On Sunday 4 October, Davinia Cowden from our Glasgow projects team completed the Loch Ness Marathon, raising in excess of £1,000 for RNLI.  Set out below is an account of her experience.

If you asked me 7 years ago whether I thought I'd ever run a marathon, I'd probably have laughed loudly and walked off in my 4 inch stiletto shoes. However, the Race for Life in Edinburgh 2002 changed all of that. My competitive streak was irritated by my slow effort at the 5k (no one told me about Arthur's Seat) so I decided to take on a half marathon later that year. By the time summer 2003 came around, I'd decided I wanted to run a marathon.

Unfortunately, it wouldn't be until 2009 that I successfully completed the marathon training, never mind the marathon itself. Not seeking advice, followed by poor advice, on the footwear needed to run such a distance resulted in repeated painful injuries. Conceding that maybe I was faulty, I resorted to seeking help from physiotherapists and podiatrists early in 2009. Apparently I'm not that faulty and a simple set of orthotics was all that I needed to make running (almost (!)) pain free. Little did I know, until then, that it's not normal to feel pain all the time whilst running... Anyway, if it hadn't been for them, I wouldn't have managed the Loch Ness Marathon on Sunday 4 October.

The Loch Ness Marathon was a fantastic experience - a very scenic route (I say this despite having scoffed previously at suggestions that this was a plus side to the run on the basis that I'd be too focussed on pain to notice anything else) which I think other marathons will struggle to compete with and it was very well organised. The downside to the Loch Ness Marathon is the hills: there are lots of them, most of them very steep and rarely with the upside of a superb downhill run on the other side. We were however blessed with the weather - bright blue skies and a gentle breeze - which was a massive improvement on the 50 mile per hour winds and torrential rain from the previous day. 

Given my less than successful previous attempts at even getting to the start line for marathons, I was wary of committing to raising money for charity. However, 12 days before the Loch Ness Marathon I finally felt confident that I'd make it to the start line this time. So I decided to raise money for the RNLI. Being an avid sailor I felt it was time for me to say thank you to all of the courageous volunteers who help make the water a safer place to be.

Despite how long the Loch Ness Marathon took me and the hills involved, not once did I say "never again". In fact, I'm planning my next marathon and how I'm going to significantly reduce the time I'll take to run it!