Royal Parks Foundation Half Marathon, London – Sunday 12th October 2014
If you want that London experience but the Marathon is too much then I would highly recommend the Royal Parks Half Marathon (and it is over with in half the time so more time to soak up the atmosphere!). You see more of the best parts of London and run through 4 of the 8 Royal parks. You feel like you are doing the last part of the Marathon backwards but at the start of the race while you are still feeling quite fresh to take in the surroundings.
The route starts and finishes on Kensington road at the bottom of Hyde Park. You run out of the park, down Green Park and past Buckingham Palace. Run down Birdcage Walk, past Houses of Parliament and loop out and back over Westminster Bridge. You run along the embankment for about a mile before returning through the Admiralty Arch, up the Mall and past the palace again. Back up through Green Park and into Hyde Park. You are roughly at halfway point by now and the remaining route loops through Hyde Park and Kensington Gardens before finish back where it started.
There is a good Festival Area with a charity village, stalls and food and drink. There are around 16,000 runners so there is a great atmosphere. There was plenty of support along the route with the majority in Hyde Park. My friends saw me 4 times throughout the race without them having to move very far due to how the course loops.
Entry for the race is via a Ballot which opens towards the end of Feb for about a week and you find out if you were successful the week after so no long wait like VLM.
Oliver Thomas – PB time of 1:42:08
