Well, honestly, I have been struggling a little with running post marathon. It feels like a huge effort and while it has sort of been nice to be out, I haven’t massively enjoyed it either. This morning was gorgeous though and it seemed like a good day to head to Bolton Abbey and do a little loop. Kath went further to get her miles in (she has a half marathon in mid June which I am not running) and I decided I would do the Barden Bridge loop using run/walk. I wanted to enjoy it and not worry about huffing and puffing my way around.
Bolton Abbey was perfect for running this morning. It was warm enough to be comfortable in short sleeves but the trees provided cover from the sun. It was also very very quiet. After the usual pee stop I said bye to Kath as she set off in the opposite directions and plodded my first 2 minutes. That felt a bit like hard work. I was grateful for the walk break. I tried to consciously look around, note the green ground cover from the wild garlic, the odd patches of blue from the bluebells, now at the end of their glory and the comings and goings of lots and lots of little birds. I tried not to think, just react to the beep of my watch – run – walk – run. Don’t think, just be.
I watched the river gently make her way, nudging the ducks to where she wanted them and giggling softly as the ducklings tried to resist. I felt content. I hit a mile and glanced at my watch. Wowsers I was going super slow. It felt like I was working so much harder than the pace would suggest. I felt disappointed. I carried on. I was now conscious of my breathing, I seemed loud, I seemed heavy footed, I could hear my heart beat and the blood rushing round. I could also hear the negative chatter. For the next mile I concentrated hard on ignoring the noise, on watching a dipper and a wagtail and on putting one foot in front of the other: Beep – walk, beep-run, beep-walk…
I briefly stopped at 2 miles – on Barden Bridge where I saw the first human since leaving the Cavendish Pavilion. I let two cars cross the bridge, took a couple of photos and continued, feeling slightly grumpy about being slow and now struggling to enjoy the run. It felt like all I could hear was my running noise and chatter about how crap I was. I don’t know what drew my attention but it suddenly occurred to me that there were so many far more positive noises I could be tuning into. Whatever it was, it made me listen and suddenly the bird song grew louder, the gentle breeze was singing in the trees and next to me the river was gurgling and sounding content.
‘Hello’, the river goddess Verbia whispered to me ‘how’s the running love?’ I don’t know why she has an accent like my grandma’s but she does – very West Yorkshire with slight hints of Lancashire in the vowel sounds from living so close to the border all her life. ‘Oh, it’s nice but it’s slow and feels so hard’ I said – not out loud I don’t think. ‘Oh, but why rush?’ She gurgled. It was rhetorical of course ‘ Look around, everybody is just at the pace they are meant to be’. She was gently teasing me I think. Nudging me along, letting me know that I was ok but as with any goddess, you just never quite know, there’s always a mystery, always an edge. She seemed all knowing and a bit bemused by me as she made her way slowly along the familiar path. But I did look around, I saw the cows in the field lazily chewing the grass, I watched some sand martins (I think) play around me seemingly flying high, swooping down and looping round for the pure joy of it. I giggled, Verbia gurgled back.
I saw a very speedy runner with a dog come towards me. She was past in a flash and briefly I felt crap about being slow and so laboured. ‘But you’re not her’, I glanced at the river and understood. Me and the other runner were each running our own run, with our own thoughts and our own battles. I smiled, I was enjoying the run again, the pace seemed unimportant now. I nodded a thank you towards the Wharfe as I turned very slightly left to go past the aqueduct steps and onwards into the woods.
I saw Kath. We stopped briefly for a quick chat and then continued on our ways. I had about 1.5 miles to go now, she had about 3. There were a few more people about on this stretch, not many though and mostly I ran in glorious solitude with time and space to notice the different greens, the changing feel of the footpath, the nobblyness of the tree roots. I ran the intervals as they fell, no cheating and it felt hard but my head was in the right place. It wasn’t even that I used mantras or tried to drown out the negative with positive chatter. It was just that after my little ‘chat’ with Verbia it felt like I was doing exactly what I was supposed to be doing this morning. Like this was my time to run, my time to be at each point along the way exactly at the time I got there. Just as the Wharfe meandered along with a calm inevitability, so did I. I felt slightly disappointed when it was over. I even briefly considered going on in spite of feeling physically quite tired and being a bit of a sweaty mess but arriving at a gate and the bridge back across the Wharfe to the Cavendish Pavilion which seemed busy with people had broken the spell. The magic had gone even if some of it has lingered all day.
then another tube and then a train to Greenwich to get Kath to the red start area. As I left her to continue on to the blue start we were both quite emotional and for the first time the reality of us running this thing separately dawned on me. I walked away with tears streaming. By the time I got to the start area I felt better, back to settled. I handed my bag in and found somewhere to just sit for a while. I had my wholemeal roll with peanut butter and then I lay back on the grass just drifting. After a while I thought maybe I should go for a pee. I headed over to the toilets, looked at the queues and instead decided to brave the female urinals. Let’s just say it involve cardboard devices and an ability to be fairly accurate. It was an experience. Just before I entered the start zone I went to the proper toilets which were almost queueless by then. I was ready to get going now. I chatted to a couple of runner’s around me for a bit, everyone playing it all down and just being there to finish etc. I don’t buy it. I know they have a time in mind and I know they are here to race – themselves if nothing else.
minutes after in completely new kit. Something was wrong there, some sort of cheating but there’s nothing I can do and I have lost all the time I was up on my six hour goal. I set off again but I miss Kath. I have a little cry. My head is slipping. My six hour marathon is slipping away. I don’t like doing it without her. It feels wrong and I feel very very alone.
I stop my watch. Under 6.30. I get my medal. I take a selfie and start the long walk to get my bag. I look at my phone. Kath had obviously tracked me and had sent me a text. I ring her. She’s waiting for me where I exit the runners only area. I mix my recovery drink and walk to find her. Only when I see her do I find out that she had finished. She’d completed in under 5 hours in spite of also having a pretty rough time. Our adventures are better when they are together sort of adventures. This was not a good adventure.
As you know the last bit of preparation for the marathon was not ideal, I had a horrible cold and chesty cough that seemed to take forever to clear and my last couple of runs were short and slow and hard work. Not ideal but nonetheless I felt excited about going to the running show to pick up our race packs. I did this on Thursday after we realised that I was in London for a meeting anyway and could change my train tickets easily and without massive extra cost to come home a bit later.
collected our numbers and timing chips and then had a look at the stands. I joined the 
I was late home on Thursday and I was tired! Friday I was unsettled and couldn’t really focus on work. Eventually we went for a little trot out which was harder work than I really wanted it to be. Still though I was excited and only mildly terrified. Later on I packed my bag, worried about what to take, repacked my bag and continued worrying about what to take. I didn’t sleep well. On Saturday morning we were both awake early, much earlier than we really needed to be but we tried to have a calm and relaxed morning and then got a lift to the station. We were on our way.
aimlessly for ages we just opted for the ASK Italian even though we had a booking for the evening there too. The lighter options were actually just right for lunch.
Re-reading this post I realise it says very little about the emotions of the build up, about what I was thinking and feeling. I think that’s maybe because I wasn’t. It was sort of all consuming and life was split into pre marathon and post marathon with the latter being forever away. Yet I felt very little and thought very little about actually running the marathon. I knew that the reality was that I was undertrained. At the same time I also knew that I could get my backside round the distance. It felt a bit like there wasn’t much to think about and emotionally I just felt settled that whatever was going to happen was going to happen.
really (not) a runner 