As I said in my previous post on this years London Marathon: “Wow!  This year is the 40th year of the London Marathon.  This is one of the most iconic mass participation event in the world, and this year it is celebrating 40 years… amazing.”  Even more impressive, we all managed to run together in the year of Covid.  We all ran individually wherever we are, virtually, but at the same time all together.

What can I say.  This was still an epic event, albeit completely different to anything ever experienced in the events history (as far as I am aware).  I ran in support of Dogs Trust, and you can read why on my post here.  There is still time to sponsor me!  The page is open until next year when I take on the Race to the Tower ultra marathon.

In summary this was one of the hardest marathons I have run.  Dogs Trust kindly offered me a place a week or so before the event, and so I had not done any specific training.  In fact any training really, as I was just coming back from injury and gearing up for restarting training.  I had run a handful of 5km’s and one 10km in the past 2-3 weeks.  During the run, this lack of training became very evident.  The first half marathon seemed to go well, and I as running about the 2 hr mark.  I then stopped at home (the benefit of a virtual race I guess) to refill water and take on some food, that took about 15 mins whilst I said hello to family, and then I was off again.  When I reached around 25-35km I essentially had a mild bonk.  I could still move, but maintaining a steady running pace was challenging, and a fair few walking sections crept in.  Taking on lots of fluid and food, and a good talking to myself, seemed to get me going again.  I reached home again with around 0.25km remaining (I had planned to have 1km remaining, but I am not complaining at this point).  The last section I ran with my daughter and my dog – so a wonderful ending to a wonderful run, especially as I was running for Dogs Trust.

After the race, Dogs Trust very kindly hosted us runners on a virtual post-run party.  We used Zoom to meet up, and it was great to see and talk to the Dogs Trust’s amazing team and thank them for all their pre-race and during the race support.  It was great to chat about the run, but more importantly hear how the fundraising supports the work involved in running Dogs Trust, especially, and most importantly, the wonderful care given to all the dogs.  I cannot overstate how appreciative of the support I am – many thanks to Tristan, Beth and Holly.