Sunday 20 February - Seville

Where's Bertie? Slightly to his surprise, he's still at the Aire in Seville.
Weather: Less cloud than forecast and warmer too.

Six years ago today we visited the archaeological museum in Seville, on our way stumbling across the Seville Marathon in progress. The seed of taking part was planted in Mick's head, and with his age marching rapidly towards 70 he decided that if he was going to break his marathon PB (set in 2010), then he needed to get on with it, and why not in Seville?

Of course, there was the small hiccough of Covid, such that when Mick bought his entry last October we didn't know for certain that we would be able to get here, but travel restrictions seemed to have calmed down enough for us to have a reasonable level of optimism. Then along came Omicron and the ban on tourism to France combined with all ferries to Spain being booked up to the gunwhales. Mick continued diligently to train, but as the French border closure dragged on, our optimism waivered. We knew that we could leave home in the middle of February and still get here in time, but also knew that it would be less than ideal not to have any time to acclimatise to the temperature. Would we have jumped on a plane had push come to shove? Probably not.

Anyway, today was marathon day, we were in the right city, and all that lay between Mick and his medal was the small matter of 42.2km of running (or 43, if you don't take the racing line...).

Daylight was barely seeping into the day as we stepped out of Bertie this morning, but we could already hear the sound system in action at the start/finish line (I bet that delighted everyone at the Aire who thought they were going to get a Sunday lie-in). I suppose it wasn't very far away as the crow flies, but was 2.5km by road.

We joined the hordes heading to the start, where with 15 minutes until the gun I waved Mick off to find his starting pen. By good fortune, he had thought to activate the 'Live Tracking' function on his watch, which made the rest of my day much easier. Instead of standing on various streets wondering if I'd missed him, and having to stare intently at the passing runners the whole time, I could take a look at my phone and see exactly where he was. 

Live tracking - a most handy thing!

Thus, I spent my day variously cycling and walking around the city to stand on various street corners to cheer him on. Whilst there were crowds of people milling around that I had to weave my way through, most of the roads in the city had been closed to motorised traffic, making junctions quicker to cross (although I noted that many people still waited for the green man, even where the roads were closed), and giving the option of doing things like riding up the wrong side of dual carriageways.

Looking relaxed and happy at 12km in

The first time I saw Mick was at 12km, when (as you'd hope!) he was looking relaxed and happy. The second time was at 22km when he said he was struggling a bit with a tight muscle in his groin. When I saw him again only a few kilometres later I could see he was leaning to one side. This was not good! I'm not sure my words of encouragement were overly helpful ("Only 20km to go!", "Just 3 parkruns to go!" "You're looking much better than lots of people I've seen" (the latter was not a lie)).

Probably the best part of the course, as it takes a little looping detour around the fountain at the Plaza de España

Alas, for the second half of the course he had to stop at increasingly frequent intervals to stretch the cramping groin, which scuppered him from achieving the time for which he was aiming. On the plus side: 1) he finished! What a star!; 2) he felt a lot better at the end than he did last time he ran a marathon; 3) He *didn't* go out too fast; 4) His calf held out!! (this is worthy of more exclamation marks, but I shall be restrained); 5) He ate enough that he didn't lack energy at any point. In fact, he reports that cardiovascularly and muscularly (save for the groin) he felt fine.

It was getting a bit warm by the time he finished.

The finisher approaches, finishers' goody-bag in hand and medal around his neck.

His chip time was 5:00:48.

When, within five minutes of him finishing, I said that he just needs to sort out the groin, do some strength work in that area to prevent a repeat and come back and give it another go next year, he didn't either dismiss the idea or say that he would think about it later. I have every confidence that if he can get through both training and the marathon without injury, he can still beat his 12-year old PB.

I lent him the bike to get back to Bertie.

The rest of the day has mainly involved eating and drinking (for both of us; I severely undercatered for my own food and drink today), and whilst we had planned to leave Seville this afternoon, purely for the ease of driving out of the city in the quiet of a Sunday, when it came to it neither of us could be moved to move. We will, however, be off in the morning. We've a rendezvous 500km away in a few days' time.