Luton Marathon- risky time of the year

In the entry list we had a women’s team: Fiona Oakes, Anna Finn and Helen Watkinson. As most of you know Fiona is responsible for the Tower Hill Stables Animal Sanctuary and fits in running around her duties. Despite the 400 or so animals to feed and care she manages to train to elite level in the marathon even with a missing knee-cap. She has to race sparingly and cannot be certain of making it on the day due to the needs of the animals. Year 2009 has been a difficult year and Luton was the last chance of registering a result. Alas it was not to be as her partner, Martin points out:

“….. Fiona is flat on her back with suspected Swine Flu. She has been really ill and is absolutely gutted she cannot run tomorrow as she was flying. She has got herself into really good shape, lost a lot of weight, put in so many miles and sessions of speed and really tried hard for Luton and now this. She is not best pleased to say the least! …..”.

Cedric David running his first Marathon heard the news and writes:

“Thanks for passing on the message about Fiona. We all missed Fiona yesterday, it would have been great to have our leading lady to boost our moral!

The results are out: Anna 4.32.59, Helen 4.54.23 and myself 4.25.41.

Apart from some strong wind it was a surprisingly nice and partly sunny day. I had a good race up to that famous hill on lap 3 you told me about at the AGM. After that I was struggling to actually keep running even on the flat bits! My pacing was a disaster. My first two laps were both within 1.20, I lost all on the final 6 miles. I guess it’s all a learning exercise.

Helen had a much more even race and could more or less keep up with her garmin pacer , she just lost a couple of minutes on her last lap. We met Anna that day for the first time, which was very nice. She started the race with a bad leg but fought it through. Very inspirational!

In the relay race we spotted a VRUK vest, I don’t know how it was, but he took some pictures of us when we passed the finish area after our second lap. In case you find out let us know how it was.”

The relay results are not published yet due to the complex recording of results and verification required.