Mike Griffin

Last Saturday in Tullamore, I ran in the Tullamore Half Marathon. The race doubled up as a few championship races:

• Offaly Half Marathon Championships
• Leinster Half Marathon Championships
• National Half Marathon Championships

That meant a very healthy entry list, and Mayo AC sent around 40 athletes to compete along with a bus to bring us there.

An early start with persistent rain, we were picked up in Castlebar with other stops on the way. I was feeling tired so had a bit of a snooze to pass the time.

Once we got there, the rain started to ease off, and I got out for an easy warm up to shake out my legs and scope out the start. After that, there was a bit of waiting and the usual toilet trips before we headed off together to line up.

The race got underway after a quick intro to the guest starter. I missed his name, but if I heard correctly, he’s been a member of Tullamore since the late 60s and on the national committee since the 70s. That’s hella commitment for you!

The first few kilometres were busy with everyone jostling for places and moving up and down through the crowd. I wasn’t too pushed about moving around and tried to hang back a bit. Then we got to a nice downhill past the strawberry seller and I let my legs open up and moved up through the field a bit.

I was feeling good and latching on to groups all the way to about 7.5km. I took a gel at this stage as I had planned to take two throughout the race. I was starting to think that maybe I had gone too fast, but again found a group that were moving at a nice pace for me and slotted in. We kept together and they dragged me up the hill around half way which I was struggling with. I started to lose contact with them from about 12km and watched as they moved into the distance. I was starting to struggle a bit here as the road was getting lumpier with more up and down sections.

There was another hill coming up and I thought I’d have another gel at the end of it, but then I got around the bend and it was still going. I lost a good few places here, my legs just weren’t up for the hill at all. That’s not too surprising, I haven’t been feeling the same grá for hills in the last couple of years. I got the gel into me and started to feel a bit better, still losing some places, but I got the pace back to where I wanted it.

The last few kilometres had some roundabouts and good crowds cheering us on but again, quite a lot of uphill sections. I was struggling along in these bits until we got to the flatter last kilometre. Tony passed me along here, and told me afterwards that I was a target for the previous few kilometres!

The race finished with a lap of the running track and there was a strong wind in the back straight. I was passed coming into the track, but on the home straight I was able to pick up and get past him again to finish in 1:25:16

Name	Bib	Place	Time	Chip time	Pace	% of winners time
Mike Griffin	208	154	1:25:16	1:25:07	4:02	126.47