Before the story of my London Marathon day – a message of
thanks for the fantastic support I have received for my fundraising for The Outward Bound Trust. It was a particularly special moment when on
the evening before the race, my fundraising total reached and exceeded the
target figure set by the Trust (£1,750) and, as I write this post, I am short
of the target I set myself by only £150.
I am hoping to make a final sprint to or even beyond that last line and,
to help with this, donations can be made via my Money Giving site: http://uk.virginmoneygiving.com/JohnReece
And now to the London Marathon itself…
You don’t get a London Marathon medal for completing 4
months of training involving almost 400 miles of running, weekly sweat sessions
at the gym, the taking of cold baths and the abstinence of alcohol. You get the medal for completing 26.2 miles
on the day, on the course and in the event.
If anything was going to bring that point home to me it was the dilemma
I faced at just over 2½ hours into my race, almost at mile 16 – the point where
I “disappeared from the screen.”
As reported in the last instalment of Run Reece Run, an
injury sustained two weeks before the race had left me in a position of hoping
that complete rest from running, regular stretching and rolling exercises and
liberal application of anti-inflammatory gel would bring about sufficient
improvement to enable me to last out the whole 26.2 miles. Not having the test of a run over the previous
week meant that, as I stood in the starting pen, I had no real basis to know
what sort of shape I was in for the challenge ahead. Apart from the unwelcome need to get up at
5.30am, the morning could not have gone better and I even managed a last minute
toilet trip that I was sure would save me a minute compared to last year’s
marathon experience at Brighton (when I’d needed a “Paula Radcliffe” stop at
mile 9)!
As we set off I was amazed that immediately, despite the
press of the large field of runners, I was going at the pace I’d originally
planned to run. Everyone around me was
moving at a pretty uniform pace of 9 minutes per mile and I was delighted that
no problems were being reported from ankles, shins and calves. However, I was aware that my right upper leg
definitely wasn’t firing on all cylinders.
For a start there was a semi “dead leg” sensation about it and secondly
at each strike of my right foot there was a feeling like I’d just prodded a
bruise. My hope remained that this would
settle down or at least get no worse during the run and there was certainly no
immediate moment of crisis. My initial
frustration was that as the three starting routes merged at about the 3 mile
mark I somehow found myself behind a large group that were following pacers
aiming for a time about 30 minutes behind the mark I was hoping for. This slowed me down by about 10 seconds per
mile for a while and then having got past the pacers I found it hard to pick up
my earlier speed. 
Nevertheless my mood
was pretty bright as I waved in acknowledgement to the Cutty Sark, the second
of my revised priorities as set out in last week’s post on my blog (the first priority
having been to reach the start line!).
My trouble in sustaining my early pace (which on the face of it wasn’t
too ambitious bearing in mind it was a minute per mile slower than I’d
sustained throughout the Richmond Half Marathon, just three weeks previously)
was reflected by the fact that after completing mile 8 I found my pace slowed
to about 9 minutes 20 seconds per mile.
Again I found it hard to shift out of this pattern and I decided that it
was sensible to go with the flow and aim at 9m20s to 9m30s per mile pace. All this while I was increasingly aware of
the ache in my right upper leg but doing my best to draw inspiration from the
act of crossing Tower Bridge and reaching half way. Looking back, I’m amazed at how quickly the
first half seemed to go by, however this might be a matter of perspective
around what was just about to occur!
Mile 14 was not a comfortable one for me – my pace slowed
further, down to 9m40s per mile, and the ache in my leg was now distinctly
getting on my nerves! This continued
into mile 15 where my pace dropped to 10 minutes per mile and as I approached
the 16 mile mark I knew I was in trouble.
In a moment of genuine confusion I slowed to a walk (or hobble) and a
nearby marshal obviously sensing something wasn’t right pointed out a first aid
station further along the course. At
that point one suggestion that had been made to me beforehand came to mind –
seek out some Deep Heat gel! I went to the First Aid point but was told they
didn’t have Deep Heat. Instead I was
shown a stretching exercise and I gave profuse thanks, though privately I
reached the conclusion it was about as effective as sticking plaster and a
couple of aspirin in a major surgical operation!
