Extracts from Running on Empty
It's A Dog's Life
I had many many funny experiences when training for the marathon, but probably my funniest occurred on a mountain in Spain while running with my friends' nutty dog, Toffee. So here for your delectation and delight is an account of said run. And if I can manage it a photo of said nutty dog to accompany my tale.
I should also point out here, that I am rather phobic about dogs...
“Toffee! Where are you going you stupid animal. Wait there!” I panted, redfaced and sweating staggering after my friend’s stupid mutt. I was halfway up a mountain in Spain and it had seemed like a good idea to take their dog out for a run. I hadn’t factored on either the intense heat (it was early evening, but still very warm), the difficulty of running up a hill that seemed relatively easy to walk up (the downs were going to seem a doddle after this) or the fact that Dave and Heli’s daft animal had led me astray.
The village where my friends were living is high in the Alpujarran mountains in southern Spain. It is a tiny village, with a mere 600 inhabitants, so the idea of getting lost in it seemed almost laughable. We had strolled up this way a couple of times already, and I knew that when I started on the downward stretch of my run, I eventually hit a little alley, which should take me down the side of their house. I use the word should advisedly of course. I had reckoned without the intervention of Toffee.
Toffee is a quite insane creature that my friends got off a farmer. Spanish animal husbandry being what it is, he only survived being beaten over the head with a spade (the fate of his siblings) because he was the runt of the litter and hid in the back of the cave where he was born. The farmer took Dave and Heli to see him, and he became part of their family.
I may have mentioned before that I am a little wary of our canine friends. Actually a little is putting it mildly. I am practically phobic. I blame my mother who for years regaled us with the story of the nutty dog they took in for a while which ripped her best dress up. It was before I was born, so I never met said nutty dog, but the tales entered somewhere deep into my psyche and took root. So much so that I have been frightened of dogs all my life.
Since I met Dave, he has been trying very hard to persuade me that dogs are man’s best friend. And he has partially succeeded in that I can at least now bring myself to pat one. We did make an agreement that when I got a baby he’d get a dog, but er – four babies later we don’t seem to have got on to the dog part. The trouble is of course, that if we got a dog, it would be muggins looking after it.
Bearing all this in mind, I had been somewhat anxious on our previous visit to Dave and Helen to discover that they had got all dogged up as it were. But apart from a nutty tendency to bark every time anyone comes to the house (Heli lived in fear of her Spanish neighbours poisoning the dog because their dogs are so beaten into submission they never bark) and an even nuttier tendency to run after cars and mopeds, Toffee is an incredibly docile creature. And I found I actually liked him.
So when I mooted going for a run and Heli suggested Toffee accompanied me, I didn’t spurn the idea in the way I would have normally. In fact, I thought it might be a good idea, just in case I ricked my ankle or something. Toffee wouldn’t be your ideal rescue dog, but he might just do the trick in the event of an emergency.
We set off around seven, leaving Dave, Dave and Helen in charge of the offspring.
“I won’t be too long,” I said in a cheery manner, thinking that at most I’d be about half an hour. Steph and Christine were still sufficiently small to cause maximum havoc in the early evening and I knew Dave wouldn’t thank me for leaving him with such chaos to handle.
On the way up the mountain, I encountered several bemused villagers, out for their Sunday constitutional, who were evidently not used to seeing redfaced sweating English women panting through their village.
I staggered past them, and reached a stream, rather wishing like Toffee I could just lie down in at and wriggle around to get cool. It was a mistake to go running in the evening. The heat from the day was still overwhelming and the top of the path looked a horribly long way off. What had I been thinking?
Eventually I reached the turning point, where the path widened out and flattened off. I wasn’t yet going down hill, but at least I could run at an even pace. Well, I should have been able to if I hadn’t then got wussy about the boulders and rubble lying en route. I was sure I was going to trip over one and take a tumble, so I cautiously jogged along at snail’s pace, which made my usual running speed look positively herculean.
Toffee meanwhile would run miles ahead, and then come barking as if to say, Come on, slowcoach, what are you waiting for? He also had a disconcerting tendency to dart off the path when he found an interesting smell to follow. I have no idea what he was looking for – rabbits, perhaps? – but he would take those moments to dawdle and then get extremely cross with me for running on.
The path we were following was wide and broad, and had I not been worried about tripping over my toes, I might have actually got some kind of pleasure out of looking across the valley at the fantastic views, but thanks to total paranoia at the idea of breaking a limb or two, I kept my head firmly focussed on where my feet were going instead.
