Coming up short...

Since badly injuring my achillies in February, I have been forced to revisit all my goals for 2013. The 'biggie' that I was building up for was London Marathon in April: that was the first major event to go flying out of the window. I had also secured myself a place at the Edinburgh Marathon as a back-up to London, in case I got ill on the day, didn't quite get the time I wanted, needed a another crack at it etc. That went too. I had also secured free entries for the Guernsey Marathon (that took place last weekend, 22nd September) and the Bournemouth Marathon (6th October); inevitably, these have had to be shelved too. All the key build-up events I had scheduled in to lead up to these marathons, such as the Duchy 20, the Yeovil Half Marathon, the Torbay Half, the 20 mile RAT race, have all been knocked on the head too. I just haven't been able to do the mileage that I used to churn out in my sleep and so long distance events have simply not been achievable goals this year. It's been a frustrating year in that sense; however, I like to think of myself as a positive person and to prevent myself from going mad whilst I've been injured, I have re-evaluated all my plans for this year in order to extract some positive experiences and gains from what has otherwise been a pretty appalling year on the running performance front.

My usual ethos is: the longer, the better! I definitely feel that my strengths lie in the longer distances as I have a stubborn, bloody-minded attitude and an uncanny ability to block out pain, both of which are somewhat essential traits in order to succeed at endurance events. The title of my blog alone is a bit of a giveaway that my heart very much lies in marathon and ultra running and I like to think any chances I have of being up there with the country's top athletes will be at these races and not over more traditional track distances. That said, this year I have embraced the unexpected opportunity to really attack some shorter distances and this has generated some pleasantly surprising results. My 5k PB (18:15) in June, run on an already mashed up tendon, gives me an indication that without an injury and with a solid block of training behind me, a sub 18 minute time is very much within my grasp next season. This Sunday, instead of being where I really wanted to be - toeing the start line of the Guernsey Marathon in St. Peter Port - I was at a very different kind of race.

Honiton Running Club organise an annual event called the Cotleigh Canters, at the quaint little village of Cotleigh in East Devon. There are 10k and 5k options on offer and a 3k fun-run for the kids. Not wanting to do any more running on tarmac than I have to at the moment, I opted for the 5k: again, a sign of how things have changed this year, as before I wouldn't have even contemplated lacing up my trainers for anything shorter than 6 miles - I just didn't see the point! The 5k is advertised as a race and not a fun-run, but nevertheless, amongst the usual smattering of senior and veteran runners, there was a large proportion of teenagers on the startline... Well, I say on the "startline", but they were actually stood a good few yards in front of the line and edging further forward with each passing second until the starter finally blew the horn to get us underway. It was lovely to see so much enthusiasm for the sport from all these youngsters and it's a promising sign for the future! From my experiences at Parkrun, the teenage runners tend to go off like bats out of hell at the start as if they are running a 400m race. They have enthusiasm and confidence in abundance and seem assured that they can keep up their suicidal pace for the whole 5k! Within the space of 100m, I found myself languishing back in about 20th place and feeling as though I was crawling, yet a glance at my watch revealed that I was in fact running bang on 6m/m pace. No problem, I thought, let them go; I'll reel 'em back in on the hill! And sure enough, as we turned the first corner and started to climb the 1km long hill, I slowly worked my way up through the field. It took me until 3.5km to draw level with the leading man - in fact a 16 year old! - but once I did I surged past and thought: I could win a race outright here! I wasn't about to pass up this opportunity and so, after a conservative opening mile of 6:45 up the hill, my next miles were done in 5:55 and 5:40 and I felt stronger and stronger as I pushed on for the finish. If the shout I overheard as I rounded the corner to the finish line of, "Oh my God! It's a woman!", was anything to go by, I think people were as surprised as I was that a female had won the race outright. (Either that or I badly need to consider a course of HRT...). However, I'm not going to get too carried away, as most of my competition were teenage boys and not senior males: I'll have to try and beat them next time!! ;-)

Battling it out for 1st overall at the 4k mark.

