I really need to get back to completing the blog posts on this before my next big exciting adventure!
Sooooo Sunday morning Alison and I were up at stupid o'clock and went about getting our planned breakfasts, trying not to wake Kellie, as our half marathon started at 6am and her marathon not until 7am, but she was awake and listening to us pottering about quietly, lost in our own thoughts.
We were out the door just before 5am and heading down to the train station. Oh yes, remember we practiced this the day before? Well things look a tad different in the dark and we took the first left instead of the second! As we were walking down thinking hmmm not sure I remember this shop here or there and we see some fellow runners coming up from the other direction. I lifted my throwaway jumper to indicate my race bib and said "are you going the wrong way?" Ummm nope, we were! haha They said "follow us, the train station is over there". Oh dear.
So we get to the Town Hall train station and descended the steps and see wall to wall runners on the platform waiting for the train. Alison announced:
"We've found our people"
I had to laugh. We fitted in amongst the crowd on the platform where we could, the train soon stopped and we squished our way on board holding on as there was standing room only. It took only minutes to get to Milsons Point and we walked to the starting area in darkness, deciding the wait to the portaloo was way too long and we didn't really need to go. A quick photo (excuse the grainy texture) which I sent to Kellie so she knew we were there, a quick hug and then Alison headed to her A Group starting area (because she is superfast) and I made my way to the B Group and started chatting to a lass from Queensland who was finding the weather just a tad coolish! About ten minutes before the start I braved the cold and ditched my throwaway long sleeves ready to start.
I don't remember much about the start really, I can't recall if they played the National Anthem like they do in Melbourne. I just remember walking for about five minutes to get to the actual spot where we could start running and off we went. It's so colourful on race day, the gear people wear, the flashes of colour as runners go past. We did some winding around streets before we got to the bridge. Now my pics going over the bridge are quite blurry as you'll see but that's because I didn't stop. I kept on running, that was my aim to make sure I ran continuously over it. It was one of the highlights of this race.
And I took no more pics during the run, I just wanted to soak it all in, so relied on the race photographers and there were plenty! Despite being overcast it got quite humid running amongst the buildings. I lost all sense of direction though, I had no idea where I was. Lots of chatting and camaraderie on course, I couldn't stop smiling.
Lots of too'ing and fro'ing as you'll see from the course map and lots of areas where you could see other runners which was great. Once we got to the water front it was lovely and cool, the humidity of around the city building was gone. Gorgeous vistas, but I swear the Opera House had been moved, it seemed to take forever before we rounded that area at Dawes Point and ran under the bridge and there it was, yay. The end was in sight,
At one stage I got passed by a dog! ha. And saw the lass and her dog at the end, it was an assistance dog. I loved that the dog had it's own race bib and yes, it got it's own finishers medal. Awesome.
What an impressive finish running amongst the flags and finishing right at the steps of the Opera House, here's a pic from the facebook page:
Not my greatest time by a long shot, finished in 2:44:57. I will admit to worrying about finishing before the cut off of 2:45, they had quite a strict policy on their website that you had to be at certain points of the course by certain times otherwise you would be instructed off the course. Considering I had no idea where these points were I just kept on as fast as my legs would take me. I don't think the cut off was as strict as they indicated as I saw loads of people way behind me on the double back sections and besides which the marathoners would be coming after us anyway.
But I do want to thank my running group buddy Diala for talking me off the ledge in the days prior to going to Sydney when I was having a mild freak out of finishing before the cut off. Thanks Diala!
Despite my finishing time, despite my worries and misgivings before the event, THIS is the look of happy...
The spots of rain started not long after I had finished. I wandered what seemed to be a million miles through the park to get my bag and quickly put my warm jacket on and caught up with some of the other ladies at the Opera Bar. I got to finally meet Munuela for the first time, one of the motivational forces of our online running group.
And Tamra and Jacqueline who very shortly will be flying away to New York to run the marathon. How exciting.
But I was eager to see Kellie out on course. Alison was back at the hotel and was going to try to find Kelly en route around Hyde Park, I was hoping to catch her at Circular Quay. Well we both soon realised, that despite even having her Road ID tracking going on our phones, that as spectators we make amazingly good runners! We suck at spectating. We missed her at every opportunity. We were texting back and forth to each other from various spots on the route and then gave up and decided to see her at the end. What a moment seeing my dear friend finishing her marathon.
I love these photos full of emotion that I took as soon as Kellie exited from the finishing area. They speak volumes of how proud we were of her.
Once Kellie finished we got cold, the rain was coming down a bit heavier so we got her legs moving and said farewell to the girls and headed toward the train to get back to the accommodation. Grabbed some food from a cafe around the corner and later on after a bit of a rest broke into the champagne.
We did have some grand plans of dolling ourselves up and going out to a swish bang up restaurant on Sunday night for dinner. But the last of the red hot ragers, we ended up back at the same pizza/pasta place as Friday night and Tamra joined us for dinner. Then we were back at the accommodation and in bed by 8.30pm! Yep, we girls know how to party. We were exhausted.
So as mentioned I would leave it to the race photographer and got a lot of nice photos, here are some of them. These are the types of shots you do this race for with the iconic bridge and opera house in the background.
See, there really were people behind me, I wasn't last!
Elated coming down to the finishing area.
Finished!
I can highly recommend anyone reading this to make the trek to Sydney for the event, it's really well run, such a gorgeous course, possibly not as flat as they made it sound like it was going to be, but loads of fun.
