Our first proper Marathon Day! Despite the excitement of yesterday, I slept surprisingly well and instead of being woken by my iphone alarm at 6am as expected, I had the pleasure of being woken by Ellie's phone call some 5 minutes earlier than this!! Ellie usually only knows about one 5 minutes to 6 o'clock per day but today, she was booked on an early train to Leeds to enjoy the day with us!
So down to breakfast at 6.45am sharp followed by a (somewhat unnecessary) guided tour of Leeds to our Marathon venue, courtesy of navigator Andy!
Successfully placed RV in desired location and managed to start the generator in preparation for all sorts of laminating, lap topping and other power consuming activities, including perhaps most importantly providing a 13 amp supply for the Rock Group who were at that moment en route from Harrogate, courtesy of Kevin, the second RV driver. Well . . . . . . . . the generator died after about 2 minutes - Horror!!! A quick check of the fuel gauge showed it to be just on the borderline of quarter full, too low to run the "genny"! A hurried phone call and explanation to Kevin directed him into the nearest garage to purchase fuel cans and fuel. He arrived 10 minutes later complete with 20 litres which yours truly carefully decanted into the beasts fuel tank at a frustratingly slow rate of about 4 minutes per 5 litres expecting at any time to have a little old lady tap him on the shoulder with a "Eh, you won't get far on that love!!". Despite the 20 litres and the desperate pleas of our project director, the generator still refused to start and Kevin and I returned to the garage to purchase additional fuel (another 25 litres) which we believed was still the problem. We gratefully accepted the use of the Group's vehicle and I think I was on a bit of a high by the time we returned to base! lol.
This additional fuel still didn't resolve the problem but the opportune arrival of the RV's owner did much to reduce our anxiety. In the meantime, Kevin, in his own inimitable style, had approached the staff of phones 4 U, who were located immediately adjacent to the RV and they kindly allowed us to plug in an extension lead to their mains supply. Unfortunately, we merely succeeded in blowing an extremely well hidden circuit breaker somewhere on their premises and switching off two of their TV's / Monitors for the day!
To conclude this episode, the ABF "girls" worked their persuasive powers on HSS who very generously loaned to us a small commercial generator for the day. This was hooked up and working by about 1pm, allowing the Group, "Kassiuss" to start their first set and also solve our generator problem which had been diagnosed as an extremely flat leisure battery! By 4pm we were running under our own steam again.
Phones 4 U and HSS - we can't thank you enough for your understanding and generosity.
Andy, in the meantime had been subjected to numerous press and TV interviews before the Mayor of Leeds started him on his way at 10.30am for the 1st of his 66 ultra marathons. I am sure that the official Challenge66 blog will provide full details of Andy's marathon experience so I shall not dwell on this save to say that he ran it as expected but in very cold and damp conditions. With details of Andy's progress being relayed from Hyde park, interspersed with visits to the park and performances from Kassiuss, the afternoon soon passed and we were expectantly waiting for Andy's appearance at the head of Briggate.
The cheers and expressions of joy that rang out when he first came into view were amazing and I believe made for a quite emotional end to this first epic. Andy crossed the line, in the company of several club running friends, in a time of 6 hours, 36 minutes and 11 seconds. Special thanks to these runners for their support.
After packing up, Andy accompanied me in the RV back to our overnight parking at 4 Para Barracks in Bradford. We battled the horrendous Leeds traffic in miserable drizzly dark conditions and I even managed to push aside a couple of flexible lane separators with the RV whilst driving through some particularly narrow and restrictive roadworks! Still - no harm done, Eh!
Interesting manoeuvre to get into the Barracks but exercise completed without incident and Barry drove us onward to our hotel.
The day concluded with a wash and brush up for us all (except Andy who had a cold bath and massage, which was expertly and I believe somewhat enthusiastically performed by Sopie) followed by a lovely meal, courtesy of Catherine, one of Challenge66's most dedicated supporters.
Then to bed and look forward to our 6.15am breakfast to start off Day2!!
Benji's blog
Hi little man. A long day for daddy but mummy was with him and that was lovely. It was very nice to talk to you on the computer today and I will try and do it every day.
Uncle Andy did his first big race. He did very well!
We had a band that played very nice music for us and daddy bought a CD for mummy to listen to later.
I know that you had a lovely day with breakfast at Solomon's and tea at Frankie's but I think you must have been tired as well.
God Bless, Son - give mummy a kiss from me.
Love you. Daddy XXXX
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