Lloyd Biddell

Today was a race that I've had scheduled in my diary for some time - Wrekin Fell Race which is a 5.5 mile race up to the summit of The Wrekin and two smaller ascents of Ercall giving a total ascent of over 500 metres.  The race doubled up as the county trials for Warwickshire (my county) as well as Shropshire and Worcestershire.  I didn't necessarily expect to qualify for the inter counties but I thought I'd have a go and see what happens. When the race started I went off at a reasonable pace and once out of the school grounds it was immediately uphill on a local road and I tried to keep off the gas.  At this point I was around 10th and soon afterwards we went off road to make the first ascent of Ercall at which point I was now 4th (behind someone in a batman costume).  The first ascent was runnable and about 2/3rds of the way to the summit I moved into 3rd.  I was certainly starting to blow a bit and I suspected that I had gone off a little too hard.  Th...

Not much to report over the last few weeks other than more training.  Something that has been at the back of my mind for a while is how my training today compares to what I was doing back in 2008. 2008 At my peak in 2008 I was typically running between 60 - 120 km per week and was usually dependent on injury and whether I had any events planned.  Looking back at my training diary the fastest pace I ever did was 3.36 per km over 10km, although that was very much the exception and not the norm.  I had a few runs in the 3.50 - 4.00 range but on the whole most runs were between 4.00 - 4.15. To sum up in a sentence I was doing a lot of training at a relatively low intensity pace overall (although I dont recall my pace being particularly slow at the time!).  I guess quite a lot of the mileage were 'junk miles' such as running to/from work at little more than a jog but my overall goals back then was to be able to run a marathon and ultra distances. 2016 Fast forward...

A few weeks ago we decided to go away for New Year in the Yorkshire Dales.  Naturally I decided to see whether there were any events nearby and I found a fell race about an hour away starting in a village called Great Ayton.  I've never done an event like this before so had no idea how I was going to do.  Some fell runners do not call this a 'proper' fell race as there is quite a bit of flat on tarmac and footpaths.  However, for me at least it seemed to be a good first event to attempt as a taster of what fell racing is like.  The course was 5.3 miles with about 260 metres of climb. We started off and as usual I was a little way back from the front but straight away lost touch as the road still had traffic and we had to take avoiding action and funnel through gaps in the pavement.  I probably only lost 5 seconds or so but it meant I lost touch with the front of the field.  The first km was mostly flat on tarmac and as usual I came through the field ...

To shake off the Christmas excess I entered the Wheaton Aston 10k a few weeks ago.  It is an event I did in 2012 and it didn't exactly bring happy memories at the time.  After four years of doing nothing I joined a gym and assumed any fitness I had gained on an indoor treadmill could be transferred to the road - wrong!  I entered the event in 2012 just to see where I was and the answer was pretty clear - I died after 2 miles and ended up running almost 41 minutes.  It ended any thoughts of doing further road races and subsequently I did no further running up to March of 2015. Over the last few weeks my training had been going reasonably well and my training times suggested I was in better form than the 36.32 I ran at Tamworth in October.  I've also lost a bit more weight and I'm now 10 stone 8 lbs so I'm now quite a bit lighter for some reason than I was in 2008 when I was 11st 4lb  I started off a couple of rows back from the front although I pushed a bi...

A few weeks ago I saw an event called Petzl Night Runner at Grizedale in the Lake District.  I decided to combine the event with a couple of days of annual leave to spend a long weekend in one of my favourite parts of the country.  The event had been in doubt as there was significant flooding in the area due to Storm Desmond and on the day itself there was quite a lot of snow in the hours before leading to a lot of criticism from some competitors about whether the event should have gone ahead - more about that later. I knew the course was going to be tough; firstly its the Lake District and secondly the course map made it clear that there were going to be some significant uphills so any idea of running a good time was out of the question!  The course suggested a 30m climb in the first km but between 2-3km there was a 100m climb at an average of 10% and a further smaller climb over the following km! I decided to use my old orienteering head torch made by Silva with a h...

Today was the first time I’ve done a ‘proper’ race since I stopped running in 2008, except for the one off race I did in 2012 when I thought a few months of running on a treadmill would suffice.   As I said in my last post something around 38mins would be great, 39 a bit disappointing but not unexpected and anything near 40 would be very disappointing. I know the importance of a good breakfast so 3 hours before I had a bowl of cereal but as it was near the end of the packet I kept pouring until there was a huge bowl full which I then proceeded to eat.   Frankly I was stuffed and even right up to the race I still felt quite full so I was quite worried that I was going to get stitch – lesson learned for next time!   The race itself is only a few miles from home so I knew the area and the route well – pretty much flat as a pancake with just a few tiny inclines which were barely noticeable and a small chunk of the route being run on the canal.   The race started in ...

After a 7 year hiatus my blog is back!   Shortly after my last blog post I pretty much gave up running altogether and led a fair sedentary lifestyle.   Bit by bit I was putting on weight and over the course of the last few years I had put on around 26 pounds.   Hardly earth shattering but it was a slippery slope that was only going to get worse. In 2012 I joined a gym and my fitness gradually improved although any running I did was on a treadmill but it is no substitute to ‘proper’ outdoors running.   This I found to my cost at the end of 2012 when I decided to run the Wheaton Aston 10k.   In the gym I could do 10k in around 40mins (bearing in mind my PB in 2008 was 34.30 outdoors), but in the actual race I thought I might be able to do around 38 mins.   In reality it was a painful slog after only a few km with people passing me all over the place and ended up finishing in 40.50 – my slowest ever 10km by some margin, including when I began to take up ...