Hope and Dream 10 miler

The Hope and Dream (www.hopeanddream10.com) is a 10 mile race day to help raise funds and awareness for the “Hope” and “Share a Dream foundation” There was a major effort put in to make this race a reality and a success, the goal was to raise €100,000, so far in excess of €120,000 has been raised so fair play to everyone who contributed. Enniscorthy was awash with the yellow race jerseys last Sunday morning. There was entertainment with Liam Sharkey down at the start and guest of honor Micheal O’Muircheartaigh  started us off. Over 850 entrants were there at the start and we all set off towards Davidstown.

I’d a touch of the man flu over the weekend and said to myself I would just tip along but as I walked towards the start hearing the music I decided see how it goes for the first few miles and go from there. The first 3 miles were really about getting into a rhythm , the lungs were slow to warm up but then I found myself in a group of 3 traveling well. We were just outside of a 7 mile pace and tipped along getting gradually faster, able to talk and starting to think about breaking the 70 minute pace. It was a hilly course, the weather was just right plus the Slaney Cycling team offered water along the way.

I didn’t do that much distance running for this, did about 12 miles during the week and rested 2 days before. I took one of those energy gels before the start and a small bowl of porridge and I was glad of the gel round the 8 mile stage. There was a fair big hill at this stage and we agreed to run our own race after it. With the hill I just kept the same pace and caught my breath at the top. The average pace at this stage was 7.01, just outside a time of 70 minutes finish and as I hit mile 9 I went for a burst down the hill back into town. I caught up with a couple of the lads from town and was flat out to the finish, nipping in under the 70 and was delighted. There was a great feeling around the finish area, I watched some army lads jog in with 50 pounds of bags on their backs, fair play to them with those hills. 10 miles is a nice distance for a race, plenty of time to get going, I’d really like to get that time down a couple of minutes by next year, maybe give Ballycotton a real go.