Nagpur :-The weather predictions looked good for race day, about 5 degrees in the morning and about 9 in the afternoon with rain throughout the run, but in the afternoon the wind picked up with shower. Since I’d been so low on energy for most of the year and having a bit of an Achilles niggle for the past few months, I either expected to run out of energy during the race. The first few kilometres were downhill and everything went fine. London Marathon is known for its runners in fancy dress running for charity, so along the way I saw a rhino, a four-person fire truck and a guy keeping a football in the air the entire time. I managed to keep a decent pace until 13k after which I slowed a bit, but it went alright. At around 20k you round a corner and all of a sudden there it is, Tower Bridge. What a sight. Running over Tower Bridge with people cheering you on is quite special. At around 30k I had the feeling like I’d already ran a marathon, but I still had 12k to go. It was getting harder and harder to lift up my legs. I also noticed the sky was getting dark and there was no way to avoid the downpour. It also got very windy at that point, so far, a short while it was very wet and cold, but luckily it didn’t last long. London Marathon is known for its crowds. If you ask runners what they like about the London Marathon, they are quite likely to answer the crowd. Normally there are over a million people along the course. t around 35k I decided that I probably needed more salt, but didn’t have any extra with me, However, we were heading back to central London at this point and the roads here were closed off on both sides, meaning it wasn’t really possible for me to just leave the course unless I maybe climbed over the barriers, but I could hardly lift my feet, let alone climb over the barriers. So, I came up with plan B, surely the medics along the course would have salt. In the meantime spectators along the course were handing out sweets a lot, but that wasn’t what I was looking for. I realize that I’m lucky that I had the opportunity to run London at all, since it’s so difficult to get in and it’s also great to see mass events returning after covid. And I got my second World Marathon Major star, just four more to go.
