The Madrid Marathon, 28.04 2024

Girls weekend to Madrid!

On Friday morning, Sarah and I set off from Gatwick, headed for Madrid to run the marathon (and have a mini-break). We flew with Air Europa, and everything went smoothly, the flight there is so quick!

We arrived, figured out the Metro, and got to our hotel, the One Stop Fortuny by late afternoon. I highly recommend this hotel! It's staircase alone is worth staying for...

...and it also is beautiful and very quiet, and has bathrobe and slippers. We spent the rest of the day walking around the centre of Madrid, seeing some art, and had dinner (the world's biggest tapas) in the Playa Mayor.

Saturday morning, went to the Marathon Expo to pick up our running numbers, via getting caught in a downpour. The Expo was fun and we found our names on the wall!

After drying off at the hotel, we headed out (via a few other, less dramatic, soakings), to do 2 laps of the city sightseeing bus tour with Big Bus (with broken windscreen wiper). We also practiced our new hobby (inspired by Jack) of collecting drain covers.

Then we fuelled up for the marathon at Poke Friendly La Latina (which I give 6 stars out of 5).

Our hotel turned out to be 2 minutes from the start, so it was a pretty leisurely start on marathon morning. We actually arrived far too early, so went back to the hotel for safety wees to avoid using the portaloos - luxury!

The race was a 10km, half marathon and marathon, and had different starting waves depending on your pace. Our wave was stating at 9.35, but the start wasn't very well organised, and no one was checking who was in what wave, so it was a bit of a free for all. Once it got started though, it was a brilliant event - one of my all time favourite marathons! 

The route was really excellent, a bit undulating and winding all around the whole city, and was so varied - city, old buildings, parks, cathedral, palaces.... everything! It was good having done the sightseeing tour the day before, as we recognised things, and it was like doing a second sightseeing, there was so much to look at. Also fun being "confetti-ed" under a bridge, watching the temperatures in the bus stops (ranging from 8 to 30oC), hearing the bird/laser beeps of the road crossings, and looking out for all the giant statues of men on horses, and spotting parakeets. Not so fun was having to avoid lots of men spitting and peeing everywhere. Someone's spit actually hit my leg!! What is it about big city marathons that mean that so many people are suddenly unable to manage their body liquids in a normal way? 

My favourite part of the route was the bit about 3/4 of the way through, near and through the Casa De Campo, the absolute most beautiful of parks! I felt really good throughout the whole run, and loved every single step. We finished in 4.06. The finish along the tree lined Boulevard by the Musuem de Prado was excellent, and it was nice to stay around and soak up the atmosphere and see people finish. 

Afterwards, we braved the epic 2 minute walk back to the hotel, to freshen up ready for an evening of the important tasks of refuelling...

and celebrating....

Monday morning we had Churros for breakfast at Churrería Santa Theresa - outstanding churros!

Followed by a trip to the Real Jardín Botanic.

It was an altogether brilliant weekend! Thank you Sarah for four days of fun and chatathon-ing....there sure was a lot to catch up on! 

Not The Recce Weekend (running), Not The London Marathon with Phoenix (running), and London Marathon (spectating)

On Friday morning fiancé Andrew (thank you for all your incredibly kind messages!!) and I set off for Chichester, to meet Tara and Alan for the annual "recce" weekend. This is a weekend dedicated to figuring out the route of the upcoming LDWA 100, which takes place on the end May bank holiday. This year was titled "Not The Recee Weekend", as due to logistical challenges in all getting to Scotland (where the LDWA 100 is this year) at the right and same time, we had relocated to Chichester, which was less of a logistical conundrum. 

I had never been to Chichester before, and it seemed a very lovely city. On arriving, we set off straight away, to run a marathon route (designed by Tara and Alan) along the Sussex Literary (literally) trail, up to the South Downs, back along the Roman Road past the Halnaker windmill, and through Boxgrove, finishing back in Chichester with a look around the cathedral. We had several luxury checkpoints, even having a celebratory Pimms at one (thanks Tara!). 

Saturday we did a beautiful 9 mile run heading along the Chichester Canal with ducklings and swan nests, down to Chichester Marina where we had a coffee stop to rejuvenate. Filled with caffeine we bounced off for a section along a lovely beach, and saw Major Mike in Tintanic!!

We completed the run all along beautiful trails to finish in Chichester at the Buttery teashop, a very good place to finish indeed.

We went our separate ways, and I headed to Walton on Thames, for part 2 of the weekend.

After 2 hours sleep (thanks to getting a room in the Travelodge right across from the Wetherspoons, and enjoying most of the night listening to drunk people and bad music), my alarm went off at 04.15, and after a brief meltdown, I reminded myself that I voluntarily choose to spend my weekends doing things like this. The reason for this early start, was that today was the London Marathon, and I was heading up to see the end, and for reasons which had made sense when I entered after a nice big glass of sherry, I thought it would be a good idea to run the Phoenix Not The London Marahtin first. Luckily, I'm not the only one with such ideas, so Annabel, Gavin and Sean were also doing the same, so it was a really fun day.

I ran my marathon - 8 laps on the towpath - in the cold but sunny early morning. I was enjoying it, and seeing everyone, until half way when I fell over. I then had to take a little time out in the loos, cleaning myself up and addressing my second meltdown of the day. After reminding myself again that this was "fun", I got back out on lap 5, put the Hades Town (my new favourite musical) soundtrack on, and was soon enjoying things again.

Afterwards, we headed up on the train to London, and were at letter M in time to meet Sarah when she finished her London Marathon - and celebrations began! Thank you Annabel, Gavin and Sean for all the cocktails, cakes and Doughnut Time doughnuts!