One Down Seven to Go!

Well Sydney certainly turned it on for the Marathon.


I had a great trip and it was fantastic to have both my brothers there to share the experience.


I arrived in Sydney on the Tuesday night as I had work commitments and also wanted to catch up with friends and family before race day.


By Thursday morning my body was telling me I'd made a mistake - with one night on a couch and the next on a camp stretcher my back decided to stage it own revolution & refused to co-operate with anything I wanted to do. I'd also somehow managed to slightly strain my left ankle on a light jog that morning. Thankfully my brother Brent located a decent mattress for me and I managed to get into an Osteopath on the Friday morning to crack me back into shape.


Saturday came round and brought with it the first real hot weather Sydney had seen this side of winter. With temperatures forecast around 31 degrees and many locals saying it was well above that I started to worry a little as I really don't cope with extreme heat all that well. I forced myself to have a relaxed day and even managed to have an afternoon nap. That night my sister in law Claudia threw together a magnificent pasta feast and we dined outside making the most of the weather.




The human body is an intriguing machine and no matter how relaxed I think I am I really struggle to get a good nights sleep before a big event. Sydney was no exception - I spent a restless night tossing and turning and was grateful when the alarm went off as I could start preparing things and get some focus in my day. The other thing about the human body is the frustrating way mine seems to cope with pre race nerves - to say I have gastric problems is the nicest way of explaining things and I almost missed the start of the race while queuing up at in the start area to use the toilets for the third time that morning!




As usual there were a number or real characters taking place and one that really caught my attention while waiting in line for the portaloo's was "Marathon Man" obviously not impervious to pre race nerves he had to wait in line with the rest of us to use the facilities as well - a number of us had a good chuckle as it seemed a little ironic him going into the loo in costume - it would have been great to see him go in as a runner and then come bouncing out in his superhero costume!







The marathon itself was a bit of a killer. Rod, Brent and I all started together with a few slaps on the back and wishing each other all the best then ran to the top of the Sydney harbour bridge together before Brent settled back into a pace he was more comfortable with. Rod and In continued on tracking the 3hr 30min pace setter running about 4min 50sec kms a pace we were both comfortable with our training runs we had done together at home. Rod settled down fast and all ways looked comfortable. I struggled to get any sort of rhythm going and dropped off at the 11km mark leaving Rod to keep up the cracking pace in the heat.


By the 25km mark my usual problems started up with my hamstrings tightening up massively and I was restricted to a slow jog for the next 7-8km.


Apart from the run over the bridge, the short section around Centennial park and the final kilometre the course was really uninspiring with a number of "out and back" sections and tough grunts on freeway type section of roads with no escape from the beating sun.


I saw Rod come past in the other direction on one of the out and back sections at about the 30km mark. He was at that stage around 12 minutes ahead which shows the amazing pace he had been setting keeping up with the 3hr 30min runners to that point then somewhere between the 32 & 33km mark I came right for a while and set a good pace much of the way to the finish and really cranked it up in the last 3km to the spectacular finish line just in front of the Sydney Opera House.



I missed seeing Brent go past me on one of the long out and back sections and couldn't help wondering if he was OK being his first marathon and the number of runners I passed collapsed in heaps on the side of the road didn't help alleviate my fears. Little did I know he was having a great time just cruising around the course in his own time savouring the experience and already planning his next effort at a faster pace now that he had an idea what it was all about.



Rod had a few cramp issues in the last 10km but still finished in an amazing 3hrs 41 mins which was a PB. I came in 8 minutes later at 3hrs 49mins which was another PB knocking 32 minutes of my time from the Auckland Marathon last year and Brent cruised over the finish line with plenty of gas in the tank in a very credible 4hrs 39mins.



Our "support crew" - my two sister in laws Claudia and Lisa as well as all six nieces were fantastic cheering us on as we went through centennial park then fighting the traffic for the next two hours to make it to the finish line. They probably had a harder day than us in the end!



We celebrated with a beer and lunch at one of the cafes close to the Opera house overlooking the harbour then headed back to Brent's for a few more beers and a BBQ a perfect finish to what was for me a very special day as part of a great family and as brothers.