Having reached the moment of dilemma a few quick points
of reference went through my mind – chiefly, I was over half way and secondly, I badly wanted to finish! I think if it had been wet and/or cold a few
other points would have come into the reckoning but one thing was for certain
- the weather was about as perfect as it
could have been for a Sunday afternoon “stroll”! Having come off road for just over 5 minutes
I re-entered the fray, limping along at about 3mph clutching at a point
somewhere to the right of my backside where the pain seemed to be seated. Some more calculations had me working out
that at the rate I was moving it was going to take me over 3 hours to reach the
finish. I wasn’t too happy at this
conclusion so thought I would give a walk/run strategy a go. Possibly as a result of seizing up a bit I
found this even more painful than my running had been earlier and worse, within
seconds I felt spasms going through my right calf! This brought that effort to an abrupt end as
I reckoned a calf strain would be a fatal shot to my chances of finishing. A little later, having tried to pick up a bit
more momentum, I tried one more effort at breaking into something a bit faster
than a hobble. I seem to recall this
raised a rousing cheer from the crowd but sadly even their enthusiasm wasn’t
making the difference and I felt the red alert from my calf almost
immediately. Nothing else for it then –
three hours of limping around Docklands and over to The Mall!
There was something very surreal about the next few
hours. It was very odd having a constant
wave of people running or walking past me.
It must have been into my third hour of hobbling that the wave dissipated
a little but it was still constant and was increasingly occupied by fancy dress
clad runners. I concluded that sleep
would come easy that night as I would be able to count rhinos as an alternative
to sheep. In all, I think 5 runners in rhino
costumes overtook me and I was particularly impressed by a man carrying a
fridge and at least a couple of soldiers accelerating past me with fully laden
backpacks. One thing about my
predicament was it probably gave me the most 360% experience of the London
Marathon that you could expect to have.
The crowd were brilliant, not 5 minutes went by without a
call of “Come on JR” and I was just disappointed that all I could do was offer
a “thumbs up” when I wanted to respond by breaking out into a run. Inevitably a lot of people were asking “Who
shot JR?” and my stock answer became, “Mo Farah did – he shot me in the
backside”. For the most part I managed
to keep fairly positive with just the occasional moment when I felt frustration
building up in me. I think I was helped
in coping with the emotion of the situation by the fact that I’d had time for
mental preparation between originally getting injured and the day of the race. I don’t know if I would have coped so well if
the injury had come unexpectedly on the day itself.
I began ticking off objectives. Firstly, looking out for “number one fan”
Lesley and close friends Marilyn and Jan who I was hoping to see in the crowd
at mile 17 – didn’t see them but at least looking for them had kept me occupied! Secondly, Canary Wharf (priority 4 from the
last week’s blog entry). In between
these, I remember feeling particularly pleased to go over the 30km marker which
was supposed to send an update about my progress to those tracking me
on-line. As I crossed this point, I
wondered whether in different parts of the country there might be the raising
of cheers in recognition that I was still “in the race”. Sadly it transpires that there were no cheers
for me at this point as the technology failed to register that I had reached
30km and, in effect, I had “disappeared from the screen” over an hour earlier.
On route I was spotted by Moni and Gillian from the
Bearcat Running Club as each in turn paused from their own
efforts to give words of encouragement before running on (to complete their own
fantastic achievements). Thankfully at
last I saw Lesley, Marilyn and Jan in the crowd at mile 21 (Limehouse). A quick hug and words of encouragement and
off I limped again with just over 5 miles to complete. My next priority was the Tower of London at around
mile 23 and in reaching that point I was certain I would make it all the way.
At mile 24, I remember thinking how strange it was that a particular group of people seemed to be cheering me with massive enthusiasm. That was one of those embarrassing moments when you have a strong feeling you should be recognising someone but can’t for the life of you think who it is and then, just too late, the penny dropped as I realised it had been The Outward Bound cheer team! Somewhere near mile 25 I was thrilled to see (and hear) a crowd that I had no problem in recognising – The Bearcat Running Club cheer team.
This came in the midst
of a number of awesome landmarks - the London Eye, Big Ben, the Palace of
Westminster and Buckingham Palace. Then
finally the finish line was in sight along The Mall. A fleeting thought went through my mind of
trying to raise a run for the last bit – but I dismissed the thought almost
immediately!
My thoughts as I finally sat down at The Outward Bound
reception with my medal hung round my neck?
One way of looking at the experience was thinking of it as a minor
league football team that unexpectedly gets to a major cup final, holds out at
0-0 until half time against a Premier League team and then takes a hammering in
the second half! Whatever, I had my
medal and it was brilliant to see friends and particularly Lesley.
Without doubt I have a certain amount of regret that on
the day I was unable to challenge my sub 4 hour target or even my personal best
– but the marathon experience isn’t about the one day, it is about the months
that lead to that day. The four months
of my training were amazing in their own right.
The experience of sharing with club mates the aim of running a marathon
this April (whether London, Brighton or Paris) has been inspiring. Seeing so many achieve their goals (and sadly
some fall short because of illness or injury) has filled me with more emotions
than just pride. In terms of personal
goals, I had the satisfaction of achieving two officially timed personal bests
in this period (5K and Half Marathon) and hitting times in training that I’d
never hit before (at 17 and 20 miles).
With the very best of wishes…
John
