Boston Finish 2005

All of this nonsense started maybe ten months before the London Marathon in 2003. On the 'Runner's World' UK site I read an article which lauded the Flora London Marathon (FLM) as 'the best marathon in the world'. I had my doubts. Having recently returned from the 106th running of the Boston Marathon the previous year I felt like I had taken part in something that would be very difficult to surpass in any regard. Then one day my foolish eye fell on a link on the bottom of the screen that enticed...'Start a Discussion About This Article'. Unfortunately I did. My line was that although London was undoubtedly amongst the great Marathon races of the world, it could not lay exclusive claim to being 'number one'. My reservations arose from a few basics. London in the first instance could not lay claim to the long and interesting heritage that underpins the Boston event. Many marathon runners set great store by the aura of tradition, stability and, whisper the word, elitism, that attaches to the 'Beantown Beano'. I have to admit I'm one of those runners even though the case for Boston is sometimes over-made. In some other regards, like the difficulties of dealing with such large numbers, the relatively slow (and slowing) finishing times and the entry lottery made me sceptical about such an ambitious claim on London's behalf. In the heel of the hunt there was nothing else for it but for me to put my legs where my mouth was and to enter the race. Thankfully the 'Good for Age' system enabled me to avoid the dreaded lottery and to 'pass GO!', collect my number and proceed directly to Maze Hill Station and the Green Start for the 2003 running of the Flora London Marathon. Perhaps the race had started to prove the claims that had been made for it already.

Fast forward to the second Sunday in April and at just past the hour of 8:00am and I'm walking towards the wrong start of the FLM. The huge numbers that run this race each year necessitate three separate race starting points, which merge during the early miles into a single bobbing mass of running humanity. There were a few bad omens knocking around. I'd left a bag containing my energy gels and mobile phone in the taxi that had taken me to Charring Cross tube station and I had from there taken the wrong train to the start. Luckily the transportation arrangements were fairly idiot-proof and all I had to do was walk a little further than planned to arrive at my designated departure point. There were stewards everywhere and not Irish type stewards either. In Ireland race stewards are, more often than not, a t-shirt wearing volunteer who's sole expertise will be in the art of actually being present. We normally ask no more of such people, certainly not that they are actually informed or involved. In contrast the FLM stewards were everywhere and each seemed to be working to a plan. These non-Irish stewards appeared to want to help in any way they could. Very weird!

The Green start was to host 'Good for Age' runners, celebrity runners and 'others'. I still haven’t worked out who the 'others' were but I hope they had fun. I also saw a number of wheelchair athletes around the green start but can't be sure if they actually set off from this start. I spotted amongst them Kerry's very own Jerry Forde, a winner recently of the Connemara Marathon. I said hello but poor Jerry was taken by surprise and I got a very tentative and confused "Howareye" in reply. As the minutes ticked by I tried to refocus. I wanted to take this race fairly seriously and had trained hard by my standards. The scene at the start was one of carnival. Hot air balloons dotted the horizon and people milled in all direction variously eating, drinking, stretching, changing and queuing up for a last minute pee. I had targeted this race for an attempt to run under three hours and, to be honest; I was feeling quite a bit of self-imposed pressure. Although training had gone well and recent race times were encouraging, to meet this target would mean chopping over nine minutes off of a personal best that I was quite happy with. I was trying to deal with these nerves by ignoring the negative and accepting that all I could do was set out at the correct pace and see how long I could last without the metaphorical wheels falling off.

The 'correct pace' in this context is 6:51 per mile or thereabouts. I knew from experience that running a long distance at that pace would not be a simple matter for me. I'd raced at a faster pace before but never at anything over half-marathon distance. So this was to a large extent a voyage into the unknown. Basically I knew I could run the required pace but hadn't a notion about how long I could last. I was seeded in pen number one which was a novelty and I managed to line up about halfway down the pen itself. As always the last few minutes seemed endless. All of the preliminaries both practical and verbal were at an end. Roughly four months of effort had been invested in this project and I just wanted to get on the road.

FLM 2003

And then the moment arrived and we were on our way. It took a mere eighteen seconds to cross the starting line but runners remained tightly bunched as we jogged into action. The first mile away from Blackheath Common was through some narrow suburban streets and it was a little unusual I thought to have to dodge parked cars and unmarked traffic islands but I escaped unscathed. Seven minutes even was the feedback from mile marker number one. After the first mile things started to loosen out a little but not that much. Soon the runners from the blue and red starts would be joining in the fun. I kept my head down and focussed on pace. The next four miles were 06:45, 06:26 (downhill), 06:35 and 06:28 giving a five-mile time of 33:14. I was now over a minute ahead of an aggressive schedule and knew I needed to moderate things a little. I was feeling good and was trying to see past the milling runners to the fantastic crowd support. I needed to start hitting 6:50's or thereabouts and I got back on schedule with splits of 06:56, 06:56, 06:54, 06:48 and 07:02 over the next five miles. Although I felt strong I was quite aware that this was faster than I had ever started a marathon before. In my own terms I was 'clipping' along and hoping for the best. I felt I needed to hit around 1:29:30 for the halfway point to feel like I had some prospect of success. Despite a minor taste of panic, when I momentarily confused the thirteen mile marker with halfway, I was happy enough to see that three more mile splits of 06:45, 07:04 and 06:57 left me on schedule with a 1:29:33 half marathon total. The train was still on the rails.

