Thank goodness that’s over. After weeks of training, watching what I eat and increasingly being pre occupied by it, I have finally completed my first marathon.
Having dumped the kids with Emma’s mum for the weekend we set off for Inverness on the early morning train, making use of the crazy pricing of train fares. £6 to travel less than 30 miles to Edinburgh, £10 to travel from there, hundreds of mile to Inverness on one of the more picturesque train journeys you can get in the UK. We were kept entertained by the loo. Somehow people couldn’t work out how to lock it, so it was good fun watching people open the door and discovering someone sat helpless on the loo. I opened it and a Chinese man was sat on it.
On arrival we booked into our hotel. Located near the docks I was worried that it might be the work premises of those ladies who are involved in one of the oldest professions! Fortunately it was clean and there was little sign of nervous looking gentlemen booking in under false names.
Then it was time to register at the Festival of Running. As these expo’s go it was pretty rubbish. No free T-shirts, pens or anything else for that matter. Just over priced running gear and a few charity stalls. We met Emma’s cousin Rhona and the crew for the pasta party where we ‘carbed up’ for the next day. Rhona was going to be my nearest rival, as we frequently have come close in recent races, and this was going to be both our first marathons.
Race day arrived and we joined 3000 other nervous runners at 7.30 am to board the buses for the long journey to the start near Fort Augustus. We sat on the bus and waited...and waited and waited. After an hour I decided to nip into the bushes for a pee. Would you believe it, mid flow the buses started up and started moving. It was an extreme version of the scenario ‘you wait for a bus for ages and then 3 come at once’. The difference being 25 buses left at once! With a few dribbles on my trainers I got back on. You can imagine the excitement on the bus. I began to appreciate how big an event this was. Apparently the Loch Ness Marathon was voted one of the top10 to run in the world, which explained the number of non Scottish people around me. An American, a French bloke, some Germans and some weird sounding folk from Blackburn, Lancashire! It was an impressive, if not surreal sight to see a convoy of all these buses travelling through the winding roads of the highlands, through some breathtaking scenery. Then you arrive in the middle of nowhere and join the queue for the portaloos. I disobeyed the rule of not peeing in the bushes, and paid for it by standing in a marsh and soaking my trainers. Not a good start. Then a pipe band marches through to the start, and the horn blows and we were off!
(At this point I will do a separate report on the race itself for the benefit of any marathon runners looking for snippets of info on the course and event. See The Loch Ness Marathon: Runners Report)
Here is an abridged version of it. Basically I had 2 minds about what pace to go at. Having had a bad cold the week before I was doubtful of getting near to 3 hours and thought maybe 3: 10. But I started to run with Ian & Stuart (2 very experienced marathon runners from Dunbar). After 4 or 5 miles I realised I was going at the 3 hour pace and they were beginning to slow a little, so I pushed ahead. I kept that pace, but then they both passed me at around 14 miles, and soon after I paid the price for a hasty start. My splits were getting worse and worse and by 18 miles I was not enjoying myself. I got stuck in a mental rut of negativity, feeling the pain and struggling. At 24.5 miles the final blow came of Rhona passing me as I was pulled up stretching with cramp. From thereon it was just a case of trying to keep the legs moving and finish. The last mile is mentally very tough. It skirts around the Queen Park stadium, before a sharp right into it. Here with less than 100 meters to go, I got severe cramp and had to stop again, before restoring my dignity and finally finishing with a time of 3 hours and 13 minutes.
I was initially disappointed with my time. I had hoped for better but I think the lack of experience showed. I actually think I would have been quicker and feeling fitter if I had set myself a 3:10 pace. However, the results put me in 127th place, which might give me a best of age position for London. So on reflection for a first marathon it wasn’t too bad. Emma did very well. Nursing an ankle injury from the summer fell race, she smashed her PB by 9 minutes with a 3:47. Rhona got 3:10 and was 10th woman and 2nd in her age group, so she deservedly got a prize.
Post race I was feeling very sore, which was partly eased by a vigorous massage. But at night my body was in shock. I was burning hot with a fever, especially my legs, but shivering cold. I was wrecked! But, a mouthful of pain killers and a sausage supper from the chippy over the road made all the difference.
After a good nights sleep we made full use of the pool and Jacuzzi, and got every penny’s worth of the hotel breakfast. 3 visits to the food bar replenished all the lost energy from the marathon. Back on the train, the scenery was even better as snow had fallen in the Cairngorms. A great way to round of the weekend. Will I do it again? Maybe...or maybe a different one.
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