My First Marathon

The white peak marathon 2011

My goal was to not blow and have a great time and a secondary goal was sub four hours.

I went off with two mates at about 8:40 miling. We were running how we felt and that was the pace so we were well on for sub 4 we went through half in around 1:53 and feeling good.  I had knew that the second half had a nett descent of around 250 meters and so far it had been all uphill, only gentle, but up none-the-less.  After the half point i was really looking forward to a bit of descent but i had to wait a little longer.

At 17 miles we were still going up and at a drinks station one friend stepped on my heal; I wear vibram five fingers and it came right off so I had to stop to put it back on.

The next section was horrible in the toe shoes, hard trail with sharp rocks scattered over the trail: exactly the surface that barefoot ted said is the most painful to run on.  I had to slow due to the surface but kept contact with my mates who pulled ahead when I was putting my shoe back on.  When the became a bit nicer again I quickly made up the ground on my mates and was feeling strong with lots of energy.

However at mile 19 it became obvious that my train would be stopping at cramp central station. At mile 20 I adopted a run walk strategy; well not so much run walk as run stop scream in excruciating pain walk run.  At one point I stopped to stretch out the front of my quads but while I was at it the back of my quad cramped up and all I was left with was the screaming. Just past mile 22 was when the route finally went down hill.  Its the kind of downhill I hate; steep and with the sharp stones back so the vibrams wouldn't let me just let the brakes of.

Anyway I ran down and the cramp had gone.  However when the nasty steep downhill was done it was back to the gentle up and within 400 yards the cramp was back. At the last water stop at 23 miles I actually stopped and just sat for 30 seconds and it was good and the last time I walked.  That may be because after another half mile or so there was a big steep down section; it was two really steep down with a flat section in the middle leading to the Cromford canal path at 25 and a bit miles.  It was then flat to the end and I managed to keep the cramp at bay till the end.

And I actually didn't blow I finished feeling great (except cramp), I ran with a smile all the way I got a row of about thirty hi-5s from a group of scouts at around mile 24, and even in the midst of cramp I was bigging up anyone that passed me and I was giving a thumbs up to anyone I passed.

One massive mistake was that as I crossed the finish line I stopped too abruptly and cramped so badly that it wasn't even funny and I was screaming so loud that a marshall from the drinks station 10 metres away came to check if I was ok.

The cramp meant that I didn't do my best; I've done training runs quicker, and apart from chafing, I cant really tell I've done it; I even carried my son downstairs a while ago.  However I had great fun, I didn't make 4 hours I actually got 3;61.32, my mates didn't get cramp and did 3:54. I was the fastest person wearing vibram five fingers.