Edinburgh Marathon

England's loss was Scotland's gain as, after having had their entries rejected by the Virgin London Marathon, four Long Eaton ladies, Rachel Argent, Maria White, Karen Levers and Carrie Chan, looked north and promptly entered the Edinburgh Marathon. With the exception of Rachel Argent, none of the ladies had ever attempted such a distance before.

With plenty of training time ahead, the ladies set about constructing their own training plans and competed in various half marathons and off road challenges such as the Seagrave Wolds 15 mile race and the Belvoir Challenge 16 miles, before finally topping them all off with the famous Ashby 20 mile road race. They also managed numerous other long training runs that were completed in the cold, damp and sometimes dull English spring time, until eventually the time had come.

All went well for most, although Rachel Argent did suffer a serious knee problem and the offending knee had to be heavily strapped up prior to the race itself.

The team duly departed for the far away land of Scotland, only to find out that the weather had dramatically changed in the final week to hot, sunny conditions with 20 degree plus temperatures. Not to be deterred, the team carried on with the task at hand and, duly supported by husbands and the travelling LERC cow bell team of Nancy and Jane, all came home safely with excellent performances to show for their efforts:

Karen Levers 4:12:23 3513th
Rachel Argent 4:19:25 3949th
Carrie Chan 4:50:09 5877th
Maria White 4:50:42 5905th

Report provided by Damian Cowlishaw




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