Liverpool Rock n Roll Half Marathon (and 1 mile run!)

Two Sundays ago (still catching up!) was a big day for Andy, due to run his first half marathon (well, first since his twenties anyway!). He'd chosen the Liverpool Rock n Roll Half Marathon, mainly because of it's flatness, although the bling was not bad either!

Since his race started at 9am in Liverpool it meant an ultra early morning start for us from Cumbria. We were up by 4am and out of the house by 5am. Managed to get to Liverpool and find the car park at the waterfront by 7am so we were quite early. We managed to find the tent where I could collect our running numbers from and then it was just a case of having a look round and waiting till Andy was due to start.

There were over 12,000 people in the half marathon, according to the corale numbers, Andy was in the 12,000-12999 corale and it took him about 17 minutes to reach the start line! We managed to spot him though for a quick photo on his way out.

We met up with my friend L and her son who had arrived from afar to take part in the one mile event. We had a mooch round, trip to the loos and checked out the Echo arena which was where the half marathon and marathon runners were due back in. At 10am the marathon runners were set off, then we headed to the start area after checking in our bags.

We had several minutes of being entertained at the start line, the compere got everyone waving their arms from side to side above their head and lo and behold Sam started doing it too! Just before we set off Sam was handed a foam mohawk as well which he enjoyed till we got going.

William paused to wait for Sam and I for a few seconds then was off and running. Sam decided to mostly walk the first half but managed a gentle jog for the return journey. We headed out of the dock, onto the main road and down to the Liver building where we turned and did a loop at the waterfront and back again.

William was waiting for us when we got back, having finished a full 6 minutes ahead and collected his medal. According to his running watch he managed his fastest mile so far, 9min 40secs! Sam and I got our medals and then we all headed back to the Echo arena to collect our bags and wait for Andy to come in.

We didn't have to wait for too long! He finished in 2.00.13 according to his garmin! Unfortunately there must have been a chip timing malfunction as his official chip time came back the same as the clock time. He received a tech t-shirt, goody bag and fab medal.

We didn't stay too long as Sam was getting a bit worked up with the crowds that were growing as the runners were coming back in. Andy is definitely considering doing this run again next year (if only because you get an extra medal for just coming back a second year!).

Shiny, shiny bling!