Race report by Janet:
On Sunday 13th April, 5 Lostockers took part in the Schneider Electric Paris Marathon. Following months of training and many injuries along the way, the Lostock team of Beverley Atherton McKenna, Lynda Hardman, Greg Kilshaw, Sally McCoy and Janet Rhodes all made it to the start line with great support from team mate, Heather Soden and Sandra Aspinall who accompanied them to Paris to cheer them on. Having all run a marathon in the last few years apart from Lynda, who took on her biggest challenge with a gap of over 13 years since her first marathon.
The marathon started on the Champs Elysees, just past the Arch de Triomphe. Team Green arrived at the start just after 10 am and entered the starting pen with the 4 hour runners. Trying to take it all in, the atmosphere was electric with djs, live music, big screens and motivational messages encouraging us to think about why we were doing this! The start began in small waves and we ran freely for the first few miles, giving us time to look around and settle into the run. The route was breathtaking, winding its way through the many cobbled streets of Paris and passing all the main sights, running along the Seine, by the Louvre, past the Eiffel Tower, in front of Palais Garnier and by Notre-Dame. Not a fast course by any means but a rolling one through beautiful parks and with the most incredible and very noisy crowd support throughout. The support stations were also well stocked with several types of cakes and fruit. It was brilliantly organised and a truly unforgettable experience.
Team Lostock times were: Janet Rhodes finished in 3 hours and 35 minutes, (a PB and a Good for Age qualifying time, finishing 52nd out of 1276 in her age category) Greg Kilshaw completed in 4 hours and 22 minutes (gaining a new PB by 13 minutes), Sally McCoy finished close behind in 4 hours and 28 minutes (84th in her age category out of 324), followed by Beverley Atherton-McKenna in 4 hours and 39 minutes and Lynda Hardman in 5 hours and 14 minutes who both completed inspite of injuries that would have stopped most people even starting a marathon.
Paris was a record breaking marathon and the Worlds biggest one to date with 56,900 runners starting, 51% of whom were first timers, 31% were women and 33% international entrants, The average age of competitors was 37 years and 4 months and its safe to say that all the Lostock team were well above average! The marathon was won by Benard Biwott (2:05:25) from Kenya and Bedatu Hirpa from Ethiopia was the fastest woman (2:20:45) It was also a record breaking charity event with nearly £5 million raised by 6,000 runners supporting nearly 300 charities — a record for charity bibs.
