What a weekend!!

Last weekend was the GNR weekend, dubbed by me (and a few others) NOT the GNR weekend, mainly because so much had changed because of bloody coronavirus that it was nothing like the proper GNR. For a start the queue for the portaloos was only 5 people deep, the loos had fresh bog roll, dry hand towels and no shit on the seat! have you ever heard of such a thing at a major running event? Nope, me neither! but more of that later…. lets start at the beginning of the weekend.

A Friday begging email from parkrun saw me volunteering to marshal, it seemed a good idea at the time, until I had to haul my arse out of bed at 8am on a Saturday morning! haven’t done that for a while I can tell you. Straight after marshalling I went to our clubs “beginners course” which is designed for new runners and those starting the running journey, or for those that are returning after a long break from running. As usual Annette lead the way and I “dicked about at the back” funny how she found every single hill in a 1/4 mile radius and made us run up it. I was well aware that she was timing the walk breaks so she was at the top when she started the run section ( and I was still very much at the bottom of the hill)

Off to the cafe, which no longer does cake, FFS the whole point of going to the cafe is for the cake, we could have gone to the new cafe, but its shite, the coffee is over priced, the cakes are crap and it takes even longer than the old cafe to get your coffee, and trust me when I tell you – that’s quite an achievement!

Home, quick shower, change into comfortable driving clothes, await my daughter, decide I am hungry. When she arrives we load the car and head towards where Annette lives ( Via McDonalds) I have arranged to pick up Annette at 13:50, I have asked her 3 times what time I am picking her up, just to be sure she knows ( she does) and all of a sudden the queue at McDonalds is a billion cars long and not moving. I pick the gherkin out of my burger and put my foot to the floor so as not to be late, arriving outside her door at 13:47 (She’s not ready!)

Bag into the boot, we head off on our 4 hour journey, We have a table booked at 7:30 and the hotel had “plenty of parking”. Apart from one short pee break about half way we have plenty of time ( or do we?)

We find the hotel and drive round twice, not a single space in the car park, or on the road nearby, all local roads are “permit parking only” and its gone 6pm. Annette phones the hotel who tell us to go to the Royal British Legion as they have an agreement that customers can park there for £3, we get there, no room at the Inn, try parking in Lindesfarne road, its not permit parking there, so off we go again!

Eventually we park, haul our bags down to the hotel, get our keys, decline breakfast at £9 a head (fucking rip off) and tramp up to the rooms. Annette has the worlds biggest bed, but windows that don’t open, ours has single beds, a little bit too close together but windows that open onto the beer garden below, and the road, with the local tossers driving their incredibly noisy cars, with shite exhaust pipes, and a drunk bloke singing the same line of the same song over and over, but the shower looks nice!

We find the restaurant, and go in, Annette decides to go to waitrose and get porridge for tomorrows breakfast, but wasn’t back in time for our starters arriving so I think her hallumi was cold, she was bloody lucky it was still there, I was famished. The food was lovely, I think we all enjoyed it.

Have you ever managed to go into a turkish place and not had to sit through 8 rounds of happy birthday with all the frigging clapping? me neither! every bloody time. And of course, they never do all the birthdays at once to get it out the way, oh no, every 10 minutes the music comes on and the clapping starts.

Went back to the room and the two children went to bed (Annette and Bex both in bed by 10pm) I am left watching Emma Radecanu winning the US open, brilliant game, lovely smile, and a refreshing change from the shite I watch on tele at home that himself puts on and falls asleep watching but wakes up the second you pick up the remote to turn it over.

Sunday Morning I watched the Elites doing the GNR in less time than it takes me to run 5 miles, whilst eating my porridge in bed, we dressed and took our bags back to the car.

As we loaded the bags into the boot we heard an incredible sound and all stood there looking skyward, we knew what it was, we were all excited about what it was, not one of us took our phones out of our pockets in time to take a photo!

and then we headed off to find “decent coffee” because someone needed a PRP, I’d had mine, Bex had already had hers (and Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays) but someone else was playing the long game!!!

No coffee to be found we ended up at “Town Moor” where the assembly zones for “not the GNR” were, we found a trailer thing selling coffee (cash only ffs) who takes cash when they are going running, Bex and Annette queued for the loo, still no joy for one of them. Then we walked miles to find the bag drop because one of us needs a jumper after a run, “that’s fine” I said, “as long as I don’t have to walk with you to collect it afterwards!”

“erm, I need a wee” I confessed, only to get daggers from the pair of them because apparently it was only 2 seconds since they went and I said I didn’t need one. I found a bank of loos with hardly any queue and 2 ( yes 2) attendants joyfully replenishing and cleaning them, so they were in fact, LOVELY. One benefit of the rolling wave start times brought about by covid is the loos seem to be able to cope better with the throng of people over several hours rather than all in the space of an hour.

