Picking up from yesterday –
I didn’t realize until someone told me race morning… you know how in America, running etiquette is that when you walk you do it to the right? Well, in England, you go to the left (of course – but that hadn’t even dawned on me).
Although, running anything after the first few corrals seems to be a little loosey-goosey in England. When I asked what side I should walk on, everyone was very much like, “it doesn’t matter.” People didn’t seem too concerned about time or anything. It was suuuuuuuper laid back – definitely a change from how it had been in Spain (my only other European race experience).
I walked the whole thing. I was just kind of exhausted. I know jet lag isn’t a great excuse and people can argue it’s not a real thing, but I was just tired! I’d been burning the candle at all ends with the running project and work and therapy and everything. So, I just walked.
The time limit of the full marathon was 6 hours, and they started an hour after us, so technically we had plenty of time – especially because our course was basically the last half of the full course. So… I wasn’t terribly worried about time – except.
It did state that there would be a van for both the half and full marathon. And I just thought “how?!” The course overlap so much how will you tell and why will you?
Thankfully I had my full marathon bib, due to the happy accident of signing up for the wrong thing at the beginning of the season. So, at least if someone had to look (if I had to pull up my layers), maybe they wouldn’t question me.
I was so scared of a shuttle (that never came), that I went to the sidewalk and tried to just look like a pedestrian walking along.
(I later learned that a human being acted as the “shuttle,” and walked along with the last person at the pace they set. So, it all would’ve been fine even if I hadn’t been hiding sort of in plain sight.)
I did go onto the road to make sure I hit all the splits, and yet none of them showed up in my results! I’m guessing it’s because my bib didn’t change from marathon to half in the system quickly enough, so it wasn’t equipped to do that. But that was kind of a bummer.
And this is where I’ll pick up tomorrow!