Parkrun #11: Newbiggin by the Sea

Parking at the Newbiggin Maritime Centre at 08:42 in the driving rain, 10°C on the dash of the car, I had to question my commitment. And whether the event was even on — where was everyone?! As it turned out, it wasn't a wasted trip and soon someone pulled up next to me and put on an extra layer of running gear before getting out.

You see a lot of reviews of different parkrun locations saying that it's the friendliest event they've been to, and Newbiggin is no exception to that. In this case, however, it quickly felt justified. Maybe it was because the relatively low numbers (93 runners) meant that a good proportion of the people there seemed to know each other. Maybe it was the candour of the race director and his assistant. Maybe it was both of those. Whatever, it was a nice welcome.

Once underway, and with the rain stopped, it was roughly the same level of congestion you get at most events. I probably could've passed more people than I did, but didn't want to weave and cause others to trip or adjust their stride to avoid me. Besides, I wasn't really feeling good enough to put on the little bursts I needed. For the second half kilometre or so, however, I properly managed to get myself boxed in repeatedly. It was already starting to feel like a really slow day (which I would later find out is a fine illustration of how I couldn't judge my own pace to save my life).

Running up off the promenade to the houses on Beach Terrace (who must have incredible sea views), my left foot was already protesting, with shooting pains down my toes. (I should explain this in a separate post someday.) And while we were still on tarmac, the slightly broken nature of it meant I was having to pick my footing carefully, as well as run with my toes curled. It was all adding to a feeling of this just not being a good day. But at least I was starting to make ground on people rather than being overtaken.

Even that didn't last long though. 😂 After overtaking one person near the bowling green, I realised I'd made the mistake of not having anyone in front of me at the one point where I didn't know where to go next. The path split in two, but both the straight ahead route and the one to the right were fenced off. Turns out I needed to cross some rough grass and concrete behind the bowling club pavilion, but my hesitation meant that the fella I'd just passed was back in front of me again. And he proceeded to disappear into the distance. Hey ho.

Coming back down the slope onto the prom was nice, but looking along it to find the turning point that marks the start of the second lap was tough. Looking for a cream building — the Art Deco-styled Caffe Bertorelli — my eye first found various houses that offered false hope before they finally found the right building... which looked a mile away. 🙄

When I finally made it to that turning point to start the second lap, the race director was shouting encouragement at everyone, especially a group in front of me that he knew, and telling them the time so far. "Come on! 13:50!" he told them. My heart sank, as my oxygen-starved brain figured I was headed for a 28-minute time, having forgotten the stretch of prom we'd done before getting to the start of the lap. The next few minutes of running were filled with gloomy thoughts as I pictured myself on a steady decline of form and wondered how long it would be before I gave up running for good. Properly demoralising thoughts, they were, as I arrived back at the slope leading up off the promenade for the second time.

To make it even better, the first time up the slope had been fine, but the second time felt like a crawl. At this point, I was continuing with the 5K simply because I knew I could finish it and because I felt I needed a measure of my decline. People continued to overtake me, and I just wished they'd get past faster and be done with it.

Coming back down the slope for the second and final time put me back into a slightly more positive mindset as I made the most of gravity to reduce the gap to the person ahead. I then tried to up the pace for the final couple of hundred metres, which was when I started to hear the race director reading out times again. And it was then that I realised my earlier mistake. The "13:50" that I'd heard wasn't my time at the halfway point; the end of that lap had been after halfway. I might not be doing as badly as I thought!

A few more metres and I thought I heard a "six" in what he was saying. Had only 26 minutes passed? I was probably less than 50m from the funnel and pushed again. "25:48! 49! 50!" he counted. Holy guacamole! Push push push!!! 20 or so metres to go and he counted over the 26 minutes barrier. Run, Mal, run!!! For the final few metres I practically sprinted, fuelled by adrenaline.

My final time? 26:07! A new parkrun PB by just 1 second. I'm welling up just writing this, as I sit here in Caffe Bertorelli with my gingerbread latte. Can't quite believe it. It's not all lost. Let's goooo!!! 😁