It was only at this stage, at mile thirteen or fourteen that I started to get genuine running room. Up until then the running had been less that comfortable as heels were regularly clipped, elbows jostled and going around corners in a crowd was very tricky. As the crowd loosened out a bit I could concentrate on keeping an even stride. I was tiring by this point of the race, but I suppose that's part of the deal, and was trying to focus on rhythm and breathing in order to try and conserve energy. The first five splits after halfway were solid at 06:43, 06:48, 06:51, 6:52 and 06:47. By eighteen miles I had to concentrate harder and harder at maintaining a regular pace, even though I was managing to succeed thus far. My body wasn't shouting at me to stop but it was whispering urgently in my ear that it would really like to slow down a little. All the while famous landmarks came into view and receded behind. It was like running through some weird Austin Powers set with Big Ben, Tower Bridge and all the rest on view. Groovy baby! At one point, and I swear this is true, someone even shouted, “Come on guv’nor”. I had to check twice to make sure I wasn’t in an episode of ‘Only Fools and Horses’.

The problem increasingly now was getting my legs to behave. As usually happens at this stage of a race I was tiring mentally. At each of the mile markers I would hit the split button but then forget to check the time for the previous mile. As I was wearing a pace bracelet, in theory it should have been easy to judge easily how I stood against the clock. In reality the simple task of comparing the time on each mile clock with the schedule on my bracelet was regularly impossible. In retrospect the next four miles from eighteen to twenty-two were the end of the beginning. With some great difficulty I managed figures of 06:47, 06:57, 07:04, 07:07. It was at this stage and this stage precisely that the entire exercise went pear-shaped.

Just after the cobblestones outside of the Tower of London there was a water station. I have a vague recollection of a traffic tunnel around the same area. A tired runner who looked in almost as much trouble as myself veered across my path lured by the bottles of spring water on offer. I had to pull up sharply and my left leg went into cramp. I came to a shuddering halt, grasped the back of my leg in agony and shouted after him, "Gosh! That was a tad careless young man!" It was words to that effect anyway. Although I'm prone to cramps in the later stages of a marathon I had had none of the usual warning signs this time. From experience I knew how to deal with it. I stretched out, started to walk and eased into a jog. I was back running fairly quickly but it was only at that stage that I realised how deep in trouble I actually was. And my problems were nothing to do with my running friend who had steering issues.

My initial intention when I got going again was to try to catch the guy who had caused me to pull up. I wanted to ask him how easy he thought it might be to run with a shoe up his arse. As I jogged by the side of the Thames with four miles remaining I realised immediately that any hope of either getting stroppy with 'broken steering guy' or breaking three hours was history. From that precise point on it was a question of survival and it wasn't going to be pretty. I had developed pains in my waist, chest and arms. To be brief, I was a wreck. Then I had to walk. I'd never walked in any race before. I walked and tried to draw deep breaths. As I went slowly forward the pains eased back and I jogged again. After another half mile I walked for another thirty seconds and jogged again. When I look back and see that that mile was 7:38 I'm astounded, genuinely. I was still cramping but being forced to switch to a lower gear had helped, as had the walking, but I was crashing and burning in award winning style. Mile twenty-four was 8:02, mile twenty-five was 9:22 and mile twenty six was a spectacular 9:55.

Even for someone like me who takes joy in overstatement and who revels in the dramatic it's impossible to exaggerate how much discomfort was involved in those last two or three miles. I was a shell and all that I contained was pain. Even though I managed to run some of the remaining distance it wouldn't be what we'd normally describe as running. I did my share of weaving and grimacing and groaning. In short it was a blood-bath. I tottered over the line in 3:06:24 for a PB by a little over three minutes. I've never felt less enthused about a personal record before. To run such a time in different circumstances would have given me great satisfaction. On this day, I wanted to curl up and die.

To finish, just a quick word on the question of whether London is really the best Marathon race in the world. I now know the answer to that question without a shadow of a doubt. I feel I can talk with great authority on the issue having run both races in less than a year, just about. If however you want to hear that conclusion you’ll have to go and collect my gels from the taxi man, because I just haven’t got the energy to type any more.