Fantastic! That’s a brilliant effort after a stressful day.
I don’t think I’ll ever be happier to finish 21,375th in an event…
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I was having this discussion at work today.
I’m in favour of a standard cut off for all marathons, similar to Ironman (so I’m told).
No idea what that should be, mind.
5 hours feels about right?
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SA, as we all know, loves a hard cut-off. I think they limit marathons to 6 hours. But they also have the intermediate times for Two Oceans and Comrades qualifiers. Having the jeopardy does add to the spectacle and viewing numbers.
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It’s like it’s pick-on-joe week on this forum 
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I like the idea of the officials just shutting the road off in a human chain. They do it at the checkpoints and near the finish. None of the sob story, you’re in or you’re out. 
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It would be a fast walk, granted. 
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A 27yo man could push an old lady in a wheelchair around in 8+ hrs. With no training.
Or so I’ve heard.
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Last finisher - 8:10:58
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Doh. She actually showed me that video, after asking me to type some random number in the tracker. Either she read it wrong or I heard it wrong.
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No it’s 8:10:58 - I misread it 
The journo wrote it like this - ‘eight hours, 10 minutes and 58 seconds’ which is silly
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I think there were later finishers (looking at twitter), but they had an alternate finish in st james’ park after that guy finished. Long day either way…
The oldest finisher was 90 and looked pretty fresh at the end (7ish hrs I think), was off for a large glass of something 
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Actually, isn’t the whole point of the marathon to run the distance continuously, make an announcement at the end, and then drop dead? If you fail to do any and all of those things then you haven’t done it properly.
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I came into this race as an Ironman training day, but was definitely looking at 3:15 as a target, with 3:10 as a stretch ‘perfect day’. Training had gone well, other than 3 lost weeks due to achilles injury in mid Feb/early March.
I’ve done many quite a few marathons and have a well established method of executing the race which gets the absolute best from the fitness I have on the start line. The approach is first 6 miles the slowest (about 15secs/mile slower than target pace) with heart rate in the low 140’s. Miles 7-20 are at race pace with heart rate rising from mid 140s to mid 150’s. At mile 20 drop the hammer, give it everything in the last 6 miles which are usually the fastest and heart rate rising from low 160’s to finish in the upper 160’s.
Pre race went well, and on race morning I felt ready. Then London transport threw a curveball…my route was DLR from Tower Gateway but after a couple of stops we were told there was a broken train ahead, line suspended and to get off and seek alternative routes. Brilliant! Cue 150 runners panicking. Uber’s could not get us there due to road closures – it felt like checkmate! Fortunately I got chatting to a couple of guys from my Green start, one of whom’s partner was not in a state of incoherent panic and worked out a route for us: walk to Canary Wharf, jubilee line back into London Bridge then an overland train out. We would make it, albeit with more more walking and a whole heap more stress and far less prep time in the pen. Still I was happy just to make the start after that!
In the pen I felt the lack of relax time but rushed through everything and lined up for the race. It started raining about 20 minutes before the start, and I was across the line and away at 10:05.
First 6 miles:7:25, 7:24, 7:20 (downhill mile), 7:31, 7:24, 7:25
This is usually my time of Zen and calm in a marathon, feeling super easy but today I just couldn’t settle. Heart rate would not go down to the target low 140’s and remained stuck at 149-150. I know this was too high, but I was already at 15 secs/mile slower than race pace. The choice was really slow the pace until target HR was reached and definitely miss target time, or stay with the pace knowing that immense suffering would happen later but maybe I could, just, eke out that sub 3:15. I went with the pace. It was raining heavily.
