Milton Keynes Half Marathon

My blog frequency and training frequency are very tied together. Therefore no blogging equals precious little training. So entering the Milton Keynes Half Marathon maybe wasn't the wisest thing to do? Well, both Gazza and I entered, I've not run this race before so it was a nice change.
Getting to the race was ok (apart from the queue to turn right into the Open University). The race itself seemed quite big with loads of non club runners (I'll talk more about that later) with fairly average organisation and long toilet queues! (more queuing). There were 3 main downsides, first, it took us an hour to get from the Open University to M1 junction 13 (ouch), second it was very windy in the second half of the race (as Statto had predicted) and it made conditions very tough indeed and third, it poured down in the last couple of miles. Serves me right for being so slow as I finished in a pathetic 2:20 and I don't care about the seconds.

As I was running, I made some observations about my fellow runners. I don't want to sound up myself or superior here so if I do I apologies. But most of these observations were made about the non club runners around me...

Why do some runners pin their number on their back?

How many gels do you really need for a half marathon?

So many runners were carrying large water bottles when there were water stations every 3 miles. And even worse, quite a number were wearing camel back rucksacks which didn't look that comfy

A lot of people were wearing way too many clothes, waterproofs, fleeces, hats, gloves, long leggings, jogging bottoms, all of the above

Why do people wear baggy shorts over leggings?

Adidas leggings are often see through in the wrong light!

And how do I know (as a seasoned runner) that some of these things are daft? Experience I guess...