#18 Just me waffling on

Apologies for the lack of quality here, I was bunged up with hay fever! Just a quick one about the official announcement the 2027 London Marathon will run across two days! I also talk about Cape Town becoming a World Marathon Major, which I've also entered the ballot for. I also chatted about Berlin Half, Prague Half and the Summer Spine 268-mile ultra marathon that took place earlier this week.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:03

Hi guys, welcome to episode 18 of the podcast. Um gonna go straight into it. Um it's been confirmed that London Marathon officially will be a two-day event in 2027, uh, which I think is uh brilliant news. Um I got an email uh the other day to confirm it actually. Um so it's gonna take place on Saturday the 24th and Sunday the 25th of April. Um so across both days, um it'll go from a one-day event to a two-day event. So basically, um it says, what does this mean for your ballot entry? Um, your ballot entry will be automatically included in a draw for the Saturday and the Sunday. As you added a donation onto your entry, giving you double the chances, you will now automatically have four chances at securing a ballot place. We will share your ballot result with you in July. So uh, yeah, in terms of that um donation thing, so basically, upon entering the ballot, like you had the option to uh double your chances by paying 50 quid, and if you if your ballot entry is unsuccessful, you get given like a hydration vest that's allegedly worth over a hundred quid. So um what it also means is that a hundred thousand people will run the London marathon across two days. So I think for the London marathon that happened um a couple of months ago, I think it was something like 55,000 uh people ran it and now it's a hundred thousand. So yeah, I think it's a really good thing because it effectively means that like twice the number of people um will get to take part in the London Marathon as opposed to normal, which for me can only be a good thing. Um, however, like um reading some of the comments on London Marathon's announcement, uh, there's quite a lot of negative negativity as there is these days, and you just you know, there's just no pleasing some people. Basically, like the gist of it is like some people are saying, oh, it's it's all about money, um, it's gonna be too disruptive to local people and people, local businesses, and also that apparently because it's gonna be spread out across two days rather than one event, it's gonna like ruin the atmosphere and kill the magic. I just think like while everyone's entitled to their opinion, I do think it's pretty ridiculous and the negativity about this announcement. I mean, like I say, it gives like twice the number of people the opportunity to take part in this amazing event, so how can that possibly be a bad thing? Um someone actually commented about like how you know what if um you and your partner had both entered it and you both get you both get in, but you both do it on on different days. Um and the gist of it was kind of like, you know, if you're spectating all day Saturday and then you've got to run on the Sunday, then the spectating all day Saturday is really hard work. I don't, to be honest with you, like I don't really buy that. I think um if you're stood around watching someone run a race for a few hours the day before you do, it uh it will have absolutely no bearing on your performance whatsoever the following day. I mean, when I did uh Rome Marathon, for example, you know, I did a lot of walking around Rome itself the previous day, and I can tell you it had absolutely zero impact on my performance on race day. Um, you know, if you do end up doing it on different days to your partner or your friends or whoever, I really don't think it matters. Just make it into a full weekend of it and just like support each other one day and vice versa on the other. So yeah, I yeah, I don't I really don't get the negativity towards it. I just think it's a fantastic opportunity for more and more people to take part. It also means that there's like more fundraising opportunities for charities as well, because obviously like charities like heavily rely on the London Marathon for donations and for their income. So to ex you know, to extend the event to two days means like even more charities will get to earn even more donations, and again, that is only a positive thing. Like, how can that possibly uh be a bad thing? I I don't know, but yeah, nevertheless, it's gonna be a really good event. Um, I think this year's event just gone, which I talked about a few weeks ago, was really good, even though I just watched a bit of it on the TV. I definitely would have liked to have been there myself. Um, but anyway, in terms of like uh finding out whether my ballot entry was successful or not, I'll find out I quote early July that they haven't given a specific date uh when the results come out. But yeah, sometime in early July is when I'll find out my fate. Um I'll I will just like um keep entering the ballot every year. You know, if