For my first marathon, I chose one of our local favourites, Stratford.

The day was cool early on but soon warmed up when the sun came out.

I was running with Rich Keen so we stuck to the Chuggers philosophy of starting off in the pub. It was only for a coffee and somehow we managed to avoid ordering any lager or fry ups.

The start of the race was busy and narrow but the congestion soon thinned out.  It was nice to see Richard Newby running and have a brief chat before he sped off on the half.

Stratford marathon is roughly two laps of the half marathon.  The first lap was good but peeling off at 12 miles was depressing as the field and support thinned out and we weren’t even half way.  Our support crew cheered us on at half way and it really helped.  All was going OK, even the second climb of the hill near Welford.  But then I found myself at the start of the infamous 6 mile Greenway cycle track from Long Marston to Stratford.  I really didn’t need reminding by the marshal that it was “only” 6 miles to go.  I told myself it was less than we run on a Monday but it felt like ten times as far.  Every time I looked at my Garmin, the distance elapsed since I last looked got shorter and shorter.  I stopped briefly at the two water stops on the Greenway and only managed to get going at the second one thanks to encouragement from another runner.

Finally Stratford was in sight and I slowly made it to the park where the race finished.  The support at the end was fantastic but I couldn’t match Rich Keen’s sprint to the finishing line.

The banana and bottle of water that you get at Stratford was most welcome but my Chunky Kit Kat king size was more use!  I couldn’t walk for a while but finally managed to find the strength to hobble to the chip shop – sadly the queue was too long and I had to have a healthy baguette!