The win was a massive confidence boost though and my time of 19:01 on a course with a 1km long hill on it wasn't too shabby. The president of the running club who awarded the prizes was lovely and offered me the celebration cake they had had made for the event as an extra prize for beating the female course record and for being the first female in the history of their club races to win a race overall. The cake is massive and, 5 days on, we're not even half way through it yet!

Thanks for the yummy cake, Honiton RC!

Talking of coming up short; on Tuesday this week, I had a go at my first ever 3000m race. In fact, it was only my second ever track race in total, after the 5000m I ran at the Devon County Championships back in May. It was the last Exeter Harriers Open Meeting of the season and so a good opportunity to try out this distance and record a time before the end of the season. I used to think of 5ks as an out and out sprint and so this would have been a distance I would never have entertained this time last year. However, I think that doing lots of shorter stuff has rejigged my brain into thinking that 5k is a half decent distance; 10k is quite long; 10 miles is an uncomfortable slog and anything over that is simply beyond contemplation at the moment! In reality, 3k is not far - just under 2 miles - but thinking of it as 7.5 laps of the track built it up to be something bigger in my head and led me to go out too cautiously. I was aiming for a time of around 10:40, which would be around 1:25 laps, but I fell quite some way short of this target. I was hitting the 'lap' button on my Garmin at the end of each 400m circuit, but, in the darkness, with the flood lights casting shadows in awkward places, I was unable to actually read what my watch said and virtually found myself running blind!

My 3000m debut was nearly brought to a dramatic and comedic end at one stage as there was this small but not insignificant incident involving a super-market trolley! What's a trolley doing on the track, you ask? You make a valid point! Basically, the starter carries his starting gun and equipment around in it and pushes it from place to place. He had evidently not seen me coming at the end of lap 3 as I was isolated between a group of fast guys way out in front and some other runners who were some way behind me. As I passed the finish line and looked up, to my shock I found him and his trolley occupying lane one: he had already started out to cross the track. An official ran in from the far side to try and push him back and so the man threw the trolley into reverse and beat a retreat off the track as I simultaneously swerved to avoid crashing into the side of it! Lap 4 was my then my slowest of all: not because of the very minor detour - that cost me nothing time-wise and I wasn't remotely bothered by it - but because the incident just tickled my sense of humour and my legs started turning to jelly as I struggled for 100m to suppress laughter. I could just picture the results: Sutcliffe, Ellie: DNF (untimely end to race due to collision with super-market trolley). I'm sure Mo Farah has never encountered this problem! It also gives a whole new meaning to the expression 'to get trolleyed'!! Jokes aside, it wasn't my best performance: 10:56 in the end, and some way short of my 10:40 target. However, my last km was easily the fastest of the 3 and so I know now I need to attack the race harder from the gun next time and visualise it as a 2 mile point-to-point race instead of 7.5 laps, which, psychologically, makes it seem much longer!

With fellow Harriers Adam, Rich and Mike, looking shiny and sweaty after our 3000m efforts!

I have no races on the horizon until the on 13th October. I was recently contacted by the organisers of the Great West Run (the South West's equivalent of the Great North) and offered a free "VIP" race entry: don't be alarmed - we're not talking VIP on the same scale as the VIP runners at the Great North here!! Much as I am flattered to have been asked and hate to turn down opportunities such as this, realistically, I am just not ready to do justice to a road half marathon yet. Yes, I could get round, probably under 1h30, but if I am being treated as an elite runner, I'd want to put in a performance that is worthy of that treatment, and I couldn't do that over this distance at the moment. So I think it will be the first round of the Westward League cross-country for me that day instead!

Between now and then it's a case of cramming in a few weeks of decent training. I have secured a place in the Grizzly ballot for March next year and that is going to be my target, so to be on that start line in competitive shape and to have a chance at placing in what is one of the toughest races in the South West, I need to be starting to build up towards it now. This means a winter full of off-road runs, hill reps, long intervals and steadily increasing the mileage: if 2013 was about coming up short, in 2014 I'll be in it for the long-haul.