We Did It!

Each of us can now claim the title of Half Marathoner and is the proud owner of a Great Wall marathon medal! We variously shuffled, crawled, walked and jogged our way across 2,582 steps and 21 kms. And imagine all of us achieving a PB! Is there nothing we can't do?

Here's a quick recap on how the race and the lead up went:
We met all the other participants in Ying and Yang square at 6 am and it was really quite cold

We did a group aerobics warm up session (we hadn't seen some of those moves since the 80s - Rancan Sisters eat your hearts out)

We left in 4 waves of 500 runners every 10 minutes from 7.30 to 8 - we were in wave 4 because we had no previous recorded times.......We were counted down out of the square and as agreed we started together

(And that was the last moment some of us saw another FGM for several hours!)

First we went up the 5 kms hill dodging goats and enthusiastic locals on the course. For those of our readers who think this does not count as a hill, round this first corner things went up, up and more up... You get the picture 

We then did the 3.5 kms on the wall (refer earlier post for fabulous wall photos)

After a few kms on the road dodging trucks, scooters, bikes and more enthusiastic locals, the race organisers lost their sense of humour and had us run in an old gravel quarry (this photo is one of the better sections of the road)

Then the highlight was running through local villages, fields and "dunny" lanes

Then we turned around and came back through the quarry and along the road, by this time in full Chinese heat, into the square for the finish where we ran across the line, threw our hands in the air in triumph for the official photograph (which no doubt will cost us each a fortune) and hugged the lovely Dane who gave us our medals. Yay we did it - all of us - the hardest half marathon on the planet!

KYLIE's SURPRISE

Kylie came 29th in the women's half Marathon, finishing 3rd in the 45-49 year age group in an incredible time of 2.22 minutes. (Just to give you an idea of this achievement the female winner of the half marathon came in at 1 hour 50 minutes). A PB and well inside Kylie's personal objective of a sub 3 hour finish. "Mate I just wanted to see what I was capable of." It is possible that Kylie passed Louise on the road on her way back into the finish line before Louise had reached the 10kms mark but this is unlikely to be confirmed by anyone writing this blog. Kylie attributes her time to the three performance-enhancing gels she consumed during the race but we just say its innate fitness and hard work. She is also strenuously resisting Briony's injunction to turn pro as she doesn't even like running. 

ZOE's GREATNESS

Zoe also achieved a fantastic PB coming in at 2 hours 34 minutes, 2nd in her age group 50-54. Zoe was relieved to be able to finish the half marathon having trained for three others but having to withdraw on the eve of each race due to misadventure. She was certainly clutching her medal all afternoon! It was touch and go for a few tense moments in the square when Zoe's time was not registering for the a Women's half marathon. The observant among you will notice that Zoe's bib does not include an F before her number, which meant her time was in the male list. Still a very competitive time for the opposite gender. We were particularly taken by Zoe's snake shedding performance as she shed layer after layer of clothes before the race, battling the cold conditions. 

LIZZIE's MARVELLOUSNESS

Liz cruised through her second half marathon achieving a great PB of 3 hours (and the pesky 1 minute which in the annals of history will be forgotten). Liz trained for three hours and achieved it in perfect style without much sweat and without a hair out of place. As we all stripped down our layers before the race Lizzie's last layer was a fashion statement - a little sexy black cross over number. Perfect for everything but a real challenge for application of the 50+ sun cream. Liz was dubious about the liquid glucose and hydrolysed starch products being so freely consumed and promoted by Kylie and Zoe before the race, as she had not consulted PubMed to check out the therapeutic claims. Under pressure she put one in her pocket. At the 13kms mark Liz, feeling a little low in energy, scoffed her gel, got an immediate rush and finished the race on a total high!

BRIONY's TRIUMPH

So Briony, our fearless leader for this caper, put in a fantastic performance under 4 hours of 3 hours 45 minutes, 22nd in her age group and a PB. Thankfully for her that is now crossed off the list and she says there is no chance a full marathon will ever go on her list. (We are all relieved about that). Briony's low key and dignified style belied a personal determination that was awe inspiring. The thought to do this race came from nowhere, not from a life time of sporting achievement like other members of her team, but from her strong belief that we all need to stretch our comfort zones. Note to Briony: there are limits on how far we can stretch with you (but we have been thrilled to be here with this one). Briony's medical team (Liz and Zoe) were right on her case about food intake yesterday. Briony was only seen eating two jelly beans and a banana all day. "I just can't come at the mayo and thousand island dressing". The rest of us thought it wasn't the day to be fussy about the sandwich dressing, although we agree it did drown the 30cms baguette. But the lunch being offered by the locals was not really a better option:

LOUISE's CULTURAL FROLIC and FLIRTATION WITH SPORT

Louise has a medal and much to her amusement a half marathon time. She came in well under her goal of five hours achieving 4 hours 18 minutes, ranked 30th in her age group. Louise's marathon experience differed from many other participants: she took over 100 photos, made friends with people from 3 other countries, practiced her French with some lovely québécois, was interviewed on the wall for CCTV  and was showered in flowers from local village kids. 

Louise maintains the gel Kylie gave her for the last half of the race grossly overstated its miracle working  capacity - who knew that pre race running would have made such a difference. Kylie maintains that without the gel she would have been a DNF, given all the cultural distractions on the day. Louise is very pleased with her achievement, and in particular the extensive digital record of the day. If she could insert the video here of her crossing the line and jumping up and down on the finishing time mat she would have no hesitation. 

We were warmly embraced by the locals being serenaded in by the local band at 6 am

And many locals came out to cheer us on and high five us along the way......

Establishment photo of the day

You were probably expecting a photo like this of the tent establishment at the all important half marathon turn left sign (refer earlier post) 

But that is not the best photo.....after a marathon and a half marathon a lot of water and electrolyte drinks are consumed in a very short period of time to try to repair some of the impact on the body (this is a moan free blog so you won't hear anything from us about sore joints or the wonders of tiger balm). We piled into our bus at 1.30 and left for Beijing. Two and a half hours later we were stuck in traffic when one enterprising guy approached our driver requesting a toilet stop. Our best translation of the reply was either "No" or words to the effect of "can't you see that I can't let you out here on the main road.." Half an hour later, his friend approached the driver and said "all these people really need to pee". We were surprised that he felt these words would jump the language barrier. Again he was rebuffed. In desperation a girl marched to the front of the bus, grabbed the rubbish bin, took it to the bottom of the back stairs and announced she was setting up a facility. Down came one of the bus curtains to make some privacy but it was not enough. After the call went up a lovely Kiwi family volunteered their flag and guess who was sitting in the row behind the back stairs........

You will be relieved (haha) to know that the driver did finally stop at a petrol station where we all dashed to the trees on the side of the road, hoping that a public squat was not illegal.

We finished the night toasting ourselves and our collective achievements