Marathon Day

Marathon day marathon, Deal, Kent 3:52:14

Photo David Brett

This is a marathon that is becoming popular. SVN ran it last year and were putting it on again this year. Ballina were also putting one on today in Mayo. I choose the SVN event in Deal in Kent.

After last weeks super run in Seville in 24 degrees, this weekend would be a lot different as I still had Seville in the legs and the temperature would be a tad cooler.

The race started at 8:30am and was over 2hrs drive away from Basingstoke. It was a real early start and I made it there with 30 mins to spare. En-route the temperature gauge in the car was showing -1 degrees and it was still at freezing at the start line.

The course was a very simple one and there was only around 100 in the race. Some were on day one of a quad on four different courses over the weekend.

Aid station

We were off at 9am from the aid station. We started going south for about 200m before turning at a cone and coming back north. The wind was in the back for the first leg out which was approx 2.7 miles. On the lap we were always on the coast and on a good tarmac path all the way.  The route brought us along side the Deal stone beach, past some scout huts and eventually into Deal town sea front which hasn't changed for centuries. Some fishing boats were shored with the fishermen selling crabs and other fish right on the route. As the day went on more and more walkers and particularly dog walkers shared the path with us.

After leaving Deal village we passed by Walmer castle for about another 1K still on the coastal path. We then turned around and re-traced our steps back to the aid station.  On the way back the wind was in our faces and got stronger as the day went on. We passed everyone twice per lap.

Great medal

I actually felt pretty good even after Seville and came through the first lap in 45 minutes exactly. That was 3:45 pace. I also had found my place in the race and pretty much stayed there all day.  Lap 2 was exactly in 1 hr 30 so the pace was still the same. Half way came at 1:52 so a sub 4hr was definitely still on.  A 46 minute third lap brought me through in 2:16 and still going steady. A 47 4th lap meant I had 58 minutes to do the last one. I ended up managing 50 minutes as I was slowing badly. But still this was good enough for a 3:52 which was my 47th sub 4 hr race.

This was a nice low key race that was perfectly organised by SVN.