How I FINALLY got a place in the London Marathon

It’s many years since I first began trying to get a spot in the London Marathon. I’d grown up watching the race every year on TV, so now that I was living in London and I was actually a real runner – it seemed ‘sensible’ to enter.

London Marathon Ballot reject

It’s a big race with more than 40,000 people taking part every year. But it’s popular too and securing a spot is HARD. My application to the ballot was rejected four years running.

There are other marathons though, so I ran a few of those. I ran Brighton Marathon twice, the Robin Hood Marathon in Nottingham, then traveled to Edinburgh where I dipped under the four hour mark for the first time.

I’d been chasing the illusive sub-four hour time for about nine months, and now I’d done it I needed a new goal. My mum had persuaded me to run Venice Marathon because she and my dad would be in town for my dad’s 60thbirthday the weekend of the race. I agreed and hatched a new plan.

Getting a London ‘Good For Age’

If I could knock 10 minutes off my marathon time I’d be under the Good For Age qualifying time for London Marathon which stood at 3 hours 50 for women in my age group. If London Marathon wouldn’t let me in through the ballot, I’d work my way in through the side entrance.

Despite the months of training, injury, flooding and 30mph winds scuppered my plans in Venice. I crossed the line with numb arms and cramp in both calves in 3 hours 56 minutes. So close, but so far.

A fast, flat marathon course in Manchester six months later and a new training plan were called for. Week after week I dragged myself out for long runs at marathon goal pace with the words ‘Good for Age’ going round and round in my head.

afterrace

Half way through training I had to go into hospital for an operation, but two days after a general anesthetic I was back out there and running 18 miles at a pace I knew would see me cross the line in 3 hours 45 minutes.

Changing targets

After the 2013 London Marathon, and just a week before my race in Manchester, the London Marathon announced that the Good For Age qualification standards would be changing, but there was no word as to what they would be changing to.

This was a major spanner in the works. I was aiming to run a qualifying time but didn’t know what that was. In the days before the race I went backwards and forwards in my mind as to what my race plan should be, but come race morning I knew there was only one option: run as fast as you can and hope that it’s good enough.

I crossed the line in Manchester in 3 hours 38 minutes. Whatever the London marathon would announce wouldn’t change the fact that I was delighted with my time.

When the new times were announced my category had been lowered to 3 hours 45 minutes. I was in, but many runners were left disappointed. They’d run what they thought was a qualifying time for London, only to find out that they hadn’t.

When Good For Age applications for the 2014 race opened and I finally got confirmation of my acceptance into the London Marathon. Filling in the registration details the same question popped up – ‘what’s your expected time for this race?’ Oh no, here we go again.