London Marathon - Narrow streets , colourful crowds , Majestic Tower Bridge and Finish at Palace Grounds.

 

"Standing at the start line of a marathon demands more than just courage, effort, and training; finishing it is simply the logical conclusion."

 I heard somewhere, or maybe I just made it up. But standing at the start line of a world marathon major certainly demands much more.

Chasing world majors isn't just about your running abilities; it involves securing entry, obtaining a visa, sparing time, finding affordable flights, traveling thousands of miles, braving different climates, and let's not forget, some training . Finishing it is just a matter of a few hours.

This time, it involved more than 24 hours either in the air or airports due to Dubai floods and another looming Gulf war. And here I was, shivering in the cold at the Blue starting wave, just after crossing acres of lush green sheep-grazing yards of Blackheath.

The London Marathon is unique in many ways. It has four start points: blue, red, green , and championship or elites, and many starting lineups  in each colour. From 9:00 AM to 11:30 AM, waves of runners from different countries start running this iconic race depending on their target finish time. Faster runners start first and slower runners start last, making it a colorful festival throughout the day. My time was 9:42 at the blue 10 starting wave.

All marathons in Europe start in the late morning. In India, we have to wake up at 4:00 AM to get to a 5:30 AM starting line. But here in Europe, you can have a normal sleep, have some breakfast, and then move to the holding area. This is unimaginable in India due to the hot tropical weather. The support and festive atmosphere started right from our photography session at the London Eye. People were wishing us luck on the streets, at tube stations, until we reached Blackheath.

The flow of thousands of runners continuously streamed from the station to the holding area in the vast, seemingly sheep-grazing area. I wondered how one of the biggest cities in the world  could still keep such huge open areas clear of buildings and land development. The color of lush green grass always pleases the eyes. The first sight of holding area was half a mile long, parallel lines to toilet porta cabins. Warming up with more than 1000 runners in Blue 10 wave, I wondered how many runners in total were running.

As the weather was cold, runners were clad in layers. As start time approached, jackets started flying overhead towards the donation box. People started moving, but I couldn't make out if the race had started or not until we passed a gate some distance ahead. It was quite an uneventful start.  The street was narrow, passing through a colony of two/three-storied brick houses with sets of chimneys over the roof, fenced with ample green  space within those. I felt like I was running in the monsoon in my native village. Cheering was so loud from the beginning; it looked like the entire village was there on the sidelines with bands and music.

One singer of the cheering band ran with a  probably local runner ahead of me for a few meters with a microphone in hand, singing a melodious song. It felt like a festival and not a marathon.

 As planned earlier, I was going to run this race monitoring running power in the first half and the last 5 km. I practiced that in my training runs. I didn't want to spend all my energy in the beginning and hit the wall later. It was a pattern I wanted to break now. Sub-4 finish or not, I would not bonk and finish the race strong. So my watch was showing running power, average heart rate, and average pace. The second important thing was I didn't want to run extra miles, so I stuck to the blue line. With running power below 250, I was getting a good pace; just my heart rate was higher than usual. But I ignored it, attributing it to the cold weather. Fortunately, it settled after a couple of miles.

Everything was perfect in the beginning, not much crowd. We could see the road beneath our feet. In London, they have colorful roads with different colored gravels showing on surface. They don’t make it smooth with black asphalt  perhaps because they don’t want it to be slippery in perennial rains. The broken blue line was visible on those colored gravels. I wished to follow that line till the end. The crowd was ecstatic, loudly shouting names on T-shirts or runners. The houses were still three stories high with yards on both sides of narrow streets. Volunteers' warnings of road bumps saved us from tripping. We enjoyed the descent in the route till runners from other starting areas joined us. In Berlin, I planned and executed 11 km per hour till three hours before hitting the wall. Here, I didn't want a heartbreak again.

