The next stop en route to Berlin was a marathon double, starting on Saturday with the Hamsterley Forest marathon. Lured in by the hilarious pre-race notes and the £15 entry fee I thought this would be the perfect warm up to the Lakeland Trails marathon the next day - until the race organiser sent out the gpx data of the route the day before. The "only one hill" in the race notes was actually 3200ft of climbs up and around the same hill three times! Anyway, I decided to take it easy, aim for somewhere around 4:30 and leave plenty in the tank for the next day. The route was basically two miles or so out from the start, then three times around/up/down a big hill over 7 miles, and then a couple of miles back to the start. Oddly, the first loop was the hardest, although not knowing how long and steep the climbs were the first time around may have had something to do with that. Knowing what I was in for the next two times around seemed to help a bit. As the first in a double it was a pretty uneventful race. I lurked at what I thought was the back, chatted a bit at the aid stations, pootled up the hills nice and slowly, and enjoyed the scenery (and the breeze) at the top of the hill. Towards the end I started passing a few people, lots without water bottles which seemed a bit silly on such a hot day, and was surprised to finish in 4:07, even more surprised to finish in 18th place. I hung around a bit at the end, had a sausage roll and plenty to drink before the drive home, and start freaking out about doing it all again the next day.
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