For those who came in late *
Hello, I’m Jeff, I am married to Anne, have been for more than 35 years. I also run. I’ve been doing that for more than 50 years. I started at Little Aths and graduated to Knox Athletics club as a sprinter/hurdler. Over time the distances grew and the hurdles got higher until I was more comfortable just running.
Combining an interest in football and running I started boundary umpiring, a pursuit that involves 15-20 km of running per game. Eventually life and stuff caught up and I retired from that and thought about running my first and as I expected only, marathon.
In 2003 a group of us from the athletics club formed a training group with the aim of competing in the Melbourne marathon. In those days the marathon was point to point, Frankston to Melbourne finishing at the Arts Centre. 3 hours and 24 minutes of running with pain, cramps and a certainty that I’d never do that again ensued.
It took a lot of persuading and 5 years before I once again took to the roads, this time as a road trip to Canberra. The lure of running around the National capital and the thought that I could do better were enough. Cooler weather and more training took a whole minute off my previous time. Worse was to come.
We felt there was improvement still to be found and fronted up in Melbourne only to get hit with a warm northerly wind. By now the course had changed to out and back from Melbourne to Beaumaris. Warm but with the wind behind us everything was fine. The moment we turned back into the wind it proceeded to suck moisture out of us. Continually cramping for the last 10 km led to a finish over four hours. We must be better than this!
And so we ran. Our first overseas marathon combined a trip to France, red wine and an introduction to costumes and celebration that comes with Medoc, the marathon through the vineyards of Bordeaux. Yes, you can drink red wine during a marathon. No, you won’t run a fast time. If that’s what you are after you’re in the wrong place but if you want to run and have a good time. Highly recommended.
Fast forward to 2015. Sixteen marathons down, now the high side of 50. PB is 3.12 run in Melbourne in 2010. Looking for a challenge. Boston. One of the major marathons of the world, a hundred years of history and I could run the qualifying time. I’ll write a blog post on each of the major marathons individually but this was the first. Two weeks before we were due to leave Melbourne and Boston is under two metres of snow. Apparently not that unusual unless you live in Australia. Cool, very cool run with a biting wind. The gloves never came off. Ran 3.13. Now hooked on major marathons.
Over the next four years we completed the big six Chicago, New York, Boston, London, Berlin and Tokyo. Also Venice, Valencia and Paris. I’ve also run a marathon in each Australian state and the ACT and the NT. Six Canberras and nine Melbournes. Forty in all.
So what’s the next challenge? This is it. Three major marathons in three weeks travelling around the globe. I’m now 63 years old. I can feel time is catching up. While we can, we will.
* For those who came in late. A reference from the Phantom by Lee Falk