The beauty and the beast of the New Forest

THE New Forest in mid-summer is simply divine. Forest ponies wander aimlessly across roads which weave their way through the 145 square miles of Forestry Commission land.

The magnificent and serene view is a mixture of heathland and thick forest, rich with English oak, beech and ash. The foliage is so thick and the canvas so green, you’re almost tempted to turn down the contrast button.

The view is very much the same but far less appealing from a runner’s perspective. The forest then becomes an unedifying slog along bone-crunching gravel paths and softer, but lumpy tracks, with a few annoying, little climbs thrown in. All this is set beneath a choking canopy of trees which hide the sunlight but which, on a hot summer’s day, leave your lungs bursting and straining legs screaming with effort amid the stifling humidity.

The New Forest 10 was my first race for over a year since suffering a monumental running disaster during a half marathon in Poland when I blew up big time after seven miles.

At mile seven in the heart of the New Forest, with a tough dogleg of a hill lying ahead and my body hurting badly through a simple case of being palpably unfit and blatantly ill-prepared after a niggling knee injury, I was asking myself why I had bothered to enter. Only the encouragement of cheery, yellow-bibbed marshals, some familiar running friends watching from the sidelines, and walkers traipsing through the forest spurred me on, plus the lure of a magnificent horse brass which every finisher receives.

It was a case of mind over matter – and not letting it matter. My body wanted to quit, as memories of that torturous run in boiling heat of Torun in Poland 13 months ago returned. Then I did stop and walk. The humiliation of giving up has never left me. In the New Forest, it was dispiriting to watch runners, who I normally beat in these races, ease past me in those last few miles with their eyes firmly fixed on the finish.

The teasing Tasmanian Devil on my shoulder was taunting: “go on Dave, have a rest, what harm is a little walk going to have?” Agonising and haunting memories of the humiliation in Poland returned. Feet were dragging, there was hardly any lift, my shoulders were sore, stinging sweat was running into my eyes and the hamstrings were so tight a concert harpist would have had a field day. I was running so slowly that even my Garmin GPS watch ran out of battery juice.

I ran for a while with one guy who, like me, is in the autumn of his running years and who had just got back into running after a long-term injury lay-off. We both lamented how we were not running as fast as we once used to but agreed that as the body gets older you need to re-set your goals more realistically.

And that’s why I’m now foolishly considering a second edition of Around Britain in 80 Races in 2012. The first tilt in 2007 spawned a book, so now I’m thinking of taking on a fresh running challenge in Olympic year with another 80 races around the UK? Stark raving barmy!