This is another marathon blog penned by Geoffrey.
Please contact me if you are interested in knowing more about anything related to this Marathon event.
Over to Geoffrey …
A warm day greeted the 20,000 runners on the Saturday. Although most big city marathons are held on a Sunday, Stockholm is on a Saturday for some reason. It’s a scenic course with a number of rolling climbs taking in many of the city’s highlights. An enthusiastic crowd for many parts of the course although strangely quiet over the last 2kms. The undoubted highlight was running a lap inside the beautifully historic 1912 Stockholm Olympic Stadium to the finish line.
However, after the start gun it was hard to get into any sort of rhythm. It was hard going with the record number of entries, a tight congested course, a number of pinch points, water stations struggling to meet demand due to the hot conditions.
From a scheduling perspective I couldn’t fathom why they had a 12 noon start time where the temperatures were already mid-20s At a time of year it starts getting light at 3am so an earlier cooler start would have been logical. The 20,000 runners were started in just 3 closely spaced waves just minutes apart. So – for mid-pack and slower runners this meant your run was mainly spent watching others close around (to avoid bumping into them) rather than being able to appreciate the sights around the course.
I was aiming to stay with the 4h 15m pacers but after every aid station you’d have to weave your way through the congestion to regain contact with the pacers. AS the race progressed It became so warm that missing a water stop just wasn’t an option.
After nearly 3 weeks indulgence on a cruise ship I was not in condition to run a strong time but – despite the race challenges – this was still a super cool way to sign-off my Scandinavian holiday…
