Robin Hood Marathon - Race Report

I learnt an important lesson about technology and planning on Sunday.  Fortunately, neither came to my undoing, but it was a close call.  First of all I discovered just how reliant I have become on my Garmin GPS watch.  We were staying at Ruth’s parents the night before the marathon and I only took my Garmin with me.  I charged it up over night, but when I unclipped it from the charger in the morning it completely froze.  It still showed the time, but it wasn’t advancing.  Pressing all of the buttons in every combination imaginable had no affect.  It was just stuck on 8:18^:21.  Ruth tried to persuade me that it would be a good test to run without a stopwatch, but I wasn’t convinced.  I’m terrible for starting too fast when I do have a stopwatch, without one I was convinced I’d run the first half too quickly and be knackered way before reaching the finish.  I kept it with me to the last minute and periodically pressed buttons to see if I could reset it.  By some fluke it suddenly went through a reset phase under its own accord just as I was about to hand it over to Ruth and say goodbye.  I’d have my trusty companion with my after all.  However, I made a mental note to always take a back-up stopwatch with me in future.

I then had another panic attack as I was waiting in my starting zone just 18 minutes before the marathon was due to start.  I suddenly realised I didn’t have my timing chip attached to my ankle.  No chip would mean no time and, therefore, no official result.  At this point crowds of runners were entering the starting zones and a bigger crowd of spectators were lining the sides of the street.  I had to fight my way through an oncoming tide of runners and supporters in order to get to the car and back in 18 minutes, which was parked at least a half mile away.  I was also relying on Ruth going straight back to the car after saying goodbye to me and still being there.  She had talked about going off for a coffee, and I had no idea where she’d go for that.  I sprinted back to the car, which was not the warm-up I wanted, and, fortunately, found Ruth in the car park just a few meters away from our car.  I got the car key off her, found my timing chip, attached it and jogged back to the start.  I found myself jogging with quite a few late arrivals, which made me feel better.  I fought my way through the crowd and got back to my zone with about 3 minutes to spare and an elevated heart rate.  I’m sure I’d forgotten to attach my timing chip due to being so pre-occupied with my non-functioning Garmin.  Anyway, alls well that ends well.  I was in the right starting zone ready to tackle the Robin Hood Marathon for the third time.

I had previously run the Nottingham marathon in 2007 and 2008.  In 2007 it was the third marathon I’d ever run.  In 2008 I entered in order to pace a friend on what was her first ever marathon.  I distinctly remember saying at that time that I’d never run it again.  The reason for this is that the first half is reasonably hilly and very crowded, with approximately 9,000 half-marathon runners and just 1,000 marathoners.  At the half-way point many runners start to speed up towards what is their finish, whilst us marathon runners just need to get our heads down, stick to the target pace and focus on the other half that is to come.  The second half of the marathon is then pancake flat and with very few spectators to cheer you on.  For some reason, going from a busy run in the first 13 miles to a quiet and lonely second half seems to make the race seem longer.  The other reason I’d also previously said I wouldn’t do this race again is that the last 5 miles are alongside the River Trent and it always seems that you have to run into a headwind when you are at your most fatigued.  It has always seemed a brutal finish, and Sunday was no exception.  If anything it was worse than previous years as we had to do battle with elevated winds that were ahead of Hurricane Katia.

However, despite all my moaning, I was looking forward to running the Robin Hood Marathon once more.  My previous three marathons this year have all been off-road affairs.  They’ve also been getting progressively smaller in size: 600 at the South Downs, 200 at Fairland’s Valley and approximately 50 at the last marathon.  It made a nice change to be taking part in a road marathon with a very large field once again, were there was no need to read race directions and no need to carry your own sports drink and gels.  It was also nice to be back on familiar ground and to know exactly what was coming up. 

