I've been a little bit slow with this (alot like my running, as you'll see below) but here, finally, is my race report from the Luton Marathon of 2005.

It all began last April, when Alan Burke asked me if I'd fancy doing a fun run in Bilbao, near where I live in Limerick. I agreed and started my two weeks training for the "fun run". What Alan had neglected to mention was that the so called "fun run" was actually the national 10k road racing championship in Bilboa. I had plenty of time to rue this on my slow plod around the 10k course.

However, I found once I cross the finish, the feeling of achievement was super and I was hooked. Over the summer Alan and I (and John Mac) ran a number of races and I toyed with the idea of doing the marathon. I had booked a holiday at the end of September / start of October, which ruled out the Dublin marathon, as I would not have time to train after getting back (and I knew I would be sampling the local brews while away).

So, after a quick search, I found the Luton Marathon in early December suited me perfectly-- easy to get to from Limerick, very reasonable entry cost and easy to get accommodation. Also, it was on a 3 lap circuit of the town which mean if anything went wrong, I'd be passing the finish at 17.46 miles and could see how I was doing. Although the field was limited to 600 runners, there was also a marathon relay taking place where three runners ran one lap each. This meant there was a constant stream of new runners coming onto the course.

The journey over was a Ryanair flight from Shannon and a taxi journey to my B&B. The B&B owner was from Tipperary, my native country, so I saw this as a good omen. The other 3 guests were also running, although they were all aiming for sub 4 hours and I was hoping to just get around. In the run up I had managed a 1:54 and 1:52 in Longford and Cork half marathons and had managed a few long runs of 15 and 20 miles. In the negative column, I had my Christmas party on the Thursday before where I carb loaded, mainly on beer.

I got a lift up on the morning of the race with one of the other runners and nervously togged off. Before I knew it, it was 10am and we set off from just in front of the sports centre in Luton. It was a bright, clear and relatively warm December day and over the first lap, I ran with one of the relay runner who was taking part, meaning that I kept a fairly healthy pace by my standards. I clocked the first 8.73 miles at 1:19, just inside the four hour mark (9:09 min miles) and was running comfortably and passing a few runners.

The second lap was a bit slower over a loop that stared out from the suburban square, through a housing estate, across a park and then into rural areas, then looped back again through a bunch of tower blocks and the square to the finish. Fortunately the course was fairly flat, although some of the gates that you pass through into parks etc were pretty tight especially on the first lap when the field was bunched. By the end of lap 2, at 17.46 miles, I was on 2:48, so I:29 for the second lap and feeling pretty ok. This is when things started to go wrong for me, as my the front of my right began to ache at about mile 19.

I struggled on manfully, until about mile 20, when I had to stop and remove my right runner. After 2-3 minutes I was able to put it on again and continue on but had to stop again at about mile 22 and 23. After that break, I was able to keep going until the finish. I also somehow managed to miss the 24 mile marker, which depressed me as I thought mile 24 went on way too long but I got a huge boost when 25 finally came into view. I eventually made it over the finish line in 4 hours 42 seconds, exhausted but delighted.

After the race, I returned to the sports centre (about 1km away from the finish) and changed. It also had a swimming pool (which I did not take advantage of) and massage facilities (which I did). There were also a few Irish runners there, most of them heading back that night to Dublin. I eventually gathered my belongings, had my massage and headed off in search of a train station to catch the train to London for a celebration (but that's another story).