18 April 2004

Flora London Marathon

Marathon training is attritional and as a consequence of injury and illness nine of our twelve original entrants (including two husband and wife teams) made it to the wet and windy start line of the 24th London Marathon - not bad going all the same for a very small club, and a few of those who did start were less well prepared than they would have preferred to be due to injury etc.

However our intrepid runners were not daunted by the weather and by the end of the day Team East Haddon were "Singing in the Rain" as eight of our runners broke the 4 hour barrier.

Personal best times were recorded by: Bill Messinger who achieved a 16 minute improvement and Tim Dunkley who knocked a whopping 46 minutes off his run at London last year whilst Watkinson & Steve Best (both first time marathon runners), Lindsay Scholey & Rachel Punch (both Dublin Marathon veterans but debutantes at London) not only set personal best marathon times but for good measure achieved personal best times for the half marathon. There were superb efforts from our secretary Lynne Watkinson, our veteran marathoner and team president Peter Taylor and Kim Messinger who beat Jeffery Archer by several minutes and enjoyed the worst of the weather for her troubles! Other notable results came in the ladies race where Lynne Watkinson finished 341st and Lindsay Scholey 656th.

So it was all smiles on the way home - courtesy of the transport generously provided by the Gerald White Group, Kislingbury and Abington Vehicle Rentals, Northampton, driven and navigated by two other Team East Haddon London Marathon veterans - Jamie Scholey and Mark Watson - who had abandoned their trainers for the day to get us there/ back home safely (with plenty of toilet stops) and carry the bags!