Part 1 – the Day Before
After three months of training through a very
wet and miserable winter, the day was finally here – it was time to run the
Brighton Marathon! The days before, I
was really hyper with nerves and energy, having tapered for the last three
weeks. I was really just ready to
run! It was great to finish work on the
Friday, knowing that I had an extra day off on the Monday, and I rushed home
quickly to pack my gear as the next morning was going to be very busy.
Saturday morning, I went to Parkrun to marshal
with Ben and Wai Meng as we were all running the next day and didn’t want to run the 5k. During parkrun, I was approached
by a lot of walkers and Sunday morning strollers in the park asking about the
run – and one couple, hearing me shout encouragement to the runners, said “easy
for you to say, standing there!” I
replied back (kindly, but with a bit of smugness) that I was going to be
running a full marathon the next day!
Think they were a bit shocked by that but wished me luck!
There was no time for coffee and cake after
parkrun, so I rushed home to grab my bag and then got a lift from my brother to
the station. Had a couple of panic
moments when I insisted I check for essentials such as which running vest I’d
packed and did I have my Garmin! I met
Ben at the station, and we got on the train to Brighton. It wasn’t a very pleasent journey – the train was
delayed and was absolutely packed – we had to stand for the first 20 minutes
until people got off at St Pancras International. Even when we did get a seat, it was a crush
as everyone seems to have suitcases with them.
Once through London it was a bit better and we reached Brighton with no
delays – and immediately met up with Wai Meng and her mother who had just got
off the other train. We walked down to
the Hilton where we were all booked in and dropped off our bags, before going
to the pub for a light carb-loading lunch with others from running club. Had a very tasty goats cheese ciabatta,
delicious! After lunch we headed for the
Expo, to pick up our race numbers. It
was busy, but we still spent a bit of time looking around the stands. I got a pack of gels from the High5 stand.
Back at the hotel later, who
did we spot?! None other than Paula
Radcliffe! We even managed to get a
photo with her – that was awesome and totally made our day! Think that is the first time I have ever had
a photo with a famous person! It was
actually a great hotel to stay in as it was where all the elites were staying,
so we got to see many of the top runners.
We also got treated very well by the hotel staff, who were fully intent
on catering for runner’s needs all weekend!
We had dinner at a local
Italian – which was packed with runners – and I had a very simple macaroni
cheese (it was very nice, but a huge helping, so I left about half of it). I was a bit cheeky and had bought my own
drink, a chocolate soya milkshake, as I did not want to risk fizzy soft drinks,
fruit juice or alcohol the night before the race. Headed back to the hotel, and we wished each
other a good night’s sleep before the big day.
I decided to go for a quick dip in the swimming pool and spent very relaxing hour or so in
the pool, Jacuzzi and sauna, mmm bliss.
Managed to quite sleep well that night – dropped off early but then woke
up at about 5am – the only problem was the room was really hot and stuffy. Even with the window open and fan on it was
hot, and the cold water tap even came out warm so I couldn’t even have a cold
shower or drink cold water! I watched TV for a while, as my head was spinning from thinking about the marathon, but finally managed to fall asleep and sleep reasonably well until morning.
Coming up - part two, the race itself!
Coming up - part two, the race itself!
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