This is a guest post courtesy of Ivana. The London Winter Run took place on 4 February, 2018.
Running hardly gets better than the London Winter Run: closed roads, live bands, lovely bright Sunday morning and wonderful support from London City Runners both on and off the course.
The organisers made sure the winter theme is well understood. Mascots dressed as penguins, Yetis, snowmen and husky dogs were lining the entire course, high-fiving runners as they streamed by. If you didn’t look sufficiently frozen, marshals equipped with snow cannons were on hand to promptly shoot some lovely fake snow in your face.
Unusually for such a huge race, the starting waves were not organized by predicted finishing time, so it took the first mile or so before one was able to settle into a steady pace, overtaking the groups of charity walkers and joggers.
That might have been a bit annoying for the speedsters wanting to get to the front, but actually proved very useful for those of us who have a problem of always starting too fast and crashing midway through a race.
The route was beyond lovely, taking us through the Strand and around the Royal Courts of Justice, up Chancery Lane, towards St. Paul’s, and back to Strand and Trafalgar Square with a speedy downhill finish towards Downing Street.
The route was so beautiful in fact that most of us took mysterious detours.
The finish line was frustratingly far away when the watch beeped “10k completed.” Luckily for us, Alex, who braved the freezing cold despite being injured, was there to cheer on us near the finish line, making sure we gave it all in those (extra) last few hundred meters.
There were some great performances from London City Runners, with PBs from Duane (37:54), Alison (50:46), Ivana (51:33), Janine (54:30), Collette (55:13), Rowena R. (56:15) and Rowena J., who completed her first ever 10k run without stopping, in a great sub-1hour PB of 59:39.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Ivana (Ivi for short) took up running and joined the club after realising beer tastes the best after a long run with friends. She enjoys parkrun and signing up for races immediately after declaring she’d never run again.
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