I was left to be a Norman no mates today. All my running friends were off running in the Stamford 30k race in preparation for Barcelona Marathon in three weeks time. As I was on my own I thought I'd check out the second half of the Cambridge Boundary Marathon in preparation for the full event in two weeks time. I've only ever run the half marathon before, and most of the second half of the full marathon course is completely new to me. For good reason I discovered.
So, at 8.45 this morning I set off for the village of Coton, the end point for the Boundary Half Marathon. The spring like weather of the previous week had disappeared to be replaced by a blanket of white cloud. Thankfully, it didn't rain, but the wind and the cold had made a return. It was a 5 mile run to Coton on familiar territory. From the village I was running around the north-west boundary of Cambridge on roads and tracks that were new to me.
Shortly after Coton the route of the marathon turns onto a footpath that borders a farmer's field. After the recent rain, the path was wet and covered in slurry like mud that was impossible to run on in road running shoes. I slipped and slid around like a cartoon character stepping onto ice without ice skates. This made me wonder whether I should run the marathon in trail shoes just for this section of the route. Fortunately, 200m further on the ground condition improved and it was possible to run again.
After a further 1.5 miles I'd reached Girton, where the route of the marathon passes through the private grounds of Girton College, which was to be out of bounds to me today. Girton College is the furthest university college from the centre of Cambridge. It was originally established in the 1870s as a college exclusively for women, and was located some distance from the city centre to discourage marauding male undergraduates. Of course, it is now mixed and the University is more liberated in its views.
I skirted around the perimeter of the College and ran on residential streets for a couple of miles before reaching yet another slippery, muddy footpath. My stumbles and slips weren't quite as comical this time. After this I reached the Kings Hedges area of Cambridge and ran alongside the ill fated guided busway, which has been completed for some time but doesn't yet have any buses running on it due to an ongoing argument between the County Council and contractor over some areas of outstanding work. This part of Cambridge has undergone a massive amount of redevelopment in recent years. I once lived nearby and can remember when the area was nothing but fields. Golly, I'm getting old. It's now an area of high tech office blocks and modern housing.
From Kings Hedges the marathon route heads towards the village of Milton via the Mere Way footpath, which was once a Roman Road between Cambridge and Ely. Sounds like it should be a nice part of the route, doesn't it? Unfortunately, the southern end of the path borders a travellers encampment where menacing dogs bark and bare their teeth at passers by from behind the chain link fencing. I ran on keeping my fingers crossed that there were no holes in the fence for the dogs to get through.
A short distance further on the path then borders Cambridge's landfill site. The smell of rotten rubbish filled the air. I tried to run through it by holding my breath for as long as possible, which isn't advisable. It doesn't make for efficient running. I didn't see any other users on the footpath, which isn't exactly surprising. And although it is close to a landfill site, the path is clearly used as a rubbish dump itself. I had to dodgy smashed bathroom sinks and a dumped fridge-freezer.
Fortunately, a couple of miles further on I reached the River Cam towpath and could enjoy the spectacle of seeing many teams of rowers out training in their eights and fours. Hopefully, there will be a few crews out on the day of the marathon to provide a brief distraction to all the tired marathon runners. I was now also back to running on familiar territory, at least for the next few miles. I could put the map away and focus on just running and thinking about how close I was to the finish.
The route did take me on to a footpath that I'd never used before. When I reached it, it also seemed to be another one of those paths that not many people use. It was signposted from the road towards a field, but at the corner of the field itself there was no evidence of where the path went. I followed what I thought was the path, but soon came to a dead end so doubled back on myself. Eventually I found an opening in the tree belt that surrounds the field and assumed that it must be where the path is supposed to go. I ran through the tree belt, which lines a ditch that was once a railway line, and on the other side could make out where I needed to go, but wasn't convinced that I was following the route indicated on the marathon map. If not, hopefully the organisers will make it clear on the day.
With the problem of the unclear footpath behind me, I was once again on familiar ground and just over 2 miles from the finish line. By the time I reached home I'd covered a total of 19.7 miles in a little over 2 hours 30 minutes. Not bad considering I was running and reading a map for much of the run. Now I can look forward to another two week taper before marathon number 2.
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