I found that the first 10 miles seemed to fly by.  There are a few interesting and picturesque sights to take in over this part of the course: Nottingham Castle, the grounds of Nottingham University with its boating lake and leafy Wollaton Park.  At about the 5 mile point I spotted another runner that I’ve seen at a couple of other events this year and had a chat with him for a few miles, but I was mostly running by myself.  It does seem perverse that the bigger the running event the less people you chat to as you run around the course.  Miles 10 to 13 seemed particularly long.  It could be that I was anticipating the point at which the field would suddenly diminish leaving the ‘few’ to get on with the task of tackling the marathon by ourselves.  Certainly mile 12 to 13 seemed especially long.  But at the point where the two races divide and the half-marathoners headed off to their finish, whilst the rest of us started out on the second half of our race, I did have a sense of pride.  It gives me a great sense of satisfaction that I am able to run marathons and that here I was running in my ninth of the year so far.  But I wasn’t about to get complacent, it was time to focus on the next 13 miles.

Once past the half way point the marathon course heads east on pancake flat roads, following the River Trent a short way to the cross the river via the Lady Bay Bridge and then through a residential estate for about a mile.  Once the houses are behind you there is then a 3 mile run along an almost deserted road to the 18.5 mile point, where the marathon course turns back on itself.  The road is closed to traffic well before the marathon reaches this part of Nottingham; as a result it is eerily quiet with very few spectators.  Thankfully, Ruth had borrowed her mum’s bike and cycled out to the 16.5 mile point to wave me on.

The long, lonely road.

For about a mile before reaching the turn around point you get to see the lead runners coming the other way.  The two streams of runners are simply separated by a row of traffic cones.  A runner I was running alongside at the time turned to me and said “it’s tempting to just nip across, isn’t it?” To be perfectly honest, the thought never crossed my mind, but I had also assumed that there would be some sort of control point at the turn around point.  There wasn’t, just a single marshal to cheer us on our way.  However, soon after I’d turned around I realised I was overtaking runners that I’d already overtaken several miles back. There was no way that they had passed me again, so I can only assume that for some weary runners the temptation to cut a mile or two off the course was too great.  I only hope that they felt justified in still collecting their finisher’s medal, because I wouldn’t have.

At about the mile 20 point the course turns into the National Water Sports Centre to run around the rowing lake.  Once you round the top end of the lake there is about a 5 mile stretch along side the lake and then the River Trent directly into the full might of the wind, with nothing to provide cover.  A junior 4 man kayak race was taking place, which helped act as a little distraction from the run.  I tried to see if I could keep alongside the kayaks, but failed miserably.  I saw Ruth once again as I left the rowing lake behind me to then run alongside the Trent back to the finish.  There were only 4 miles left to go, but my legs were feeling shattered by this stage.  I took great comfort in the fact that I was overtaking many runners who were clearly struggling more than I was.  Ruth later told me that she hadn’t seen me looking like I was in so much pain in the latter stages of a marathon before.  I’m glad she kept this piece of information until after I’d finished.

Despite the bravado, I was in a world of pain at this point.

It was with great relief that I reached the 25 mile marker and knew that I’d soon be crossing the Trent and heading back on myself to have the wind behind me for a change, even if it was for less than a mile.  The crowds were immense over the last half mile, and many people started calling out my name to cheer me on, which did help spur me on to the finish.  It does help to have your name on your running vest.  I crossed the line in a time of 3 hours and 16 minutes dead.  I was very happy with my time.  It was my second fastest time of the year, but I wondered if I’d end up paying the price the next day, as I’d be starting the day by doing a 5k run with a client.  Perhaps it would have been sensible to have gone a little slower.

I met Ruth shortly after I’d collected my medal and we headed back to the car, almost forgetting to take the customary finisher’s photo, which we only remembered to take once we got to the car.

That's marathon number 9, and now 7 to go (possibly?)

As I am writing this on Tuesday morning, I can report that all was well yesterday.  My legs felt fine on my 5k run with my client, and they held up to the rigours of teaching 3 kettlebell classes.  This morning there is the merest hint of what I got up to at the weekend.  They’re not quite feeling 100%, but if I had to go for a long run I’m sure they’d do just fine.  I dare say that all of my kettlebell beginners from yesterday’s classes are feeling a lot worse.