I don't get in, like I'll be gutted, but at the same time, there's not really anything I can do about it. So hopefully I get in fingers crossed. But if not, then we'll try again next year. But speaking of marathons, um Cape Town Marathon as of next year will officially become one of the world marathon majors. So like the Cape Town Marathon has been running for several years, but next year will be its first one as a world marathon major. So um the Cape Town Marathon will take place on the 23rd of May next year, and the ballot came out last week, so I've entered it, and I find out uh next Friday actually, um, whether I get in or not. So um again, like fingers crossed, if I get in, that'll be fantastic. Uh to go to Cape Town and to go to uh South Africa, and uh hopefully I'll get the opportunity to do so. But again, if you know you win some, you lose some. You know, I talked um the other week about how my um Lisbon half marathon uh ballot application got rejected, and they also got rejected from Cardiff, however, um got into uh Valencia, which is in October this year, which um which I've definitely said before, but um literally a few days ago um found out that my ballot entry for the Berlin half marathon got accepted. So yeah, I'm going to Berlin next year. That's on the 4th of April, and that's one of the super halves. So yeah, I've really excited to do that. Um don't know how long I'm gonna go for yet, but I've been to Berlin once, but that was on a stagdo like 10 years ago. Didn't really do a great deal of sightseeing, if I'm being honest, um, as much as I enjoyed the stagdo. So yeah, I'm looking forward to like getting to explore Berlin properly, and what better way to explore it uh than on foot with my running shoes on. But with um Berlin Half Marathon, the Prague Half Marathon takes place on the same weekend actually, and I can't remember which way around it is. I think Prague takes place on the Saturday and Berlin on the Sunday, but I might have got it the wrong way around. But anyway, like a lot of people uh do do both of them. Um but uh rather annoyingly, the Prague half marathon um ballot entry doesn't actually come out until kind of like August or September time, roughly. Um so I'm not gonna like book flights or hotels for Berlin yet until I know my fate for Prague. But basically the plan is um enter the ballot for Prague half marathon, hopefully get in that and then just make a weekend, make a full weekend of it. Yeah, do Prague half marathon one day and then do Berlin uh the following day or vice versa, whatever way round I've whatever way round it is. Um but yeah, that's really exciting. Um I've actually um I've been to Prague like maybe three or four times in the past, but I certainly didn't uh run around it. It was definitely more um drinking beers. Uh and yeah, Czech beer is pretty good, but if I'm being honest, like Czech food is not very good, but the beer is very good, so it's definitely worth going in. Like Prague is a really nice city as well. Um, but yeah, uh hopefully I'll get to do the half marathon there. Um but yeah, in terms of like when that comes out, I don't know, but apparently it's kind of like August or September. So that's where we're at in terms of uh the running. Um next Saturday, supposed to be doing a um a backyard ultra with Maxit, Bishopwood in Selby, so it's not like an actual event. Um it's just kind of like um our own backyard ultra that we're basically uh doing some just like looking at the weather now on the phone, and apparently it's gonna be um it's gonna be like up to 25 degrees with a little bit of a drizzle. Um just having a look. Yeah, a little bit, a little bit of rain, which would actually be very welcome. But I think the plan is to like do it well to start it at like seven o'clock on a Saturday morning, do as much as it as much of it as we possibly can, um, and then watch the England game afterwards. Um so yeah, that's gonna be really good. Hopefully, um I really hope it does rain, by the way, because um, yeah, like this weekend, for example, it's just been far too hot. Um, like I went for a run after work on Friday afternoon, just did like a really easy 5k, and it was just absolutely sweltering. And then yesterday morning I needed to do a uh yeah, a 12k run. Um, but basically, like I did it, I got up at like half five in the morning, and even that early in the morning yesterday, it was so humid, and like I was just dripping with sweat, so it really wasn't uh nice at all. But glad I got the run done, obviously. But yeah, my point is is that when me and Max do our own backyard ultra on Saturday, I really do hope that it does at least rain a little bit, just like cool us down a bit, because there's nothing more brutal than running when when it's this hot outside, it's just really not good at all. But yeah, Rem, I'll let you know next Sunday like how I get on with that one. Um, but yeah, on the subject of the World Cup, I think it's been pretty good actually. Like a lot of the matches have been exciting to watch. The England Croatia game, which England won 4-2. I