Edinburgh Marathon Festival
Edinburgh Marathon Festival Marathon
WHERE: Edinburgh, Scotland
WHEN: Sunday, 22nd May 2011
THE RACE.
Starting near the city centre, the course went past the Palace of Holyrood and generally downhill to the sea at Portobello then along the coast past Musselburgh to a turn round point at just short of 17 miles and back to the finish adjacent to the Musselburgh Race Course.
RUNNERS. 6741 Men. 2919 Women
FIRST MAN: Phil Nicholls 2-19:21
FIRST WOMAN: Sarah Harris 2-42:59
STUBBIES: Euan McGrath 553rd 3-15:42 91st M40 of 191
John Fairhurst 3765th 3-59:16 (PB). 40th M60+ of 154
Total finishers 9660 Slowest finishing time 7-14:52
Comment.
The sub 3-45 runners had their own start scheduled at 10 minutes before the rest of us. Cold blustery showers meant I was glad to be wearing a bin bag whilst waiting in the pen for the start – a thermal version would have been even better. After the countdown we were off. The first few miles being nett downhill meant a good start was possible without undue effort (or so I hoped). The atmosphere was good with various bagpipers and drummers and many spectators along the route. The mile-markers were somewhat inconspicuous and I had an unwelcome surprise when eventually spotting one as my Garmin was reading a little further than the marker indicated. Having “got my eye in” I saw some more which confirmed that I had lost the couple of minutes safety margin I thought I had built up in my quest to be under 4 hours. The final 8 miles into the strong wind seemed particularly hard as there was no time to ease up. Finally the finish came in sight and a final effort saw me cross the line bettering my PB by over 11 minutes and achieving the “Good for Age” target (my application for London next year is already in the post). It was well organised but unfortunately the finish was out of bounds to spectators and the re-union area was about ½ a mile walk away from the finish (which helped recovery) and fortunately the rain had stopped. Subsequently there was a walk of more than a mile to catch the shuttle bus back to the city centre. The publicity said that this is a fast course and I can see that would definitely be true in good weather. Within 24 hours I had received a text message giving my provisional chip time, which was subsequently, confirmed – a big plus to the organisers.
Edinburgh Marathon Festival 5km
WHERE: Edinburgh, Scotland
WHEN: Saturday 21st May 2011
THE RACE. The single lap circular course was on the road in Holyrood Park. We went round Arthur’s Seat, which involved going uphill for almost half the distance (lovely views of the city if you were able to appreciate them) a little on the flat and then down to the finish.
RUNNERS. 101 Men. 179 Women
FIRST MAN: Craig Neal 18:04
FIRST WOMAN: Sophie Black 23:34
STUBBY: Anne Fairhurst 190th 36:18. 2nd W55+ of 8
Total finishers 280 Slowest finishing time 52:46
Comment.
The wind was quite strong which made it a hard race. It was well organised with colour coded bibs matching the start pen pennants plus chip timing. However, there were only large T shirts at the finish when I came through in spite of ordering medium. Why is it always the same?