Marathon Blog

The second half of my London Marathon report (the painful half)…

The Isle of Dogs was not my favourite part of the run; the atmosphere was a bit subdued (maybe because of the rain), it was grey and long. The state of my legs was gradually deteriorating, but I seemed to be maintaining my pace. 20km – 30km took 43 minutes. Only one hour left…

At around 21miles, the wall loomed; my legs weren’t just aching anymore, they were hurting. Gradually over the next few miles, one muscle after the other would start to hurt. The pain felt like they had permanent cramp. My pace started to drop dramatically. I turned my watch over and decided not to look at it again. At the same time, a curious thing happened… I got the munchies! I couldn’t pass someone who was holding out food without grabbing something… gummy bears, oranges, mars bars… they were all that was keeping me going!

I got a slight lift as I was running past Tower Bridge as I could see all of the slower runners going the other way… thank god I wasn’t back there again! As I continued along the embankment, the pain continued to get worse, but the mile markers continued to count down. The two offset each other and somehow I kept going. I knew that if I stopped for an instant, my legs would lock up so I just kept going… I felt like I was in a trance.

30km-40km took 53 minutes… slow! But now there was only 2km left now. I turned the corner at Westminster. 1 mile to go. The crowd was fantastic but I seemed removed from it all. I couldn’t feel the pain anymore… all I had was the anticipation of finishing. The countdown markers came rapidly now. 800m left, 400m left… less than 1 minute to go. I turned the corner at Buckingham Palace and mustered a feeble sprint finish for the line. I crossed it and forgot to smile for the camera.

My watch read 3:07:44.

The moment I stopped running my legs almost collapsed from under me. As I staggered forward I felt like my legs weren’t even a part of my body. I could hardly walk. How had I been able to run on these? I looked around me, no one seemed as bad as me!

I inched forward, all I wanted was to lie down. I got given a goodie bag but I didn’t have the strength to look inside. A kind lady offered to unwrap my silver blanket for me… I have never been so grateful! The walk to pickup my bag was interminable… there were so many trucks! This bit was as bad as the final 3 miles! Somehow I made it. At the end I was met by my parents and they took care of me… helping me get my tracksuit on, take off my squelching trainers and feeding me energy food.

After I had sat against the base of a tree for a bit, we moved over to Birdcage Walk to wait for my sister.