actually enjoyed watching. It's the first time I've actually found England enjoyable to watch for a for a long, long time. Obviously, they've got a new manager, um, exciting players, but yeah, it's like a really big tournament. Um, but there's a lot of the game, there's probably like at least half of the matches I've not even watched because anything that's like kicked off from like sort of after 10 pm, I've not even like bothered watching. It's just like far too late for me. Like, I need my sleep. I watched the um Germany South Korea game last night, actually. Well, I watched the first half. Um, South Korea led 1-0, and then obviously, like I went to sleep. I didn't even realise until earlier this morning that Germany had apparently won. So yeah, just um yeah, it's been a very good, enjoyable World Cup, but um yeah, these um early morning kickoffs are just not for me. By the way, I apologise if I don't sound too good. Like basically, you've got a stuffy nose like the hay fever has just like hit me for six. So um, yeah, the Pollen count needs to do one, basically. But um another thing I like to chat about actually, there was an ultra marathon earlier in the week called the uh summer spine. Uh so what that is uh or what it was, it's like up the Pennine Way, so it's a 268-mile continuous ultra marathon, so that's the equivalent of running just over 10 marathons, but consecutively. Um 268 miles, so it started um in the Peak District um from a place called Edale in Derbyshire and then up the Pennine Way, and it actually uh went through Penny Gent, uh, one of the Yorkshire Free Peaks in the Dales. And then it finished like just over the Scottish borders. So I can't remember the name, but this like Scottish village artistics, like just over the borders. But yeah, I followed that race um quite a bit. There's um there's an American guy called Andrew Glees, who I follow. Uh follow him on Strava and follow him on Instagram, and he took part in that race, and I think it took him like five and a half days to do or something like that, and he'd been like posting quite regularly on his stories, and yeah, there was like um a lot of bogs, so he was like literally like sort of like knee deep in mud a lot of the time, and he said that he was like hallucinating, it was just like absolutely brutal. But yeah, he did it. In fact, quite a lot of people uh did it. Um there were quite a few DNFs actually as well, and I'm suspecting that a lot of them were down to like maybe like not making the cutoff points like for each um aid station or like for each section, but um yeah, like like I say, like 268 miles just sounds like absolutely brutal. Like the most I've ever run is 40. So to you know, an app for me personally was like brutal enough. So yeah, to have to run like an extra 228, uh I can't even like comprehend it. Is it something that I would consider doing myself in the future? I'd definitely consider it, but it definitely won't be any time soon. I think I need like more um more experience at running ultra marathons. Um but saying that, like um the woman who like won the female um category, um, she won it despite having never ran over 78 miles before ever. So that's like some go in that. But yeah, fair play to like absolutely everybody who did it and took part in it. Um and then yeah, I got an email um this morning actually reminding me that it's like six weeks until um the York 10k, which I'm looking forward to doing. But yeah, in terms of like what I've got coming up, so I'm doing the backyard ultra with Max uh this Saturday at Bishop Wood, then on the uh 19th of July, I'm doing the Ghoul Riverbank Challenge, which I think is a 10k if I remember rightly. It's either 10k or 10 miles, but I'm pretty sure it's 10k. So I'm doing that on the 19th of July, and then York 10k is on the 2nd of August. So that's what I've got coming up um race-wise. It's just good to have a few races like in the calendar just to like give me something uh to focus on. Whatever happen, what actually whatever happens um next Saturday with this backyard ultra that I'm doing, I'm glad I've like said I'm doing it because it's just like giving me something to focus on with my training over the last few weeks, you know. Like what I mean by that is like there's been like a purpose uh to each of my runs rather than kind of just um kind of like doing stuff just for the sake of it. But yeah, I've been like doing my running and doing a few gym sessions and been in the pool a couple of times as well. So yeah, just like mixing up the training a little bit and um really enjoying it. Um there's not much else more to say really today, other than uh tune in next week. If you've got any questions, like comment it below. If you haven't already, then like and subscribe and set your notifications on. So every time a episode does get published published, you'll get a notification on your phone. And hopefully by the next episode, um one, I'll still be alive and two Mahey Fever will hopefully have um gone away. Uh but yeah, guys, thanks for listening. Uh take care, speak to you next time.