Middle 14 miles: 7:13, 7:13, 7:19, 7:16, 7:21, 7:15, 7:19, 7:14, 7:13, 7:16, 7:16, 7:15, 7:16, 7:15
The middle portion of the race, splits look nice and consistent but probably belie that this was harder work than usual. I upped the pace ok from the first 6 miles – and the next 4/5 miles were pretty good – HR stayed in the low 150’s and I felt comfortable, and the rain stopped before halfway. Maybe I could get away with it….however by mile 16 I was starting to hurt, quads were sore and HR was drifting too high – upper 150s, then low 160’s from mile 18 – again. I just resolved to stay on pace and kept ticking the miles off. Crowds are just immense, almost overwhelming at this race. I try to ignore them as much as I can until after Tower Bridge, I missed my support – its too hard to pick faces out as you speed past.
Final 6.2 miles: 7:01, 7:06, 7:20, 7:13, 7:33, 7:45, 8:14 (final 0.2 miles)
Showtime! As per my pace plan I managed to up the pace again at mile 20 – and duly notched 7:01, 7:06. This was hard, very hard and HR shot up to 167 – pretty much danger area for me, ie I would not be able to sustain it. Quads were on fire at this point, although I had good overall energy.
Predictably the pace fell off a bit miles 23/24 with 7:20, 7:13 and HR to 168 but this is still 3:15 pace. I knew I was still comfortably heading under 3:15 due to middle 14 miles at 3:10 pace, and hoped to hang on, maybe 3:12 ish was on. I saw my support for the 7:13 mile 14 but this probably my last stand as far as looking ok was concerned. Miles 25/26 it just began to fall apart. Quads were flaming, pace was dropping, I was in a world of hurt just forcing myself on, running as hard as I could with the dwindling resources at my disposal. The final turn, as you can see the finish line is when most find a bit extra but that was my slowest bit of the entire race – 8:14 pace – barely mustered a celebration and almost fell over the line.
Finish: 3:13:155, 167th AG, 5079th o/a, Boston Q and London GFA (if I want…)
Pretty much job done as far as time is concerned but on reflection I think the best thing is that I really think I did as well as I could with what I had on the day. It felt like ‘not my day’ for most of it, but with some hard earned experience and a ton of suffering the job was done. It’s that deepest I;ve gone in a marathon for many years, and the fastest time for 6 years. A magnificent day that tested my mettle and desire – we do this to challenge ourselves and see what’s inside and that certainly happened out there on Sunday.
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Well done, Chris. Great report and sticking with the race after the transport problems and higher HR, maybe a bit of stress from the transport issues?
Not sure if you’ve done Boston? Book your accommodation early if you go for it. It was a great race although I still prefer London.
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Fantastic race and report Chris, you had a plan and executed as best as you could on the day. That logistic SNAFU would have put me in a proper spin.
I’m deducting some points for using miles though 
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Great report.
With the wave starts and chip timing - does missing your start time actually matter these days? Apart from presumably having to weave through lots of slower runners.
How congested is it anyway, when you try to pick the pace up at 6 miles? I would imagine you are passing big groups of people.
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Well done. The transport situation sounded excruciatingly stressful. London is a trek - ‘21 the tubes weren’t running as timetabled so had a bit of a panic at Marylebone… Attached myself to a group and we managed to re route. But it was quite a hike uphill up to the starting pen. A good mile or so…
‘12 stayed at a mates and it was an easy bus/ train/ short stroll and bang straight at the pen. Couldn’t have been easier.
general pre race jitters, maybe lack of sleep, trying to get the breakfast down and not feeling 
fit can all add up to make these races a hard slog.
I had a mare doing Zaragoza marathon - Fantastic small scale city marathon if anyone ever gets the chance. Beautiful city. I think I was the only English guy there. Wholly Spanish club race vibe. Very good runners. I was ticking along nicely on training runs, but race morning just felt awful. It was a tough slog round. I ran something like 3:28 or 3:30 something can’t remember. A month later I ran Madrid in 3:07. Mad!
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Cheers @jeffb - I have done Boston, 2013 - year it was bombed. So always fancied going back to get the full experience.
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wow was that 10yrs ago already!
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Good read that @TROSaracen - well done on another gritty, well executed race
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