Though I saved 2 minutes after the first hour, I was not sure about what happens next. The race had thickened by now, with more runners now running in similar narrow streets. I guess we were running towards the centre of the city from the suburbs. Houses were not tall but close to each other. All the cheering crowds were encroaching, making the street narrower. My pace dropped as there was no way to get ahead without zigzagging, which I wanted to avoid. My running power was around 240 now.

"Everything happens for the good. I am preserving energy," I thought. Easy in pace, I started noticing the colors of the race. Runners pushing wheelchairs, runners in costumes. I too had applied to Guinness World Records for costume running with a book costume, which they approved. But later  I chickened out and withdrew. Placards added some flavors to any Marathon. London Marathon is no exception to this. Placards supporting loved ones, friends are common. Promise of a beer, evening in the club, even a marriage proposal was waiting at the finish line. Some promised to pause your  Strava when you fall. Some of those mocked tired runners with "Never say again, see you next year."

I could see flags of many countries in the crowd. The most prominent seemed to be the UAE. Running is going places. It is picking up in the desert as well. Great! I thought. Later, I came to know it was not UAE . I was looking for my India flag. I remember in Comrades Marathon South Africa, there was no need to search for the India flag. Indian runners get huge support from the Indian diaspora as well as locals with India chants and hundreds of tricolors waving. And I saw one on my left near the barricades, a big Indian flag was waving 200 meters away. I was on the right side of the road, full of runners. Zigzagging, I reached there. It was Suraj of our tour operator Active Holiday. Got my energy tank topped up with a high five with him.

With the increased crowd, following that blue line was getting difficult. At some places, it was passing into the cheering crowd. Distance on the watch was moving quicker than the same on the route. It was certain that I would have run more than 26.2 miles today. The race had entered the city now, with some modern architecture in addition to Victorian. When we turned on Tower Bridge road, someone familiar with the area said, "Wow, we will pass through Tower Bridge now." It was really the moment I won't forget in my life. A river of runners crossing the River Thames below the iconic Tower Bridge arches. I smiled wide, threw my hands in the air, being sure that some race photographer would capture the moment. The stone arches above the bridge were so majestic; I wanted to stop and admire the beauty. But when you add the result to your efforts, the joy takes a backseat.

“I have a promise to keep,” I thought before moving ahead. Many iconic buildings were located in this locality. I thought of watching a play in a London theatre someday. Though I couldn’t get a ticket this time, I was fortunate to experience the FA Cup excitement at Wembley on Saturday. When we took a right turn after Tower Bridge, a stream of runners was coming from the opposite direction in the next lane. I could spot the 3-hour pacers. I was aiming for a 4-hour finish, which meant this loop would take 45/50 minutes. I tried to calculate. Simple mathematics takes so much time when you are running a race.

Despite all these distractions, I crossed the half marathon as per plan and the second-hour target of 22 km as well. Berlin was constantly on my mind. I remembered I took a loo break at the halfway point and lost some momentum. I slowed down a bit after 22 km, and the third hour was 1 or 2 minutes slower in Berlin It was not going out of my mind .

 By this time, I had crossed around 5 sub-4-hour pacers, and I was behind another one running 200 meters ahead. I didn't try to reach him but decided to keep him in sight. The race was still full of elbowing and toeing, not thinned even after 25 km. And the crowd was more in central London. Spotting aid stations was a challenge in the colorful and noisy crowd. A runner ahead of me spotted one and stopped suddenly, causing me to collide into him. There was sharp pain and a cramp-like feeling in my legs because of this sudden change in movement. I was terrified. I walked for a couple of minutes to allow the pain to subside before starting running again.

The race was on the other side of the Thames now. I could see the 3-hour, 3:15, 3:30 pacers in the parallel lane. I could not see the 4-hour pacer now. Alarmed, I looked at my watch. I was getting bored. This was a warning sign. You first feel bored, then you question your decision to run such races, and then you get slowed down. That dreaded runners  wall is somewhere around the corner. I want to avoid that. I remember my professor( 25 years younger to me ) at ACSM, where I am learning to be a trainer, explaining about the energy system working. It looked like both my carbs and fats stores  were exhausted, amino acids came into play, reached to the brain, and started playing games. I popped my caffeine gel and started thinking about happy things.