It is a funny thing about running when you don’t know the way, but it always takes you longer then you think it’s going to. A walk that had seemed no distance, because I had been meandering along chatting with our friends and picking Steph up every time she fell in the dirt, suddenly seemed endless, now I was out here on the mountain alone with a dog and the odd goat.
Eventually habitation hove back into view, and I realised we were at the top of the village.
“Come on boy,” I said to Toffee, “take me home.”
It was at this point, whatever smell Toffee had been following suddenly seemed to be the most interesting thing in the world, so he went haring off at the speed of light.
At somewhat less then the speed of light, I started to follow him, assuming he knew the way. Wrong!
After a few minutes it dawned on me that we were nowhere near the alleyway by Dave and Heli’s house in fact we were in a part of the village I didn’t recognise at all. It seemed utterly crazy in such a small place, but somehow we were lost. The trouble is all the houses are painted white, all the roads are an intersecting connection of small alleyways which all look the same, and before long you are going round in circles. I was never any good at mazes.
Toffee was no help either. Every time I said, “Come on boy, take me home,” he would dart off confidently down another alleyway, barking wildly, before I discovered that he had no intention of taking me anywhere near home, but was simply in hot pursuit of a cat.
Mindful that Heli was having enough trouble with the neighbours as a result of Toffee’s barking habits, I was beginning to get quite desperate, as I had visions of being pursued by irate villagers with spades, determined to finish what the farmer had failed to do.
Then, miraculously we came across a building I recognised – it was a set of apartments being built by the richest family in the village, and Dave and Heli had pointed it out the previous day. I felt sure all I needed to do was go towards the right of the little square and start heading downwards.
Except once again I had reckoned without Toffee.
He spotted a cat in the middle of a group of teenagers hanging out around the corner of the square where I was headed (I have to confess by now I wasn’t doing much running), and went haring into the middle of them barking wildly.
Deciding that this wasn’t going to be good for Toffee/villager relations, I decided to back track and go in the opposite direction. So off we set once more, and I quickly found myself seriously lost. I came upon dead end after deadend, and decided the only thing to do was to get down the mountain again. Surely sooner or later I would find the main village square and get my bearings.
With a distinct lack of paths to go down, Toffee followed his basic instincts yet again, and went for where the water was. A rather lovely feature of my friends’ village is the fact that there is running water, everywhere, which comes off the mountains in the spring when the snow melts. It tumbles down the hillside in the form of little underground streams, known as asakeas. And it was one of these that Toffee took me down now. It was incredibly steep and slippery, so I abandoned all pretence of running and scrambled down in the most dignified way that I could muster.
By the time I had got down I was soaking wet, had aching legs and was thoroughly bored of this running business. However, the good news was, down the alleyway opposite me I could just make out the town bus stop. Hurrah! I knew where I was.
Toffee evidently did too, as he shot out in front of me at a hundred knots. Where the buses were, would be cars. And that meant chasing . It was too much for him to resist.
Feebly shouting, “Toffee! Stop!” I stumbled after him and then heard the sounds of a motorbike roaring to a halt, and a lot of excited shouting in Spanish.
Holy shit! I’d got my friends’ dog run over. Heli would never forgive me.
I raced round the corner, to find Toffee looking none the worse for wear, if a little cowed by the angry Spaniard’s manic gesticulating. Knowing no Spanish beyond, Hola! And Dos cervezas, por favor, I just nodded weakly, and said to Toffee, “Come on boy, let’s get you home before there’s any more trouble…”
I had such a great day the day I ran the marathon, and here is my account of how it happened...
APRIL 17 2005
Such a Perfect Day!
The weekend was brilliant right from the start. Saturday was totally mad with ballet lessons, Alex had started gym club (over lunchtime inconveniently) and Christine had a party. So of course we were dashing about and I didn’t get a chance to a) sit down or b) eat sensibly. Hmm. Somewhere in the marathon training programme it says rest up....!!
Ginia and Chris arrived in the afternoon, and then it was
really exciting packing our kitbags and liaising over the phone with various family members as to where we would all meet up. The boys were just going to come to the end, but on discovering that two of my sisters and one of my brothers would be at Docklands, they decided to go there too.
We sat down with the kids and watched Dr Who (rapidly becoming a family event in our household – the only must-see TV of the week), before having a light pasta supper and off to bed. I was thoroughly confused about diet during all of this, I must say, as I couldn’t seem to get any sensible advice anywhere. And the one thing I had been sure, of drinking lots of water, suddenly seemed to be a no-no too, as several people the previous year had drunk too much, and were very ill. How would I know if I had had enough? To say my head was reeling was putting it mildly.
