I’ve been a bit late posting, but yes, I did complete the Big Half 2025, despite the curveballs thrown such as tube strikes and er.. the heat, and maybe being a bit quick for the first few miles.

It was a great atmosphere on the day, organisation was smooth, despite being a bit worried I might be late due to having the extra distance to walk and less frequent trains etc I made it to my starting pen on time.

As we waited, we could hear the count downs and cheers for first the wheelchair athletes starting then the elite and other starting groups. The route from the start looped around Canary Wharf, through Wapping then back to same road as starting point, so around 6.5 miles in. It was amazing to see the elite wheel chair athlete David Weir whiz past halfway through his race before we’d even started.

The Canary Wharf section of the route is quite twisty and tracking watches lose signal so pace etc goes a bit astray. I was feeling confident at the start and was keeping up with the 1:45:00 pacer, but when we hit the cobbles at Wapping around mile 5 / 6 I dropped back in pace.

It’s so cool to do an event that crosses the iconic Tower Bridge in London, which was lined with supporters cheering – and some charity groups. It was a shame the Blood Cancer UK couldn’t make it to their spot but their support in the run up to the event was excellent as usual. The team running on the day in London raised towards £40,000 for the charity. I did only see one other team jersey at the start, giving the other athlete the nod, good luck to receive a confused look back “who is this stranger…” until she spotted the same shirt.

It’s fair to say from mile 8 to 11 was a bit of a slog. I think it’s that the route feels like one long straight compared to the first 6 miles north of the river. It was warm also which also plays on the mind. Coming into the finish from after 11 to Cutty Sark was more encouraging, there were more crowds and spotting the masts from the famous ship gave a boost.

The finish was efficient, drink some protein yoghurts, lucozade, congratulating messages from the volunteers and the bag pick up was quick.

The plan was to meet two other chums running Dale and Lawrence after the event. We all started at different times hence the wait (and ok, I was faster… 🙂 ) so we were able to chill for a bit, have beer before heading home.

My chip time was: 1:54:27 and my tracked time was: 1:53:30 so happy overall with the sub 2 hour half marathon time.

The fast first half gave me a bit of a boost a couple of weeks later, as on Sunday 21st I ran in the Shoreditch 10k with the Run2Drink gang – recording a new personal best of 0:47:15 over the 10k distance.

Next up – UK Cycling Events Peaks 100 miles on Saturday 27th with buddy Phil. This is going to be hilly! Also, I’ve signed up for the Hertfordshire Half on November 2nd which starts / finishes in Knebworth House – so a local (ish) one.

Thanks again to all who donated to my fundraiser for this, I and the team at Blood Cancer UK appreciate this very much. The week after this event, I had my annual check up. All signals in normal range – next check up in 6 months!

Namaste!