A couple of weeks ago I talked about how important it was to check the race route before running an event. The Glentree Winter Trail Half Marathon was one week after the Jimmy Irvine 10K and yet I hadn’t learnt my lesson at all. I didn’t check the route for this race either. I had assumed it would be the same as before. Big mistake.

There are two Glentress trail races. One in November and one in February. Both races have different routes. The November race involves six miles of climbing and then six miles of running back to the start. The February race involves NINE miles of climbing and then a steep three miles back to the start. I had assumed this race would start going downhill from 6 miles onwards, instead it kept climbing and climbing… the route had changed, and this was the same as the February race!

I don’t know why they changed it but, when you’re expecting to go downhill and have to climb another three miles, it’s not a fun realisation that you should have checked and prepared for it. My mistake. I can’t even say I wasn’t warned as I knew from the previous week that race routes can change. D’oh!

As for the race, it was slower than previous years as I was still running after illness and injury. I was pleased to finish in under 2 and half hours but I would have been a whole lot happier with six miles of climbing instead of nine.

For details on the race see these previous reports: Glentress and Glentress