Although Ginia and I both went to bed early, neither of us slept very well -so we were both up at six, trying to force food down our churning stomachs. Dave nobly took us to Morden (unbelievably on Marathon Day, Epsom had no trains running to Waterloo!), where we saw several other runners too. It’s great having the kitbags, because you spot them all!
We got to Greenwich around eight, the sun already shining, though there had been a frost, and it felt pretty cold still. Then I made a big mistake. Because we had forgotten the water, we needed to get a drink, but we didn’t have quite as much time as I had hoped, and I needed the loo. So Gin went off to get drinks, and I queued for the loo – only we missed each other. And then spent the last forty-five minutes before the race started trying to find each other.
I was absolutely hysterical, as Ginia had been my rock throughout this, and I couldn’t conceive of starting the race without her. While I was frantically searching for her, I ran into my mum friend from school – incredible given the crowds. That gave me heart – if I could find Sarah, maybe I could find Gin. She didn’t have a mobile, but I did – and eventually I got a message to say that she was at the pagola, which I dismally failed to find. I decided to shove all my gear on the lorries which take your kitbags to the finish for you and suddenly they were calling everyone to the start. I had to go. I was just on the phone to my mum, wailing that I still couldn’t find her, and miraculously there Ginia was. So I promptly burst into tears in an emotional start to a very emotional day all round. My mum meanwhile was telling me to turn the phone off…
It took us ten minutes to cross the line, and the time as we walked through was ten o’clock, which was handy as I took fifteen minutes of the clock time as I went round to work out how long I had been running for. The atmosphere from the off was fantastic. People clapped and cheered, they played music, and we really felt we were part of something amazing. We walked for the first mile and then started running. I was desperate for a drink, which we got around mile three, but then equally desperate for the loo. Ginia had the bright idea of using a pub as the loos en route were so busy, and then we were off again.
This being Sarf London, children lined the route offering high fives as we went – and there were families partying in their gardens from the looks of things. Loads of the pubs had parties on too, with bands or music playing. Show Me the Way to Amarillo was a constant theme and pretty good to run to. Unfortunately with the heat and the speed we ran to start with it all got a bit much for Gin, so she told me to go on at the five mile point and she would catch up.
I felt ok and carried on. I stopped for a while to go to the loo (this time there were some convenient bushes!), but she didn’t come on so I set off again. I got to the Cutty Sark and felt really great, as I knew that was the seven mile point. The sun was still shining, people I met chatted along the way, and there were still huge crowds along the route. The next three miles to the ten mile point were slow and steady, but I was pleased to do it in 2 hours – which was better then my training time. I then found I was running along a bit I had run along when I did the Flora 10k about twelve years earlier, which was great as its always easier to run when you know the way.
It seemed as though I had got to Tower Bridge in no time – and here there was a subtle change of atmosphere – the cheering was louder, the crowds larger. It was a great psychological boost particularly as the halfway mark seemed a bit longer coming then I had hoped. I eventually reached it at 2 hours 36 – again better then training, so I rang my mum who was at home looking after the little ones, which was another emotional moment. Then I rang Dave but couldn’t get through so left a message.
He eventually rang back when I was round mile fourteen, and luckily I heard the phone which was in my bumbag – my bil had rung right at the start to check we had met up with each other, and someone behind me had to point out that my phone was ringing!) Just after that I stopped to put plasters on my blisters, which had started a mile or two earlier. I had thought I could run through the pain, but then remembered that the advice was to get plasters on as soon as possible, which I did and it helped enormously. Though starting again was quite hard. At this point I met some Jesuits dressed as Wombles. As my brother is a Jesuit, I ran and chatted to them for a bit. It is a testament to the way your brain gets totally addled when running long distances that it only dawned on me afterwards that they were dressed as Wombles because they live in Wimbledon…
I then lost the plot a bit as Westferry Road is extremely long, and I missed seeing the fifteen mile mark – so I was somewhat surprised to come across the cheering site set up by my charity. Where am I? I said in some confusion – Near Mile sixteen, they said, which gave me another boost as I was further then I thought. I was about to run on, when I suddenly realised they were all shouting at me to look across the road, and there was my sister Lucy waiting for me. Yet another emotional moment. Luce, I love you, I yelled, giving her a quick hug and babbling incoherently, before running on.
