Team South Devon

I had done Endurance Life events before: Dorset, twice, to be precise. Both races had been tremendous challenges. The course is rated by the organiser as “extremely difficult”. But I do look back to them with fondness and even a bit of pride. When it came to deciding on my first marathon in 2022, ideally in the UK to avoid additional travel complexities in the time of an ongoing pandemic, the South Devon Marathon seemed to be a perfect choice. Who does not like some stunning scenery, nature, fresh air and a bit of a challenge? And the difficulty was only level 4 – if Dorset with a 10 was extremely difficult, 4 can’t be that bad, right? Strange though, that this terrain, once I started, did not feel that much less difficult than Dorset. Double-checking the ratings at the point of writing shows Dorset is a 5 – which must be the highest level and puts a different meaning to a rating of 4. But all of this was yet hidden from me, when I thought of it as a success to show up at the start line and to be not too worried about a cloudy forecast (thank God, not rainy) at 10 degrees (perfect), but with gale warnings (oh no!).

I did start slow though, my legs felt achy and I did not want to overdo it. But then, slowly, I got the hang of it. The terrain was extremely difficult, even when hiking. Some rocky paths were so close to the cliffs that I had to avoid locking down. I have a bit of vertigo. Sticking to a group of runners makes you feel like a team, it does not matter when you have to wait a bit at gates and narrow paths. However, after 10k in I felt somehow stronger and started to overtake more runners. Instead of walking uphill, I fell into a light jog, downhill it was pure joy. This experience of just letting go and letting the feet find their way, it was awesome. Especially being surrounded by a fairy-tale-land environment – surreal! Until half point at 22k (this marathon was with 44.5k slightly longer). My body decided enough is enough and went on strike. The legs felt like hurting jelly, the thought of pushing forward seemed to be insane. Reality check: It took me 2:45 hours while feeling fresh. How am I supposed to do another 22k in this physical condition? And then I thought I read about a 6:45 cut-off. The idea of pushing forward just to end up with a DNF (did not finish) felt unbearable. While I was stumbling forward, my thoughts got darker and darker. Eventually, I reached checkpoint 2, where Team South Devon started to form and saved the day!

Just before the checkpoint, I was overtaken by this lady with a little black Collie type of dog. His name was Jim, who seemed completely unfussed by the fact that there were 25k behind and another 17 in front of him. When I tried to make contact with the owner (Alice, as it turned out), to find out what is wrong with this dog, the simple answer was: “Oh, he just lives in the moment.” Great inspiration. Shouldn’t we all? At the checkpoint, I tried to get behind the myth of the cutoff at 6:45. No one seemed to have heard of that: “Oh, you gonna be fine. They just put it in there to scare off certain types of runners.” Another guy said: “What, you are thinking of dropping out? How can you with this great scenery around you? Just enjoy the walk!” And so I carried on joining Alice and Jim, the dog, for a bit.

Running time is so much better spent in company. I swapped marathon race tips with Alice, and when I eventually fell back I thought, well, only 14k left, let’s see who else overtakes me. Then there was this marshall who mysteriously rocked up at least 5 or 6 times during the course. “Well done, team, looking strong!” Still leisurely walking I looked back wondering who he meant. There was none. “You mean me?”, I said. He laughed and I took some of the wine gums he offered. He previously referred to the runners as “team”, I only always thought he meant someone else. “Team South Devon” became my motto for the rest of the run!

After Alice and Jim there came guy #1. He overtook me downhill, only to revert to walking just ahead of me, when there was another hill to climb. Walking up the gap closed slowly until I walked next to him. Guy #1 was in for the ultra-distance (10k extra) but thought he would stop once the marathon is done. He had enough. I understood, felt in good company and told him the story of when I did drag on doing the ultra-distance in Dorset. I had felt a bit coldish (that was in 2017, when I was a different kind of runner). The only thing that made me do it, was the threat of having a DNF (did not finish) in my race record. Back then the organisers showed no mercy transferring my race sign-up from ultra to marathon, so a DNF would had been the result. To date I don’t have a DNF. Guy #1 said, he was beyond caring about stuff like that. Far enough.

Which leads us to guy #2. Once he walked up next to me, I asked him what his story was. I got a confused look. I said, I am collecting stories to keep up my morale and so he shared: When he got ready this morning, a car blocked his car, so he couldn’t get out. Eventually the pub owner (no clue how he showed up at 7am on a Saturday morning, but hey) identified this to be the car of a regular, who sometimes leaves his car keys at the till. And voila, the keys were there. This episode resulted in guy #2 being 20 min too late to the start and as a result almost running the thing on his own. But he still looked strong and eventually jogged off.

Then there was female runner #2, who overtook me with walking sticks and an attitude of determination. She asked: “And what is your injury?”. Oh no, I had definitely entered the league of the invalid! I hesitated, then said: “My head.” She laughed (wow, as a German, I made an British person laugh! Dear diary material!). And then she told me about her terrible neck injury and how she is bouncing back and trying to do the ultra-distance in under 6:45 to qualify for something else. Once I couldn’t keep up with her anymore, there were only 8k left – and the last checkpoint, where the outstandingly friendly organiser team again excelled with kindness and encouragement. Go, team Endurance Life! You are the best!

I continued and eventually female runner #3 was closing up on me, and I held a gate open, thinking, how strong and unfussed she looked. Then I turned away, not wanting to bother her with my secret Team South Devon strategy… “Roy?”, I heard her saying my name. Female runner #3 turned out to be Francesca from the London Tube Runners group, which I had joined for runs lately. We did the same London Canal Loop run in January, which makes you official running buddies! She was in for the ultra-distance. Somehow, I fell back into a jog and managed to keep up with her for a few kilometres, chatting along as you do with someone you know. It was so great and when I eventually had to admit, I need to revert back to walking, there were only 4km left.

4 kilometres that included: passing my car in the parking lot (who are the sadists that planned that route!), climbing up and down that “easy 1.2 miles walking distance between car park and start line” and eventually an extra stretch of 1k or so, which was needed to allow us crossing the finish line in reverted direction to the start. Lovely touch, huh? Half a mile more or less, who cares? Well, I did, but I was beyond getting wound up about it. My marathon wisdom proved once again to be true: if you don’t stop, you will eventually finish. Only this time it took a lot of help from Team South Devon, the true winner of this race and the reason I did not stop. Feeling very grateful! Thank you all!