We headed off to the assembly zone at our allotted time, laughed about the ” maintain social distance” signs and remarked about the changes in process.

Weaved our way through the zig zag crowd control just before the start line, clearly put there with the intention of separating people before the run, even though we have been bunched up like kids in a disco just 10 minutes before, but actually rather fun (even if a fruitless exercise) and off we went.

Now, I am not one to moan (much) and if I am going to moan there are a few things guaranteed to set me off, Hills at the start of a run, people running fast up the inside of a gap on my left, people coming to a complete stop right in front of me, OH and people flobbing in the street are all pretty much dead certs in the “piss lottey right off” category! and I… got the fucking lot.

Couldn’t hear my watch beep, (to be fair I rarely can) and couldn’t feel the vibrate so ended up running the first 10 minutes, most of which was down hill, yes, downhill can hurt more than up hill, trust me on this one. Sorted my watch out during a walk break and nearly got taken out by someone fast enough to beat Mo Farrah coming up on my left between me and a curb, should have given him a gentle shove over the barrier, that would have slowed him down. The woman in front was equally surprised by his presence and stopped dead in her tracks so I nearly dry humped her from behind, and then out of the corner of my eye I see someone on the opposite side of the road with his finger on one nostril giving it all he’s got ( use a fucking tissue you feral bastard)

Anyway, bumped into Pete at mile 3 ish, maybe 4, had been looking out for him since the tyne bridge, it was brilliant to see him, I am so pleased we saw each other, I even got a hug.

Continued up the hills, to mile 4? saw the Emilys’ star support group, carried on up the hill to mile 6 the turn round point, I’m not dead yet, quite impressed! mentioned to Annette that I hope we see Bex soon, as it will boost her morale ( and mine) fuck a duck there she is !! less than half a mile behind us, doing brilliantly.

Saw the sweeper bus, congratulated a lady for not getting on it, its so easy to be tempted by it when you are that close to the back with such a long way to go.

Continued up the hills, my god the hills, one after another after another, to mile 8 which should have been mile 9, Annette and I were both convinced the mile 8 sign was on route twice.

We dropped down a little to head back over the bridge again, when a lovely local council worker offered to take our photo, we laughed and joked with him ( and I used the excuse for a rest) waited a couple of minutes for Bex to catch up and had her photo taken with us too. Then we all set off again for the last 3 miles.

Up (Again) there is so much bloody up on this route, through the city, where people who have finished ages ago have made their way back from the finish to the pub, or the takeaway and are now cheering quiet enthusiastically at anyone who can muster a bit of running, Plenty of cameras around, not sure why there are so many in such a short distance but of course, if there is a camera you have to run, we moaned at one camera man who was eating when he should have been paying attention to my fabulous running style and taken my bloody photo so I could stop running.

Not sure where Bex over took me, but she did, and good on her, I was walking more than I was running by this stage, my hip was hurting and I just wanted to move the finish line to me, not me to the finish line!!

AND then, there is was, the 800m to go sign (that might as well be 8 miles) then the 600m to go sign, nope still too far, Annette says lets run from that sign to the end, I must have given her a “look” because she changed it to the end of the barriers………. so at the end of the barriers I started to run, and I ran, and I ran and I ran, and the bastards kept moving the finish line further and further way until suddenly…… theres a beep, that signals my feet have hit the timing mat !

I can walk, I am done, finished, complete. Bex is there, waiting for us, but none of the usual fanfare you get at the finish line, just a hand ful of St Johns Ambulance waiting to catch you when you fall!

People who organise these events must be fucking awesome runners, because after we finished we had to walk miles to get to the medals and Tshirt, goodie bags, then miles to the “I did it” photo frames, where there are usually lots of photographers, but not this time, and then miles to get somewhere we could collapse while waiting for Annette to get her bag drop bag.

I must have looked pretty shit, because 2 St Johns people came to see if I was ok ( I was, I just couldn’t actually get my arse up off the floor and was stuck there)

Eventually we headed back towards the car, we found an awesome little coffee shop called Cake Stories in Brentwood Avenue, they gave us the coffees for nothing because we had run, and the cakes were bloody lovely too.

I mentioned that we hadn’t seen the angel of the north, and that I hoped we would see it, a few minutes later the tourist signs came up so I asked Annette to take a photo, I won’t bother again!

Half way home we stopped for a break, everyone was hungry, or thirsty, or both, and I needed a wee. One of us had finally managed to “go” !! Hoorah….. she obviously wasn’t nervous about running with me at all (but was about my driving!)

For me, that’s the last one, Bex wants to do it again, and I think Annette does too, but despite having unfinished business with the proper course, and despite not actually hating that run, I’m done with long runs.