Hornsey YMCA 10k race report

Hornsey station smells of wee. And there starts my adventure in an unknown part of North London that I had never even heard of until last year. I find my way to the park by following some people wearing their “supported by Budgens” race numbers and the park is far from the station and I’m glad I went to Hornsey station instead of Turnpike Lane, even if it does smell of wee, because Turnpike Lane tube looked about another half a mile on the map.

The race starts on time and while I’m in the crowd waiting to go two men next to me are chatting saying there’s usually people from Eastenders there and one of them thinks he saw someone from Eastenders but he doesn’t know her name but she’s blonde and shouts a lot and his mate says Barbara Windsor? And his mate says no, a younger girl and so then I’m trying to think who’s young and blonde on Eastenders and shouts a lot and I think it’s probably Carly.

At 1.8 miles we reach the hill that leads up to Alexandra Palace station and because I’m a finely tuned athlete, I run up it and overtake all the lightweights who have stopped to walk then at 2.2 miles a proper finely tuned athlete laps me and I think lapped already?!! and I’m not looking forward to doing two laps and think maybe I’ll wimp out after one lap as it’s very hot and I want to walk and I think to myself I’ll have a walking break halfway and I hope they have some water then as I finished the bottle I brought with me before we’d even started and I get to the halfway mark and they do have water and I stop and get a cup and then I’m walking drinking my water and I don’t want to throw it away and I wonder if I can run with a cup of water without it spilling everywhere and I can’t really but I don’t want to give up my cup of water so I carry on and eventually finish it and throw the cup in someone’s wheely bin and lots of people are standing outside their houses watching the race and cheering people on and I’m wondering if there was a race local to me would I stand outside my house cheering people on and I think no, I probably wouldn’t, I’d probably be upstairs playing on the internet.

At 4.2 miles I get to the hill that leads up to Alexandra Palace station again and this time I stop and walk like everyone else and then it gets flat again and I think oh shit, I’ll have to start running again and then I think I’ve only gone 4 miles but then I think but that means I only have 2 miles left and I can run 2 miles, hurrah, but then I get to 5 miles and I’m thinking of stopping and walking and I’m thinking no just carry on, only a mile to go and then I realise I’m walking and I think I’ll run again when I get to that bench up ahead but I get to the bench and carry on walking so I think I’ll run again when I get to that gate and I pass the gate and then people start overtaking me so I think fuck that and start running again and I look at my Garmin and see that I’m not going to beat my last 10k time, even though last time it involved falling over a football and then I get back to the park and the finish line, yay.

We all get herded down some cattle pen thing and I get given a banana and I think I don’t really want a banana but I take it anyway as I’m not one to look a gift banana in the mouth and I also get a bottle of water which is penguin approved.

And it says to store it in a clean, dry, rabbit free place. Why rabbit free? I’m confused.

Then I go to find my free t-shirt which is after all the only reason I’m there and as usual they haven’t got any small ones left but if I keep on eating Peanut Butter KitKats I’m not going to be fitting into small clothes for much longer anyway.

Today’s route

Stats:
Miles: 6.32
Total time: 1:10:28
Average pace: 11:09
Total calories: 533
Hills: 2
Walking breaks: 3
Bananas: 1
Bottles of water that mustn’t be kept near rabbits: 1
Music:
Mark Ronson
Klaxons
Arctic Monkeys
Good Charlotte