When will the pain go away?

A few months ago, mrs s decided she was going to run the Loch Ness Marathon and I decided I quite fancied a weekend in Inverness to give her support. After a glass of wine, I thought I might as well do the 10K. Another couple of glasses of wine later and I had somehow decided that I would just run the marathon as well and the entries had been filled in.

And so started several months of long training runs, ending in a week of doing very little except eating before hitting the road with Ritchie C, dave_m and com160, not really sure how I was going to get on.

As it turned out, it was a great weekend and we met a lot of great Fetchies, before, during, and after the race.

The race itself started brilliantly - I felt really comfortable and trotted along at a decent pace, briefly catching up with mrs s and Ritchie C at mile 4 which came as a bit of a surprise to us all. They had pulled away by the time we reached the loch side so I was just concentrating on keeping it steady and enjoying the views. I reached Dores and made my way up the hill, starting to feel a bit tired, but still going and I got a welcome boost when Lintie appeared from the woods and ran with me for a while, chatting away all the time. She was great company but I felt I was slowing her down and encouraged her to go on. And then I hit the final, steep little hill after Scaniport and things took a turn for the worse. The pain in my legs worsened and I walked up the hill for a bit, hoping that the pain would subside. And it did...until I started running again. The next 5 and a half miles or so were pretty bad - my thighs hurt with each and every step. I walked a couple more times before the finish, but was able to run through fetchpoint which was a great boost, and ran across the finish line, which felt fantastic. I had completed my first marathon in 4:31:04 and I was well chuffed.

After soup and a tattie, we headed back to the hotel to get a shower and drink some celebratory fizzy before heading out to the pub for more drink, more food, and more chat with all the fetchies there (too many to name individually but you know who you are and it was wonderful to meet you all).

It was a really great weekend (except for those last miles) which just leaves the question....


What next?