The Marathon
Well the day had finally arrived and my hopes of an typical overcast London day didn’t happen. I looked outside at 6:30am and it was a beautiful day – not a cloud in the sky. It was going to be a hot one (19deg – the hottest London Marathon on record).
One of the hardest parts of the London Marathon is getting to the start line on time. The tubes are packed and there are people everywhere. I managed to find my friends at Greenwich Park and we all got into a pre run routine. Applying Vaseline to those areas that are likely to rub and tape over our nipples.
Before the race you should have a couple of words that you keep saying to yourself to help stay focused and not let the ‘race’ beat you. Mine where simple – pace yourself, stay calm and remember to keep hydrated.
The race starts and it just a massive sea of people - 35,747 runners to be exact. It can take up to 20mins to cross the start line. The first half of the race went along beautifully. My pace was a little bit fast but my body felt really good. The crowd was amazing there were people on the side of every part of the course chanting your name. My workmate and I had a competition to see who could get their name called out the most. I won easily… no one could pronounce his name properly.
The halfway point (13 miles) was just past Tower Bridge. This part felt like a dream with the Thames and London's famous icons in the background. I felt really good and was running at a good pace but this being my first marathon I knew there was still much to come.
The Wall
I have heard of the wall but never experience it. The farthest I have run in training was 21 miles. So I expected from that point on to be very hard. (It has been proven that the wall affects most people between 2.5 – 3 hrs). As I past the 21mile marker I started to feel my concentration and energy levels drop. It was getting very hard to run, my legs were feeling heavy and I was tired. So this is what I call the robot phase. Basically I conserved energy and just concentrated on putting one leg in front of the other saying to myself “one, two… one, two”.
Gordon Ramsay
The crowd must notice when you are looking tired because they will really start motivating you to keep going because all I could hear was ‘C’mon Gordon, C’mon’. Wait my name isn’t Gordon, what is going on here I thought to myself. I then noticed just in front of me was Gordon Ramsay. I am not going to get beaten by Gordon Ramsay so I decided to pick up my pace and went right past him. I thought about shouting something like – ‘C’mon Jamie Oliver’ but realised that I didn’t even have the energy to talk.
There was only 2 miles to go and they felt like the longest two miles of my life. I started running faster trying to make sure I put everything into the race. I entered 'The Mall' just before Buckingham Palace and saw the sign 635 yards to go sign. Yes – I knew no matter what happened, even if my entire body cramped up I would still be able to crawl across the line and finish.
I was so excited and proud as I crossed the line – 6 months of preparation and 3hrs 53mins 21secs after the starters gun had gone off I was finished. My aim from the start was to complete the marathon in under 4hrs and to walk away in one piece (i.e. without damaging my body for future use). I was amazed when I checked my body later on for battle scars – no chaffing, both my nipples where still in one piece and best of all I didn’t even have one blister – not a scratch. (The next day I literally fell out of bed as my legs had cramped up while I was sleeping. But one day later I was playing touch and scoring tries.)
Chris Flack ran the 2009 London Marathon for the Whizz-kidz charity. Click here to donate to this worthy cause.
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