Dartmoor Vale Marathon Race Report by Dave Webb

My book on Running does not recommend spending the night before the marathon watching your country in the Rugby World Cup Final, getting over-excited, struggling to sleep, then getting up at 5.30 to drive to the race. But I am a free spirit, and decided to do all that anyway.

I got to the course in good time, and was able to drive round the route dropping off energy drinks. Reports of the route being fairly flat and dominated by housing estates seemed alarmingly mistaken, hills and countryside being a better description. The race starts and finishes at Newton Abbot race course, which means there is handy parking and plenty of space.

The Marathon and Half-Marathon races start at the same time, but at different places. As we lined up I heard the race director telling someone that she had decided to include some steeper hills so as to give the race a bit more character. How thoughtful of her. The Marathon begins with a mile around the racetrack (on tarmac) before heading out of the arena, so after a couple of miles we began to overhaul the slower Half-Marathoners. The route is fairly flat until 6 miles, when you go up a hill into Chudleigh, which is comparable, but longer, to the main hill on the Taunton route. Around this time there was a slightly tricky combination of more traffic and more runners to overtake. After a brief downhill there is then a much bigger climb up to Ugbrooke Park, followed by some nice countryside until you re-enter the built-up area and run up and down a number of slopes in the housing estates that so irritated Lesley.

As we approached halfway I found myself behind a curious, peroxide blond character whom I had noticed before the race, when he strode bare-chested into the toilets and put his running vest down on the floor by the urinals. Not someone who gives hygiene a high priority, and nor would you describe him as quiet and shy. As I drew closer to him I realised that he was intermittently grunting and shouting. I passed him at halfway, in about 1.34, and he announced that he normally did the first half in 1.25, and he couldn’t understand why he was so slow. He then proceeded to speed up, repeatedly shouting ‘Come On!’ to himself, and I found myself just in front or just behind him for the next 4 miles. At this point I went past him fairly easily, and I heard him shouting after me that his knees had gone.

I now faced the 2 main hills again. I got up the first one OK, but struggled with the second and had to walk part of it, as I passed the 20 mile mark in 2.26. I still felt fairly strong, and reached 22 miles in 2.40, but the climbing had taken its toll and miles 24 and 25 were particularly hard, before I managed to dig in and get a fairly good pace going again for the last mile. I had hoped to get under 3.13, though on seeing the course I realised that might be optimistic. In the event I managed 3.15.35, for 19th place, which was a decent effort for the course and probably a better performance than my Taunton time of 3.13 in April. My peroxide friend came in at 3.21, very cheerful and full of what a good race it was. It’s very friendly and well-organised, but I don’t think I’ll be going back, when there are so many other marathons to consider, and this is neither especially scenic nor very fast.