From Forrest Hamilton..

Abingdon-on-Thames is a small town about 15 minutes down the road from Oxford and its fairly flat and fast marathon has been going since 1982, making it one of the oldest in the country. Taking place the same day as the Yorkshire Marathon, I chose to head south mainly because the start/finish is just a mile from my in-laws, offering a logistically easy weekend away.

Although the race only has around 2 miles in total run on closed roads, it attracts a fast selection of runners amongst the 1,000 participants. By the sounds of it, we got much luckier with the weather than everyone running in York, even though there were plenty of grumbles from the people around me about the conditions ruining the chance of a PB. On an entirely unrelated note, I didn’t see another northerner all day.

Having entered this race back in July with the goal of attaining a Boston Qualifier (you needed to have run a 2.53.03 to get a place in the 2025 race) for 2026, I’d promptly got injured and the build up mostly consisted of cycling, easy trails and abandoned long runs. Hardly a recipe for success, considering the marathon is unforgiving to even the most prepared of us. But hey, we were headed down anyway, so I told my wife I’d run at sub-2.50 pace until I couldn’t. That was about as far as the planning went.

After the first 300m on the track (a hell of a way to ensure you go out too fast!) and a couple miles on a fast downhill stretch of road, we headed onto a muddy footpath for a mile. Surrounded by complaints about the weather (apparently Abingdon has something of a reputation for rain) and new Alphafly’s getting muddy, I felt fairly smug (I like running in the rain and my Alphafly’s were already dirty).

The smugness didn’t last long as the pace and lack of training started to pinch with just 6 miles gone. Just don’t think about the 20 miles left…

Once you’re out of the town centre, you start a loop that you do twice, this is mostly on back country roads and a business park, but does also incorporate a roughly three mile stretch (unsure if this is accurate but it felt LONG) where you run along a wonky pavement next to a busy road. This is not the best. Especially on the second go round.

Aside from this, the running was mainly good, with a good group to share the wind blocking duties and long stretches of traffic free road to enjoy the accompanying tailwind.

The benefits of the twice run loop was that spectating for my endlessly patient, excitable, and very cold wife was easy. This is probably the best thing about the race, as she was able to see me at the start, mile 10, 19 and the finish. When you’re as reliant on good vibes and a seamless gel hand off as I was, this is no small thing. Apparently, the leader at mile 10 wasn’t quite so lucky with his gel hand off, as his wife (perhaps not expecting him to be so quick) missed him and had to frantically chase up to him, to the biggest cheer of the day.

Despite having zero expectations of the race going well, the expected bonk never came and I didn’t truly hit the wall until mile 25, dragging myself to a final 7.00 minute mile and a 2.49.20 finish, which all but confirmed a trip to Boston. Running is weird and I’m not sure I’ll try and replicate my build up the next time.

If you’re looking for a new marathon to run and don’t mind travelling, Abingdon is certainly worth looking into. I’m not sure it’s quite as flat or fast as advertised but it’s well supported and organised. You also get free photos from the plentiful volunteers on course which is no small thing when they often cost £25 a pop! Perhaps this is a concession to the miles of dodgy pavement running…