We did it.

We finally completed the Frank Duffy 10 mile course, but it was still as tough as we expected. We got up much later than we had planned on Sunday to do our run as it was a long run and we haven't really practiced early starts for the marathon we'd planned to be out by 10am, unfortunately that didn't happen and it was about 2pm before we eventually started the run.
I suggested that we didn't start the race in the same place as the actual race, there was two reasons for this firstly we didn't want to have a 2 mile flat run at the start of the run as we had done this the previous week and apart from finding it incredibly boring I think we started out too fast so by the time it came to the hills we were really feeling it, and secondly we wanted to get the first of the hills out of the way as early as possible and then we would have the nice two mile flat near the end.
So we set of from where we usually park and made our way to the first of the hills, to be honest it really wasn't too bad but I really wasn't in the mood and I was having my doubts that I'd complete it. I knew what was before us and I wasn't enjoying the thoughts of it. If Sarah had of said to me at any point that she was quitting I would have happily quit with her. As it turned out she was thinking exactly the same thing as me, but luckily neither of us said it and we soldiered on.
As soon as the first lap of the 10 mile course was complete there was no way I was going to quit, even though I had a slight twinge in my shoulder and my hips and lower back were starting to pain me. Nothing too bad to make me stop but they were annoying me.
We surprised ourselves and did the first lap fairly easily and I seemed to be getting stronger as the run went on, although the 2 mile flat seemed to go on forever.
Into the second lap we were going strong and it really wasn't as daunting as we thought it would be, and coming up to the end I suggested to Sarah that we add the extra 3 miles and do the full half marathon course as I was feeling really strong at that stage. Sarah was having none of it though so I eventually agreed to just do the 10, instead I picked up the pace a little to get that boring flat out of the way and to try and finish as fast as we could.
We did it in 1.43 which is a bit slower than we wanted, but with the number of hills involved and the mood I was in I was happy enough with that.
Roll on the next long run, 12 miles next Sunday.
The weekday runs are really the bread and butter but it's the long runs that really give you the sense of achievement, and I'm really enjoying them at the moment.