'Hooky 6'

If I was a beer drinker a 6 mile race by a brewery could be quite an attractive prospect, but as I'm not the 'Hooky 6' didn't have quite the same appeal!  This wasn't helped by the alternating steady rain / heavy downpours thrown at us by ex-hurricane Bertha.  Apparently it hasn't rained at the Hooky 6 for at least 9 years - until the year I turn up to run it!  I will admit that my motivation was definitely lacking as I went through my warm up and race preparation routine.

If it hadn't been for the weather it would have been a very picturesque course, through the village of Hook Norton, with its honey coloured Cotswold stone buildings, and out into the surrounding countryside with views over the rolling landscape (had they not been obscured by low cloud!)  The course was two undulating laps of 3 miles, starting and finishing at the Sports and Social Club.  As I stood on the start line I tried to ignore the weather and get my racing 'head' on.  We were all poised and ready to go, waiting for the bang of the starting pistol ... ... but all we heard was a pathetic little click!  After a few more failed attempts it eventually fired and I got off to a fairly decent start.  However, it wasn't long before two other ladies passed me.  As usual I was struggling to get my legs going, despite a fairly long warm up, and I was unable to go with them.  After the first couple of miles I started to get into my running and saw that I was closing on one of the girls in front.  I managed to latch on to a group of men and used them to help me close the gap to her.  Despite being on the windiest, most exposed part of the course, I went straight past her and pulled away from the group, and then started to work on pulling back the next person in front of me.  I felt quite strong in the second half of the race but unfortunately I wasn't able to pull back the leading lady.  At least I managed to hold onto my second place in the women's race, (and was 22nd out of 213 overall).  This was my highest finishing position so far in my injury comeback, so I was satisfied with my morning's work.

As soon as I'd crossed the finish line I felt like I'd only just started to get going!  There were times while I was running when I questioned why I was doing such a short race (the reason being to try and get a bit of speed back in my legs), but there were also times when I was glad it was only 6 miles!  I did think that all the swimming I'd been forced to do over the winter would have stood me in better stead for today's race! 

I have to say, though, that the biggest praise should go to all the organisers and marshals who braved the horrible conditions to make sure the race went ahead smoothly and safely.  I take my hat off to them.

And despite my lack of motivation beforehand, and the mountain of sodden kit and shoes afterwards, I did enjoy it in a funny sort of way.

Oh yes, and guess what my prize was ... ... a bottle of Hooky ale of course!