Lloyd Biddell

Today was my first half marathon in four and a half years, my previous one being the Stafford Half Marathon early in 2020, only a week before Covid lock down.  A lot has changed in the time since, not least no longer being in my 30's and now less than 2 years away from hitting the V45 category.  The Potters 'Arf is a race that I've known about for some time, but one that I've never considered, partly due to when in my racing prime I often selected courses that were flat and fast.  Now that I'm past my peak it was an opportunity to select a big race with c.1,500 entrants where the course profile is at the opposite end of the scale with about 400 metres of total climb.  With a climb at 11 miles known as 'Heartbreak Hill', any chance of a PB even in peak condition was never going to happen.  Today was all about the race and try to do the best I could. Start. Second on the left. Other races that are flatter can be more forgiving when it comes to pacing and you c...

For the last few years I have had an annual holiday in Suffolk and had been aware of a 10k not too far away from where I was staying.  This year I decided to enter, partly to get a greater understanding of my current fitness levels as my performance at the recent Burton 10k ended up not really telling me much. I knew the race had its undulations and that it was a two lap course, but other than that it was brand new to me.  The start was in the market square and at the off I temporarily hit the lead up the fairly sharp ascent out of town, but soon settled into third.  About 500 metres later I moved into second and just behind the shoulder of the leader.  It stayed this way up to the 2km point at the top of the gradual climb where I was able to hold on but could offer no more.  At this point my co-leader injected additional pace on a short flat section and to follow this would have put me into the red zone.  The rest of the 3rd km was sharply downhill and the...