Dave and the others were by Mudchute station, which seemed an unconscionable time acoming, but I got there in the end. I spotted Chris first, and then saw Dave. The children were all sitting on the pavement, and I high-fived them all, kissed my lovely husband, hugged my bil, bro and sis, and was on my way again. I was probably still babbling incoherently, but it was great to see them. When I got to mile eighteen Dave rang to say that Gin had just made it to mile sixteen, which was a relief as I was getting a bit worried that she might have pulled out.
Mile eighteen was my third five mile break, so I did my walking bit, drinking my lucozade sport and eating my raisins. Starting up again was very hard, and this was the toughest bit without a doubt, as it was the five miles I hadn’t done in training. Every mile seemed to take forever, and getting round Canary Wharf seemed endless, although there was one point when the crowds really geed me on – added to which I knew I had eight miles to go till I saw everyone again.
I did run, but at a really plodding pace, and by now had started to catch lots of people walking. The fact that I was still running kept me going. They had all started ahead of me, and now I was catching them up.
For the first time in my life, I really understood the phrase digging deep. It was a bit like when you’re in labour – I went somewhere very deep inside myself and wasn’t aware of anything else but just putting one foot in front of the other. The miles seemed to pass much more slowly, particularly after I had got to twenty-one miles – I kept thinking I must be near the twenty-two mile point, but it never seemed to come. Added to which my brain felt so addled I became incapable of working out how to take quarter of an hour off the actual time to figure out how long it was taking me. So I thought I was about half an hour slower then I was, which didn’t do a great deal for my self belief.
This was the only place I contemplated stopping (Paula’s collapse at that point in the Athens marathon the previous year seems all too believable), but I staggered on, and suddenly miraculously there was the Tower of London. How far is it to the end? I gabbled as I grabbed a drink, and was rewarded with the response that I only had three miles left. The equivalent of running home from Ashtead. Easy peasy. I did my walking routine, ran again for a bit, found some loos under Blackfriars Bridge, and then ran off with renewed vigour out to the 24 mile mark.
From that point on I can honestly say the whole thing became incredibly enjoyable. The crowds clapped and cheered all the way, I seemed to be running faster then I had done throughout the race. Thanks to one of my writing friends I thought of William Marshall (who’s buried in the Temple Church) all the way along the Embankment which was very inspiring, and then I was at the Houses of Parliament and turning right up Birdcage Walk.
I was immensely grateful that Gin had suggested we ran this on our last trip up to London, as I knew exactly how far there was to go. I was still overtaking people, which also felt good, and then I got the fountain outside Buckingham Palace, and the noise from the crowd was deafening – Dave, Chris, Jo, Lucy, Tom and the girls were all cheering themselves hoarse but I didn’t see them. And then I was on the home stretch, the compere was saying that the 30000th runner had just gone through and telling us all to cheer, and I literally raced over the finishing line. I had done it. In 5hrs 28 minutes (so not the fastest time ever). But I had done it.
I promptly burst into tears, to the surprise of the chap next to me, but I was so overcome that I had actually crossed the line, and I so wished Gin had been there with me when we did. She had got me into this mad enterprise, and had kept my spirits up all through our training. We had always intended to cross the line together, and I felt a bit lousy for getting there first
I wandered away from the finish line in a daze, and rang Dave up. “I’ve done it,” I said simply. “I know, we saw you,” he said. As I was chatting someone took my photo, which made me look not a little gormless. I had my time tag taken off, collected my medal and then wandered over to pick up my kitbag. I was so out of it, I was amazed at the speed with which they found my bag wondering how they worked out my number, until it dawned on me belatedly that they could read it on my running shirt...
I rang Hilary as I hobbled very slowly and painfully down to the meeting point at Horseguard’s Parade. Now I had stopped all my muscles were screaming, and I wondered whether I was ever going to walk normally again.
While I waited for the others I met a very hot Scooby Doo who looked more then somewhat dehydrated. It was hard enough dressed in running gear, but in costume?
Meeting up with Dave and the girls was wonderful and I cried all over again. By that time Ginia had also made it through – in an incredibly courageous 6hrs15. After she had left me she had taken off the knee supports she had been wearing which were cutting off the circulation in her legs and making her feel ill. Her knees then swelled up and she had to have first aid twice. She ended up walking a lot of the way – quite frankly I think it’s amazing she finished. I would probably have given up.
As we walked slowly back to Victoria, the last few stragglers were still coming in, and still there were people lining the streets to cheer them. The good-natured support of the crowd was quite staggering and one of many brilliant aspects to what was a perfect day.
Running the marathon was quite simply a magical experience. On a par with my wedding day and the days my children were born. I wouldn’t have missed it for the world. And yes the minute I finished, I knew I wanted to do it again…