Why do you have to be a Heartbreaker?
Sometimes, one should pay more attention to the races one books. Just a few seconds thought about this race’s name might have saved me much mental anguish. Heartbreaker. Heartbreaker. Why was it called Heartbreaker? It didn’t take place in a town called Heartbreak. It wasn’t in aid of a heart charity. No, as I discovered, it is called Heartbreaker because it will break the heart of the unsuspecting marathon runner.
It took place in the New Forest, starting at the suggestively named Sandy Balls holiday park, familiar to any listeners of the Marathon Talk podcast. Indeed the Marathon Talk crew were hosting their annual training weekend contemporaneously with the marathon. So I got to see Martin Yelling seeming to sprint round the half marathon.
My image of the New Forest – based on a single visit to Beaulieu Motor Museum and a chance discovery of Arthur Conan Doyle’s final resting place – was that it was a relatively level expanse of gorse and shrubs populated by shaggy ponies. It turns out my image was correct in all but one respect. For ‘relatively level’ substitute ‘really hilly’.
After the race briefing, the race director led runners to the start. This involved a quarter mile walk down (as in downhill) a path. Only as I realised that the race start would involve running back up said path did I realise why this was called the Heartbreaker Marathon. The start was a bit like the Harrow Hill 10k Race organised by my running club, except that there would still be more than 25 miles to run after the quad-killing uphill start.
Celebrity ‘fat bloke to Commonwealth Games marathoner’ Steve Way was running. I let him start ahead of me. The course was a kind of t-shape. Three miles or so out, then three six mile ‘laps’ across the T, before heading back to the start/finish. I was able to see Steve more than once as he ‘lapped’ me.
A running club colleague had warned me that the New Forest wasn’t flat, and I confirm that he knows his Hampshire geography. For 26 miles, I was running either uphill or downhill. And given the T shape nature of the course, every downhill was run with the knowledge that one would very soon have to run back up.
About two and a half miles in, there was a stream to cross. The race director, citing recent dry weather, had assured runners that it was possible to jump across for most runners. And so it proved. Except that we had to cross the same stream on the way back, at 24 miles. If anyone ever asks you about how easy it is to jump across a stream after running 24 miles off road with 1000m of elevation, you can take my word for it that it is not easy at all. It is in fact a rather cruel form of athletic torture.
I am misrepresenting this race. You might imagine I didn’t enjoy it. The reverse is true. It was a trail marathon run in a glorious landscape. I quite liked the T shaped course, and the intermingling of a marathon and HM at the same time. And the hills were a motivating challenge rather than a drudge.
I didn’t think I was in particularly good shape, and hoped to run about 4h20m, given that I had paced the Hampton Court HM at 2h10m the week before. But that was when I thought the New Forest was flat. So I was pleasantly surprised to see that my pace was much in line with that even though the terrain was very much different. I was delighted with my 4.19.02 finishing time.
My usual post-long-race re-fuelling option is a hotdog. The Heartbreaker Marathon advertised free soup for all finishers. Soup? How could that be a good thing? Well you can take it from me that this particular cup of hearty, hot soup was welcome in every respect. The perfect revival, putting my heart back into one piece, and tempting me to re-visit this race in future years.
