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 lead extended to perhaps 10