The big loop was almost complete, and I could see runners on the other side of the route with pacer flags of 5 or so. My third-hour end target was 33 km; it took me a few minutes and several attempts to calculate the pace required to achieve that target. Simple calculations became very difficult when I got fatigued. To accommodate the crowd or for some other reason, volunteers were slightly diverting the route with the help of barricades. It was making us run a few meters more. That was making my job difficult.

Finally, I managed to complete 33 km in just the nick of three hours. I relaxed a bit and celebrated with a short walk. It was another warning sign. You feel you have plenty of time and you get relaxed. I had just 9 km to go and a full one hour in hand. So, my brain boss said I could walk. Relaxation is the biggest challenge. It kills your goal silently. If you think just below 6 pace will suffice, tired legs take some more liberty and walk above 6 min/km. And you don't notice that all the advantages you earned are slipping away. Secondly, we calculate according to watch mileage. But on the course, we did run extra distance, and we have more to go which is not considered for calculation.

I started running again. I didn't notice that the race was in the most beautiful part of London. It was running in Royal London on the banks of the Thames. Only Friday, I was admiring the  same beauty of Buckingham Palace neighbourhood  while watching the Changing of the Guards. One more 4-hour pacer slipped ahead of me. I tried to hang with him for some distance, but I could manage for only a short distance. There was a strong urge to walk. But my other mind said, "It is now or never; you are not young and don’t have many chances; you were never this close. Don't stop." Legs reluctantly followed the order.

After passing through every timing mat, I thought about my family and friends back home tracking my run on the London Marathon app. I had to keep my promise to myself and tried to push. It was just 2 km to go on my watch, and I had enough time. I noted many runners walking.

"Run, we are so close to sub-4, don't walk."

 I knew their state of mind, having been there so many times. Mine was not much different. The difference was I kept pushing, though every muscle in my legs was shouting to stop.

"800 meters to go." It was 3:58 on my watch. Is it possible? I didn't want to test my brain with math again and just kept running with a steady pace. I was not pushing; that was also taking a lot of effort. Sub-4 or not, I decided to be happy with my efforts. I wanted a smiling finish more than anything else. The finish line was within sight but not approaching fast. I raised my arms in the air with a broad smile on my face. It was less for photographers and more for me, for my efforts, for though not winning but not losing the battle within myself to negative thoughts. My legs almost defied signals from the brain. I crossed the finish line of my second major marathon. Like any other runner, the first thing I did was stop the watch. The time was 4:01:30. Though the distance I ran was 500 meters more, officially my sub-4 did not happen.

Immediately after the finish, it was literally crawling as there was no space for even walking. I collected my medal, switched my phone on . The first call I received was from Nagesha, my cyclist friend now settled in London. He was waiting for me in the meet and greet area. I found my tour operators clicked some photos with the medal and tricolor. It took almost 20 minutes for Nagesh and his two friends to find me. It was very cold weather which I didn't realize while running. After the sudden drop in activity and internal heat, I was feeling very cold and shivering. Nagesh's friend offered me his jacket. We had hot chocolate for some warmth before moving to the hotel.

What went wrong was not a question in my mind! I was content with my efforts. If I had finished within 4 hours, I would consider myself as the winner of the London Marathon, notwithstanding that 20,000 more finished ahead of me. I have divided the race into 4 parts, I succeeded in three of those. I was mostly able to defy negative emotions. I was able to recognize warning signs and tried to act on them. It was my legs, not my mind, which needed more training. My professor at ACSM, where I am learning to be a trainer, Samson Sequera, believes in mileages, which I didn't agree with him. Now I see his point. Now I know if I wish to finish in good time, I should invest in mileages.

If finishing strong is winning, I was the runner-up here. The next one, I am going to win!!!!!