Record team time on Belfast marathon
George Munroe Wed 08 May 2013 updated: Fri 03 Oct 2014
The weather was perfect for it... not too hot, light breeze, and only a sniff of rain that came to nothing.
Michael worked his way towards the top athletes at the starting line and crossed it less than a minute after the gun.
Steady pace right through the first two stages to hand over to Adrian at Hillview street and the start of what is unarguably the hardest leg of the relay up the gruelling Antrim Road hill.
Glen, Michael's neighbour's son and 35 years our junior, joined the race here also, taking advantage of our spare race bibs to fulfill an important plan and pace us old ones as a bonus.
Glen went sailing past George at Gideon's Green one hour later and George set off in hot pursuit. They both caught the 4 hour race completion marker runner with his purple balloon after 10 minutes.
A consistent stubborn hammering the tarmac for another 70 minutes or so saw us cross the finishing mats with a time of 3:51:10 on the big clock above the line. The best one yet!
A wonderfully restful afternoon at Cutters afterwards, settling for extra pints and sauce smothered burgers rather than venturing up the stairs to the restaurant. A great time was had by all before heading off 6 hours later for a well deserved early night :-).
Next challenge is Lisburn half marathon/10K/fun run on Wednesday 19 June.
Big thanks to everyone who has donated so generously so far. Almost £1200 for Marie Curie to date. If you haven't given anything yet and would like to then just visit the following web page:
http://virginmoneygiving.com/classof76
Hopefully see some of you in Lisburn—feel free to join the team and help raise more by taking part in any of the runs on 19 June (fun run is easy :-).
