I'm in!!!

After months of anticipation and suspension, I finally received a confirmation for my entry in the 2007 London Marathon. It'd be held on 22 April.

It's a dream come true to run in the World's No 1 marathon.

It's ranked no.1 for many reasons and I can understand why. The expectation built up towards this race is tremendous.

Confirmation letter for the Marathon

My bib is 51152. This is the first time I'm getting a 5 digit number for a running event. 4-digit numbers are common. I guess there'd be at least 50,000 runners and the traffic in London would come to a standstill on that day. There are even 3 starting points to stagger the race! As my entry was considered late, I'd be shoved to the red start. The red start is for runners from 33,251 to 54250.

Imagine the KL Marathon that commanded only a little more than a thousand runners (I feel shy telling this, actually) and the traffic was horrendous. The Singapore Marathon is pretty well organised though, they had 20,000 over runners. But imagine what 55,000 runners would cause.

The magazine sent out to runners are building up the steam. There are so many interesting tips and articles in it and I have extracted some for this blog:
The timing of the run would be similar to other races like KLIM. They'd be using the championchip. I think I should say that KLIM is similar to this race instead.

Clearly, this is directing to the guys (and Pacesetters members) only, hahaha!!

Another peculiar notice in the magazine. Showers to cool down??!! I was imagining the type from the bathrooms similar to those used at the transition areas for triathlons. I wouldn't want to run soaked in water man! Besides, I wonder how hot it could get in England's spring as compared to the tropical heat in Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand! But it'd be sexy in that wet look though, if I can't sweat after 30km...hahaha!

The goodie that came with the registration pack. Red shoe lace in support of the signatory charity organisations. For every red shoe lace spotted in the race, a quid is donated to the charities. I think it'd go well with my new running shoes (soon..) and it's nice if I could help too.

But even if they used Google Map (which I don't think so), I think it is a good way to point out the route, drink stations, distance markers and toilets. Remember when I told you about the confusion of using miles?

And finally, this is something I would absolutely look forward to. The fancy dress marathon! I am curious if they could also get on the wet-look....**evil grin**

I really hope that one day the Malaysian marathons, be it the Kuala Lumpur, Penang or Putrajaya could reach to this level of success and publicity. I hope my great grandchildren are not too old to run then.