 minute parkrun a few days previously. So a PB was a definite possibility.

I hoped to run below 1 hour 50 (1 hour 50 is pretty much my standard half marathon time). At Weston Super Half and Cheltenham half marathon this year, they had good for age places. The good for age for women over 50 was 1 hour 50. I ran 1:49:49 at Weston this year, at the age of 49 and a half. If I could repeat it at Stroud, my first half marathon as a 50 year old, I could qualify for a good for age place. (I don’t think there’s any huge advantage to a good for age place at a half marathon, I just like the idea of achieving it!)

The run starts downhill, on a closed road. Some of the roads are closed on Stroud half marathon, but some aren’t – hence why it has a complete ban on headphones of any type.

We’d worked out that, to beat my PB of 1:48:10 (from Cheltenham in 2018), I needed to run an average pace of 8:15 minute miles. But I know I run well when I start off quickly. So I ran nearly three miles with my husband at the start. I ran the first mile in 7:26 and the second in 7:40. My husband said I would regret it if I didn’t slow down. I ran the third mile in 8:01.

As the route headed through Stonehouse, my husband pulled ahead and I tried to regulate my pace a bit. Then I heard the 1:45 pacer come up behind me, with a little group of people all aiming to run 1 hour and 45 minutes. The pacer was very enthusiastic and encouraging and it was nice to run alongside them for a while. But after a couple of miles, I saw sense. I wasn’t aiming for 1:45 and pushing myself to run it could be a bad idea.

The route passes through the countryside and through the village of Standish. Around this point was the first of only two water stops. Stroud half marathon doesn’t provide cups or bottles of water – you need to bring your own cup or bottle and they will fill it for you. Personally, I didn’t bother and just carried a bottle of Lucozade. I didn’t see many people bother with water, even though the sun was pretty warm for the end of October.

Between miles 6 and 7, the course goes uphill, up the A38. The road is open, with just a row of cones separating runners from traffic. Remarkably, some people were running outside of the cones and in the path of the cars.

The route then turns left and goes downhill, through more countryside. Around mile 8 or 9, the run enters a new housing estate. This was a new part of the route last year and cuts out a lot of running along the A419 next to the traffic. The housing estate is surprisingly big. The route then moves seamlessly into an industrial estate. By the time we got out of the industrial estate, there was only a parkrun left to go (all regular runners tend to count ‘only a parkrun left’ at mile 10 of a half marathon or mile 23 of a marathon).

The route goes along the A419, sometimes on the road, sometimes on the pavement. I was still happy with my pace. It was getting closer to my target pace of 8:15 minutes per mile and definitely looked as though I was on for a PB.

The last approximately mile and three-quarters is returning along the same route we ran at the start. At the start, it went by in the blink of an eye. On the way back, it felt a lot slower. Some of it is uphill and the sun was bright. But there were lots of people cheering the runners. I’d had a couple of women in front of me for ages. I overtook them at mile 12. Then I overtook another woman and a man at about 12.5 miles.

I crossed the finish line 1:47:23 – a 47 second PB! My husband got a new PB of 1:43:51. We were both very happy.

There was a slight glitch when the official results said I hadn’t started! I sent them my Garmin data to prove that I had both started and finished. The timing chips at Stroud are on the shoes rather than on the race number. I’m not sure if this was a problem. I was awarded my gun time as my official time (the time the race started, rather than the time I crossed the start line) – this is 1:47:41. At least it was still a PB and below my 1:50 target.

Now can I get any faster next year?