Monica and I ran in the 2005 Windsor half, and had run that with Phil Powers and Jo O'Brien, they couldn't make it this year, but a group of us including my sister and Chris had entered about 1 week before the closing date.

Unfortunatly we'd left it too late and only Monica and Chris managed to get a place, they sent my cheque and my sister's back to us. I was back in England for a few weeks from Switzerland and just getting over a cold; anyway on the Sunday morning I was just beginning to think about going out for my training run, I had Amsterdam marathon just over 6 weeks away. it was about 10:45am and I got a call on my mobile phone from Monica asking me if I wanted Chris's race number, he wasn't feeling fit to run.

Well I jumped at the news and Mon came to pick me up en route to Windsor, I had to quickly eat something with just over 2 hours until the start of the race.

We got there just in time with only 15mins to go before the start. Chris took his camera and set off to the top of the long walk, where the George statue is, from there he had a great view of the start, and the start of the second lap at approx 6 miles.

I finished the 13.1 mile course in 1:39 minutes a personal best, though I have not really run many half's in good form, so think I could do better; even still, I came 320th out of 6,500 people in 01:39:31, but I was fairly battered by the end. Monica learnt what I had the previous year, "You can't blag a half" unlike a 10km a half marathon has to be fully prepared for. Any reasonably fit person can tough out 10km, but a half marathon is too far if you're not trained. Mon looked in pain for a good while after, but had a good race anyway, didn't quit despite all the pain and the point is, got out and did it anyway, she finished just under 2:28 mins (I can't find you in the database Mon? Someone else's bib?). Many Thanks to Chris for letting me use the photo's.

Windsor half marathon homepage and results.