I’m not really sure what led me to enter this marathon. I like to make sure I have an autumn marathon to do, even though I don’t like speed training in the heat of summer. This time I was training through the summer for big ultra marathons so I had the added incentive to find a marathon to do to see if training for ultras made any difference this time.

Training was going well to start with. I gradually built up to 18 miles, but then I took a two week break to do some 10K races so I could work on my time for those. That’s when training went wrong – the following week I was supposed to run 22 miles in training, but due to needing the loo I didn’t make it passed 16 miles. My taper then lasted two weeks due to having a half marathon race, which didn’t turn out too well either. It was unlikely I was going to be setting a PB, especially with the hills I was expecting in Yorkshire; but I’d give it a good go at getting a sub 3:30.

On the day before the race I drove up to York for a bit of tourism, and to see some friends I’ve not seen for almost a year. I walked around the Minster for a while, quickly saw Nic and Emma, and then I checked in to the hotel. That evening the three of us went for food, so I had the usual pre-marathon meal of spaghetti bolognese. It was a good day, and we even got to visit the Harry Potter shop – The Shop That Must Not Be Named. It was nice to have seen them again. Emma would be running her first marathon, and I think this was Nic’s fourth – a seasoned pro!

That night things didn’t go according to plan. I couldn’t sleep.

The people in the room next to mine stumbled down the corridor at 2am, with one of them making sounds like he was about to vomit – and the other was shouting “Don’t be a d--k!” at him repeatedly. I think I got a few minutes here and there, but I was awake long before my alarm went off. Oh well, I’ve run after a bad night’s sleep before. It might still be okay.

I got to the Elvington Airfield around 07:30, just before massive queues formed to get in. I took off my #ukrunchat hoodie and headed over to the bus which would take around thirty minutes to get me to the race village. It was a little cold standing around in the race village, and if I’m honest I should probably have used that time to find the loos and locate the start. I didn’t though, instead I waited for the next forty minutes for the #ukrunchat tweet-up.

Although there had been quite a few in the group that was doing this race, only a few of us arrive before 9am. On my way to find the start I did bump into two more though – Darren and Jen, who were getting ready for the race. They’d had a hard time finding the baggage drop as they’d arrived at the other side of the campus and found the signs to be lacking.

It wasn’t really that far to the race start, but it was slow as the people I were following to get there were encountering a bridge that was acting as a bottle neck. Even when signs appeared they weren’t that clear – it said the zone 1 start was straight ahead, but that was zone 5 – I should have gone to the left instead. I did however reach the start pen with about ten minutes to spare.

The race was started by Dickie Bird OBE, a retired cricket umpire. First off were the wheelchair athletes, and then the elite and masses followed on behind.

I was aware that the first bit would be repeated in reverse at the end of the marathon, so made a mental note of the incline on the way down. It may be easy sailing now, but I knew it’d get harder.

My plan had to go for a steady and consistent pace, but due to the downhill it meant my first three miles were all sub-7:00 min/mile pace. Maybe that’d work in my favour though – I’d “banked” 90 seconds of time which would make up for what I knew I’d lose on the eventual uphill.

Just before the second mile the route goes passed the Minster, and then out of Monksgate. This bit had been familiar from the day before’s wanderings. At least I knew it was flat. The crowds were great, and I think in part they may be why for the first 15 miles I continued at a pace that was ahead of my target.

Fairly early on the city is left behind and for the majority of the race after that it is through the countryside and small villages. I didn’t really notice the support as I was concentrating heavily on the running, but it seemed like even the quietest of places had a few people cheering (even if only for Macmillan runners in some places). That’s okay though, I didn’t feel this was a race that needed it as it was pleasant enough.

At mile 5 the ten mile runners would no longer be on the same course as the marathoners, but their start was an hour behind us. We’d got over twenty minutes until they’d be coming through.

At mile 6 I high-fived two vicars, which is not something you can say every day. Further along the course the Archbishop of York was also high-fiving runners.

For a while my stomach didn’t feel great, and was making noises like a steel drum. This subsided, but did come back around mile 17. The miles in-between went by fairly well, and I’d been doing a reasonable job of keeping focused. I’d found that imagining where I’d be on my usual long training run routes was helping a great deal, especially when easy parts of the course matched up with where difficult parts of my training routes would have been.

Of course it’s not exact though – I just was just picturing myself running around Leicester. This was York, and for the most part is considerably hillier. Whenever I felt it was getting tough I slowed the pace down, and then slowly returned to my target pace once a hill had levelled off.

There were a couple of “out and back” sections, and this practice of controlling pace had worked well for the first one, and I thought perhaps I could make my tenth time racing a marathon be the one time I don’t walk. However, on the second “out and back” around miles 17-19 the return journey up hill was enough to finish me. No matter how much I slowed it was still hard work, and eventually I succumbed to the need to walk.

Up until then I’d had one jelly baby every few miles, but had been forgetting to eat some as the miles ticked by. I was however staying hydrated having had a gulp of water at miles 9 and 15. I do wonder if I’d fuelled more whether I’d have managed to hold out along that mile long hill, but I didn’t.

As the end of the hill came into sight, I could also see mile 20, and got running again and found that over the next 6 miles I was managing more running than I expected, although at a slower pace. There were times during these six miles I thought I might just run the remainder of the race without walking, but further walking still crept in there. It’s possibly the best I’ve felt on the last 6 miles of a marathon ever though.

One of the runners had someone cycling alongside him for the last few miles. I overtook him several times, but was overtaken every time I started walking – including in the last mile up the unforgiving hill to the University. I knew it was coming, but it doesn’t make it any easier.

When I got near to the top I forced myself to start running again, and then picked up the pace for the last half mile – I reached 6:40 min/mile with 0.4 miles to go, and then increased my stride so that along the finish straight I could come close to my top speed. I crossed the line running at 4:05 min/mile and then immediately had to stop due to runners that had stopped entirely just passed the finish line.

It was a very tough race towards the end, mostly because of the hills I think. It was a fun race though, and I’m glad I did it. I finished with a time of 3:20:18 (position 304 of 4139 finishers- first 7%) which might not be a PB, but it was better than I’d hoped! For a lot of the race it was looking like I’d got a good chance of 3:11, but I saw that slip further and further away from my grasp. After I’d slipped passed 3:15 I think I lost a lot of interest in keeping going.

At the finish you can grab a bottle of water, and will then be passed a bag containing a few goodies, before they hand you your finishers medal. At the end of this I had a quick lay down on the ground before taking a look at what was in the bag:

• Finishers tee,
• ASDA Caramel chew,
• ASDA Nutty bar,
• High5 Energy Gel,
• ASDA orange energy drink,
• ASDA Sports Nutrition Protein bar (Cookies and cream flavour),
• ASDA Cashew, Raisin & Cherry shot,
• ASDA Strawberry cables.

It’s understandable most of these were ASDA branded goodies – they were the principal sponsor for this race. I also heard that Nic and Emma did really well – which was very pleasing!