Lochness Marathon

Inverness, Scotland is the where the Lochness Marathon ends and wear we gathered ourselves on Sunday October 3rd to board the busses to the start line. Inverness is a beautiful town/city in the north east of Scotland at the north east end of Lochness. We had ventured here after talking about the possiblity of doing this race for a couple of years. Roger and his wife Esther and myself and my wife Joan had flown to London on the Friday before and then Saturday morning flew to Inverness.
The MacLeaniacs (Rick and Tracy) didn't have it quite as easy. Due to Tracy's work schedule they had to fly to London and arrive Saturday morning and then not arrive in Inverness till late Saturday night. We had picked up the race kits and they didn't miss much at the "expo".
We got up early to walk the 2k to the busses taking pictures of nessis on the way.
We (Rick, tracy, Roger and Keith) boarded the busses and waited and by 8 am the busses left for the long journey to... Just where were we going anyway? A stunning bus ride with beautiful views got us to the start line, actually about 1k away or more, in the middle of the scottish highlands with nary a building to be seen anywhere. Something has to be said about the logistics of this race and the great job in putting this together. Bussing 3000 marathoners to a hill in the middle of nowhere, on a road that barely fits a bus is no mean feet. We got off the busses in the cold, wet and windy conditions and there was a beeline for the heather on the hills and the few trees around to relieve ones selves. Followed by a long walk to the baggage drop off trucks and then the port-a-potties, in the middle of a field. Once that was taken care of we realized that it was not long to the start, so we made our way chasing after Roger who seemed more anxious than the rest of us to get near the start. Before we could say.. the gun went off and we were on our way. The first few miles were all down hill (more or less) and with the narrow road and masses of runners it was not possible to do the 10 and 1's we had planned on doing. Eventually at about 2 miles we figured we could walk and did. Roger suggested that 2 miles and 1 minute walks may work better so that's the way we decided to approach it. At 5 miles the first significant hill. . It was shortly after this that Rick dropped off the pace as we were going quicker than anticipated. Considering the journey to get here, it is surprising that any of us were running as well as we did, especially considering the injury problems Roger and myself had endured.
The views continued to be amazing and the light rain continued to fall, perfect conditions. My own injury issues were starting to slow me down a bit and at about 13 miles I told Roger to just go and not worry about me. He gradually pulled away. The 2 miles and 1's went off the rails for me at 15 miles as I took an extended walk break and just as I started to run again I hear Rick behind me. We ran (well almost ran) the rest of the race together. At 18 miles after going through the town of Dores to some unexpectedly racaus support from the town folks, we looked behind and there was Lochness behind us with a panoramic view and the hills on either side (photo op, also known as an excuse for a break).
Follwing this we turned to face the largest hill on the course about 2 miles long (at least it seemded like it). We'd get to the first curve on the hill and think it was almost done and see it go on forever!
We walked the entire hill, all 3, 4 or was it 5 miles? The race was becoming a struggle, but we made the most of it and just enjoyed talking to everyone. We had a laugh at everyone thinking both Rick and myself were called Barrie (hey look its the Barrie's, they would say). When we got to Inverness there was more crowd support and had to run to a bridge to cross the Ness river before doubling back to the finish line. Rick and myself finished in 4 hours and 12 minutes, Roger struggled the last few miles and finihsed in 3:58, not bad for someone who had been told not to even walk a few weeks before.
We then waited for Tracy, as we did so we listened to the announcer talking about the feats of some of the racers, and although admirable they would pale by comparison to what Tracy and Rick had accomplished over the past month or so. So we approached the announcer and let him know, so as Tracy finished he announced that she had completed 5 marathons and one half over the past 5 weeks.
Lochness was a great event in a beautiful location, a challenging course, but recommnded by all of us. Esther and Joan not to be out done, completed the 10k walk and enjoyed being apart of the event too, finishing in 1:25.