Dublin Marathon

After getting only a few hours sleep due to getting to the hotel late and its location in the bar district of Dublin, I was surprised I woke up at the first alarm at 6:20am on a Monday Morning. I had planned various alarms on my mobile, alarm clock and a wake up call.

The hotel was only a short walk to the start and more importantly the finish.

The start was in a different location this year which only had about dozen toilets and there was 10,000+ runners, so the queue's were long. As I had got there relatively earlier I was at the start line with a few minutes to spare although I guess a lot were not. However as a chip timing device was used you would get your time from crossing the start to the finish.

This year after about 1 mile the route was slightly different as it went across the main bridge and up the main street in the city before rejoining the previous year's route. There was some strange looks from some tourists who had not realised it was taking place.

The course then went past the back of the zoo and through phoenix park which was about 8 miles. There was then a few short inclines and a short steep hill which I had to walk up the last half of both of these due to my leg muscles being sore from Saturday's race. From then on I walked up most other inclines so I was able to complete the race.

I was at roughly the same pace for the next 12 miles until a few miles when I slowed down as I walked up some inclines and through the aid stations to make sure I got the required nutrition.

During this race I tried a different make of salt replacement capsules for the first time which I was ok with and I think did help me in addition to the gels I had with me as well as the nutrition available on the route.

Then with about 2 miles to go I picked up the pace, possibly due it being my 50th mile during the weekend and mentally being a big target to go through. Then in the last half mile I picked up the pace even further.

I ended up with a time of 4 hours 30 minutes which I was pleased with due to the race on Sunday and I completed a double marathon weekend.