Loch Ness Marathon Weekend

Saturday morning I boarded a train for northern Scotland and the city of Inverness, the capital of the Highlands. I really forgot how much I love traveling by train! Nothing like sitting there reading a great book, eating snacks, and watching the beautiful scenery go by! Granted it was horribly rainy out, but still there were brief moments of beauty. Especially coming into the Highlands where there was a bit of snow on the tops of some of them. The entire hostel was full of people doing the marathon, 10K, and 5K! It wasn't young people either, loads of people my parents age as well, sort of weird for a youth hostel but I suppose they just wanted to save money too. 3 of the 4 people in my room where running so we headed down to the expo which was held at the finish line at Queen's Stadium. It was the smallest "expo" I'd ever been at for a major race. I'm really glad I brought everything I needed from the US because I wouldn't have been able to get it there. Very different than both Grandma's and Rock 'n' Roll. Although there was an amazing dinner for us which included: soup, roll, salad, pasta, baked potato, and a pudding with custard! Then it was time to get my kit together for the next day and watch X Factor (British American Idol-esque show) before early to bed. But not before speaking with both of my running mentors: Chris & Chad. Words of Wisdom Version #3 "Don't let your feet run faster than your shoes" - old Scottish saying and "Some things have to be believed to be seen." If I was going to succeed tomorrow I was going to need both of these to get me through.

This time around I had to get up at 6am not 2:30am like San Diego! It still didn't feel real, didn't feel like I was about to run another marathon. But it was time to get some food in me and get all the kit on again. The long trek to the starting line began and finally ended over 2 hours later. Entirely too long between getting up and starting the race in my opinion. Fortunately the weather held out and stopped raining! The starting line (shown on the left) was literally out in the middle of the Highlands of Scotland, like some one just plunked us down in the middle of a postcard! I knew I hadn't trained very well for this so my plan was to run a mile then walk the next one and just go from there. My only goals were to follow this plan and just to finish. They had us do a wee little warm-up before we started since it was rather cold out and we'd been sitting on a bus for over an hour. Then at 10 o'clock sharp the bagpipes started. You know you're running a marathon in Scotland when bagpipes send you off! They began at the back of the runners and then came up the middle of the 2,000 or so runners before flanking either side of the starting line. As we started there they were playing us off, of course being the sucker that I am I was balling like a baby! I really must learn to not cry every time I hear massed bagpipes if I'm going to live in Scotland for the foreseeable future... Of we went into the Scottish countryside. Within the first mile we were greeted by curious horses and little sheepies with black faces. I kept to my game plan and started walking after the first mile. This course is absolutely beautiful through the autumn countryside and up and down hills, which I was completely unprepared for! After a few miles we came up along side the shore of Loch Ness, the home of Nessie, the Loch Ness Monster, hence the name of the marathon. By this point the sun was out full stop and the scenery was blissfully distracting! I've been to Loch Ness once before about 4 1/2 years ago and so remembered that there is a castle along it's shores that I would get to see again, Urquhart Castle. I did, I got to watch it grower larger and larger for a few miles before seeing it clearly from just across the loch. By this point I was about 8-10 miles in and felt pretty darn good! I was also keeping a 6 hr. marathon pace which is unheard of for me since my personal best is only 6:42. My running miles were averaging about 12 mile miles again really, really good for me! Right near the castle I thought I saw something in the water, but I'm hoping it was just a convergence of currents. I now know why people think they've seen things in this lake, now that I've seen something myself. Then things headed downhill after mile 11 when one of my knees started hurting, in mile 12 the other one started as well. I had a decision to make: get through a half marathon with a great time for me or push all the way through and spend months recovering and forgo all other sports (including cheerleading and rowing) probably until Christmas and/or end up in hospital with serious injuries? I made the sensible decision of finishing a strong half marathon and then proceeding to the next medical pick-up station around mile 15. My half marathon time was 3:08 which is faster than my other two first halves of marathons, so I was happy considering I'd done all of 6 training runs since San Diego including the triathlon. The medics had a hard time understanding why I was electing to take myself out of the race since I still looked really good. As I was brought back into Inverness I noticed that I definitely ran the prettier half of the course, so really it was worth it in my book. Once I had made it back to the finish line I had my chip cut off my shoe so I didn't get fined. They noticed I didn't have my medal or goodie bag and ran off to get those things before I could protest that I hadn't actually finished. I've of course altered both the shirt and medal to reflect the new race that I created and completed, the Loch Ness "Half" Marathon. Out on the course I met a lot of really nice people both running and cheering which was really cool since there aren't many people around, very much like Grandma's Marathon. I also saw all the important key animals to Scotland: black faced sheep and highland coos (the horned, woolly cute cows.) Once I had bundled back up and gotten all the free stuff I could get, headed back to the hostel, but not before stopping by McDonald's for a post race celebratory meal for a Big Mac, Chicken Selects and fries. Ah the gloriousness of the 3-day grace period of eating whatever you want after a major endurance event!

Back at the hostel I had my supper and then spent the rest of the evening watching X Factor, Top Gear, and Charlie Borman's By Any Means (my new favorite show!) Mostly because I couldn't be bothered to haul myself up the 2 flights of stairs to my room more times than absolutely necessary and I was completely knackered! Another fairly early night for obvious exhaustion reasons and caught the first train back to Edinburgh in the morning, sleeping most of the way...


Here is the course map, I was picked up just before the Lucozade and water station just before Dores, about where the line for the picture is.