The drive to Inverness for the Loch Ness Marathon was a good indicator of what was to come; it was staggeringly beautiful and it was a very long way! Rather than stay in Inverness itself, I chose to stay about 45 minutes away in Aviemore where the hotels were plentiful and guaranteed family friendly. However, as the kids headed off to the pool and I started my 90 minute journey just to register I began to think the Aviemore plan may have been a mistake. I suppose mandatory registration the day before an event is intended to create a buzz around the event village, but I could happily live without it.

Having picked up my race number I headed back to Aviemore where I ate as much pasta as I could stomach before heading to bed for an early night. Morning came far too soon. Maximum effort on fuelling and hydration coupled with some pre-race nerves meant a queasy start to the day, and judging by the queues for the portaloos at the bus park I was not alone in enduring an upset stomach!

It is a cruel ‘feature’ of the Loch Ness Marathon that all runners are bussed from the centre of Inverness to the start line high in the hills on the south side of the loch. Nothing quite emphasises the huge distance about to be run like being driven the entire length of the course before the start. The sense of collective foreboding added to the camaraderie onboard the rickety old double decker though, and throughout the journey runners made new acquaintances whilst swapping wine gums and war stories from training .

The start of the race is almost comically remote; a sense only amplified by seeing the empty buses drive off back to Inverness. At this point there is literally no going back. As Bryan Burnett rather too gleefully says in the promotional video filmed on the start line, ‘the only way back to Inverness is 26 miles that way’. Even though the weather was relatively mild, the start is high and exposed. I had a space blanket that I was extremely thankful for. There were plenty of people not so well equipped, and by the time the gun went some of them had taken on a quite unnatural blue hue.

By the time we started everyone was thankful just to be running at long last. The first section is sharply downhill, which was quite painful on cold muscles and joints. However, spirits were high and the banter good. The positive vibe certainly lasted for the first 10 miles, all of which are downhill with a total descent of over 300m. Those first 10 miles are disarming. It is very hard to judge how things are going when you aren’t being made to work for the miles. A marathon is a long way though, and it transpired there would be plenty of opportunity to work hard!

The section between 10 and 17 miles is flat along the loch side. My focus in this section was simply to hold a reasonable pace to tick the miles off one by one and break the back of the race. This proved to be a very sociable stretch and I fell into conversations ranging from post race meals to Scottish Independence, and all without a cross word being said!

At my level, a marathon is always going to go wrong. It is just a matter of when. A quick glance at the profile of the race makes it abundantly clear where the ‘having fun/not having fun’ transition is most likely. At 17 miles there is a long, relentless hill that just keeps giving as the route begins to track inland. Cruelly, the hill arrives at just the point most amateur marathon runners are beginning to feel a bit wobbly. Suddenly the reassuring constant pound of a running stride broke into a punctuated run/walk as literally everyone was broken by the hill. I found this section very difficult. I never fully recovered my lost rhythm with the result that the last 8 or 9 miles became a survival wobble. As I came into Inverness itself over the last mile or so, the wobble became more determined, but all style had gone and this was now a run powered by grimace.

I’ve never known a finish straight to feel shorter than it is, and the finish on the banks of the River Ness was no exception. I finally finished in a ‘tunnel vision trot’ 4 hours and 35 minutes after I started, cheered over the line by my wife and girls. I was very happy to finish, but I probably felt more relieved than elated.

After any endurance event I always find myself asking 2 questions:

• Would I do it again?
• Could I have done it faster?

Never say never, but I can’t imagine doing the training for a marathon again unless it was for a very specific target, such as a four hour time. And that wouldn’t be easy. I trained relatively hard for this marathon and I was nowhere near prepared enough to run it well. I ran the first half in 2 hours, which was exactly what I expected. In the second half I imploded and lost 35 minutes, which again is exactly what I expected. The easiest way to go faster would be to not implode in the second half, but that would require so much more training at the 3 hour plus mark that it would take over my life. In short, I could go faster, but it would require a lifestyle change and a dedication to the cause that I’m not sure I’m ready to give.

But that is a debate for another day. For now all that matters is on the bucket list it says – marathon: tick!