Monday, 26th April – The day after/364 days to go

Having hardly been able to move the evening before, some sort of healing miracle has happened overnight and I’m pretty mobile again. Not jumping and dancing mobile and definitely not running mobile, but no longer in danger of being carted off in a wheelchair.

We leave the hotel and head for the tube station. Get off the tube early and head for a large Waterstones as we’ve got time to kill and a bit of a walk will do me good.

Get the train in the afternoon and take an uneventful trip home. The boys went under their own steam yesterday evening as they have school/college today. On the trip home I try and organise my thoughts. People I know will have three questions. How did it go? Was I happy with my time? Will I do it again? None of these questions is as straightforward as they might be. Or am I overcomplicating things? It was a wonderful experience, I was happy with my time and I would do it again. But all answers have reservations.

I had a Plan B for if I didn’t make it to the start line and I had a Plan B for if I blew up towards the end of the race. I didn’t have a Plan B for it going wrong at the start of the race.

Most of my pre-race knowledge came from really good runners who start from the “Good For Age” pen. They’re coming through the start line 20 seconds after the start and are running with a bunch of other fast runners with a limited number of equally fast runners ahead of them. When they talk about London or Berlin being “fast” they mean fast for runners who can get on with it.

I finished 4,610th. I started at the back of pen 4 at the blue start. I don’t have the stats or the wherewithal to work it out, but I must have gone through the blue start with 10,000 runners ahead of me. When I got to the three mile mark, another 5,000 runners from the red start hit the tarmac ahead of me. That’s an awful lot of concentrating on overtaking to drain the mental energies with the changes of pace depleting the physical batteries. When I got some clear(ish) space in the last third of the race I didn’t have enough left to really go for it, but I was still going past people at the end of the race.

Stats are these:

5K 00:26:42
10K 00:23:56
15K 00:24:47
20K 00:24:36
25K 00:24:52
30K 00:24:56
35K 00:25:35
40K 00:25:02
2k Finish 00:10:54

1st HALF 01:45:18
2nd HALF 01:46:02

place (total) 4,610 out of 36,522
place (gender) 4,052 out of 24,423
place (M50 - M54) 302 out of 1,850

I didn’t quite manage a negative split, but got closer than anyone I know except Tom.

I note from the results that Rachel and Mark crossed the timing mat 15 minutes after the start. This must have been a planned move as Rachel has done London twice before so it will be interesting to hear their experiences.

The reality is it was unlikely that I’d give of my best in my first marathon, particularly a Big City marathon. I’m told it’s a day recovery for every mile so I guess I won’t be pulling up any trees for the next few weeks. But 5ks, 10ks and anything up to 10 miles all sound good to me.

So Chris has done London or maybe London has done Chris. I seem to recall Tom saying that statistically “serial” marathon runners achieve their best times on marathon eight or nine. At my age that’s a bit too much for me but I’ll look around for a less busy autumn marathon that fits with my current running commitments. If not I may have to visit the most awful place in England and run the Blackpool marathon next April. Either way this is blog complete …… but I may be back.

The Twenty First Photo

Home at last and with the gold medal. Am I Kenyan? Was it a dream? Did I win? No. Yes and No. Yes. Of course, we all won because it’s not about beating anyone else for 99.9% of us. The race is long and in the end it’s only with yourself as Mary Schmich has told us. How was it for me? There’s no glib one line answer. Running 26.2 miles as fast as you can is both a terrific achievement and absolutely bonkers. There are conflicts and inconsistencies throughout. I had a great time, it was a life affirming experience and I’m really glad I did it. I couldn’t say the experience was all good, though. I did the best I could under the circumstances, but I feel I can do better. The marathon is definitely not my distance but I feel I’ve got unfinished business with it. But if circumstances are such that I never run one again or never run one as fast as this again then I’m happy to have 3:31:20 on my running cv.

The Twentieth Photo

The Four Stars Hotel, Paddington. Or should that be No Stars Hotel? It was fine for what we wanted. At £89 for a double room for two nights you don’t expect luxury. I’d stay here or one of the dozens of other local hotels again. The room came with shower and no bath and I could really have done with immersing my tired bod in cool water after the race. Apart from that everything else was fine.

It was quiet and clean and the staff were friendly. It was reasonably handy for getting round. Once you have to get on a tube it’s not that important where you are anyway, in my view. I’d come and watch in the future and I’d also come and marshal; don’t know what Gill and Sharron did after they’d finished seeing runners into the restricted areas. Don’t know when Steve and Becky got released from their baggage duties, but they were in the pub for 2.30, so that can’t be bad.

The Nineteenth Photo

Happy loving couple. Why not? This marathon has really taken over my life even though I’ve been very much a low mileage trainer. Thanks to Liz for all the support and making the practical side happen. The London Marathon really is spectacular and I can’t believe how naïve we both were. I honestly didn’t realise I wouldn’t be able to run my own race at my own pace because of the number of other runners and where I was starting from. Neither of us realised that the whole of the city seems to come out and watch and that as a watcher you can’t really flit about from one place to another with any great certainty. There’s a real dichotomy in choosing a place to spectate in that the spectator wants a great carnival atmosphere and the runner wants to see and hear support from their loved ones. There were plenty of places en route where a spectator could have rocked up with folding chair and six pack with a clear view of all the runners. Convenient shrubbery for comfort break and away you go. However, there would have not been much of a buzz as most such places were none too attractive.

The Eighteenth Photo

Phew. It’s all over and the family have found me. Had momentary panic that I’d been abandoned and left destitute when Liz wasn’t there at the meet and greet. Perhaps not such a great idea to leave wallet, oyster card and mobile phone with Liz rather than in baggage. Had a tenner and free transport on the tube so would have been ok if I could have remembered (a) my own name (b) the hotel name and (c) where the hotel was. After 26.2 miles I really couldn’t remember anything.

Kids not remotely interested in running themselves. Why would they? Jonathan (nephew) has done a pretty speedy half on no training but is now living the high life in “that London”. Gerry did a marathon in the black and white days – 3:45? Not keen on the idea of another one but he may be wavering; has seven half marathons booked and paid for later in the summer so difficult to see how he’d squeeze one in. Judith is Coventry parkrun’s first Runner of the Month and is very happy with 5k thank you very much. Liz? She’ll do one soon I have no doubt.

The Seventeenth Photo

Thanks to Paul Warren for this one. Hope you don’t mind me sticking it on my blog mate. This must be at mile twenty three, but I’ll have to get confirmation of that. I can’t believe I look so stiff. In my mind’s eye I’m running upright and loose limbed, breathing from the diaphragm and storming past runners who went off too quickly. If there’s anyone local who does coaching on running style and maintaining form I’d like to meet them. This reminds me of those skiing videos you get at the end of your week at ski school and the horrible reality hits you that you’re doing it all wrong and don’t look anything like Franz Klammer, or whatever the modern equivalent is. Guess you can only play the hand your dealt.

The Sixteenth Photo

Where’s Wally? Just ahead of the balloons – the only one with a white cap. Liz snapped me at Mile 19. You can count the number of runners with two feet off the ground on no hands. Welcome to my running world. I was still going ok at this stage and very pleased to have seen the family. It had been gnawing away at me that I hadn’t seen them as if it was somehow my fault. There’s so much going on all the way round it’s difficult to pick people out from the crowd. Must be even worse for spectators with restricted views identifying us individual runners. Will get a taste of this myself at Leeds half where I’m doing the supporting and Liz is doing the running. Hope I can do a decent job as she’s been brilliant for me.