Everest Marathon 2012

My big news for 2012 was the successful completion of the Tenzing-Hillary Everest Marathon ("probably the most adventurous trail run in the world"), with Jeremy Barber and another 86 international and 75 Nepalese runners. We left the UK for Kathmandu on 14th May where we met up with most of the other international participants for a couple of days of introductions and sightseeing. We then flew to Tenzing-Hillary Airport Lukla (“the most dangerous airport in the world”) and thence spent about 10 days trekking up from Lukla to Everest Base Camp at 5364m altitude. On 29th May, the anniversary of the first ascent of Everest by Tenzing and Hillary in 1953, we ran most of the way back down, to Namche Bazaar at 3446m.

Times varied from just over 3:40 for the fastest Nepali to a bit over 16 hours for the slowest foreigner so our 12:26:20 was perhaps not too bad. Our tea break at about half way accounted for most of the 26 minutes! I probably slowed us down as I was a much less experienced marathon runner – this was my first (and so far only) full marathon – and had very little to eat in the preceding 24 hours due to a stomach problem (I was not alone in this affliction). By contrast, Dave who accompanied Jeremy and me from the tea-break onwards, was the most experienced with 280 marathons under his belt. After the race, we had another couple of days of trekking and a couple more days in Kathmandu. This was a really fantastic experience and I can really recommend it to anyone who’s fit enough for mountain walking – do the trek even if you can’t face the run!

We were back home in time for the tail end of the Queen’s Jubilee weekend – and in my case a hog roast on the Monday afternoon.

The year had started with the realisation that I needed to be fit and ideally do one or two marathons before the Everest Marathon. In spite of some bad weather, I was running 3 times most weeks. Jeremy came to run the Cambridge Boundary Run on 4th March with me with the hope of doing a full marathon; the weather was so cold and wet that we stopped at the half marathon point! The next weekend was the new Cambridge Half Marathon which was a much bigger event – they even managed to sort out the weather. I continued regular running but suffered more very wet events: I missed one fun run and once again opted for the half marathon option in the Three Forts cross-country run on 6th May. Since returning from Nepal, I have continued my fitness runs and competed in a few more races, including 3 half marathons (Heroes Half Bassingbourn and Milton Keynes in June/July and Great Eastern in Peterborough in October) and a couple of 10Ks. I was also in one of the AVEVA teams in the Chariots of Fire charity relay race in Cambridge.

Before the Nepal trip, I was also doing quite a lot of walks including some long ones – the Stonehenge Stomp (about 20 miles) with Jeremy on 29th January, a week in the Peak District in February, and some local walks including the Daffodil Dawdle on 18th March, in which I did a marathon distance in just over 6 hours including stops. I’ve not done many long walks since my return but have just joined the Long Distance Walkers Association to encourage me to do more!