Marathon Fever 2010

As a couple of friends decided they were running the London Marathon for charity, another friend thought it would be a good idea if we volunteered as staff, advertised for by a volunteering group at our university. The meeting for volunteers was to take place on the Friday before the marathon; the same day as our exam. Luckily the lady offered to meet with us quickly afterwards as we couldn't make the time, and the two hour meeting that everyone else endured was summarised for us in ten minutes. We were also handed pull-string bags with the marathon logo emblazoned on the front, and inside was all sorts of stuff: lots of food as well as a cool t-shirt, cap and bib we were due to wear on the day (and a waterproof poncho that came in handy, but I still wonder why they packed that marathon foil stuff). As we walked out of the student union building, our excitement couldn't be contained, and we couldn't wait to be part of something big!

The morning of the marathon, and travel plans looked like they would be disrupted by the regular weekend works on the tube, but TFL had some mercy and the jubilee line was working for once. The first train leaving Neasden was at 7am, and I needed to get to Canary Wharf (the location of the mile our group was covering- mile 19) by half past 7. So I texted in to say I would be a bit late, and boarded the train wearing my white marathon t-shirt with 'STAFF' stitched into the front. There were a few people already on the train who looked like they were running it, and I just stood there as more and more marathon runners got on, feeling a little important inside, that I was made partly responsible for their safety.

Most runners got off at London Bridge while I stayed on until Canary Wharf, where I was met by a crowd of people wearing identical t-shirts and caps to me. After a bit we were showed around the course, and were dropped off in pairs at the locations we were supposed to steward at. My friend Farhaan and I were luckily placed just before the water station, where a lot of the action would take place, and were told that our job was to answer questions from the spectators and ensure that they didn't cross the barriers.

The buildings overhead were mighty, and we stood at the foot of The Canary Wharf building itself, helping the water people open the catches on the bottles, ready for the inevitable horde of runners to grab them. Suddenly we were all alerted to the presence of the oncoming wheelchair racers (who are traditionally the first to start), and they zoomed past ignoring offers of water bottles. With the crowd barely present at this stage, we thought we could liven things up by helping hand out water, so we grabbed a couple of bottles each. The small group of elite women runners passed next, again with no-one taking water. But as the elite male runners with their entourage of motorbikes and cameras passed, one Kenyan lagging behind did snatch a bottle from Farhaan, who was ecstatic at his achievement (Farhaan that is, not the runner).

Slowly slowly, the average Joes and Janes began to trickle through; the fastest way out in front, with the less able and the more wackily-dressed coming later in their droves. The spectators were behaving themselves so we decided that water distribution would become a more permanent role of ours, and the helpful feeling inside was overwhelming; now multiply that thousands of times for all the runners that needed hydrating, and you got one hell of an altruistic buzz. It was surprising how many people actually said 'thank you' or 'cheers mate'; when they should've been concentrating every muscle fibre on running, they made the effort to be polite even in times of exhaustion. Such are the formalities of Brits I suppose!

Water was getting scarce on our side of the road, so we had to dodge runners to get to the other side and bring back soggy cardboard crates of new bottles, whose numbers needed further replenishing just after a few minutes (and towards the end we realised people further down our side had loads of bottles). As we were both bent over opening caps on new bottles, we got a tap on the back. It was one of our participating friends who noticed us, when it should've been the other way around! Such a surprise, inducing feelings of awe as he had covered 19 miles and still sped along, not having time to stop and have a chat.  About four hours of handing out bottles with wide smiles across our faces, and sticky feet due to the lucozade bottles runners were disposing of at our feet, the numbers began to dwindle, and the water distributors began to leave. The two of us were finally left with barely any water to hand out and to cheer on the remaining few stragglers. A few still persisted with their costumes, which were clearly weighing them down; like a few rhinos, a massive doll, a stormtrooper and a replica of the Angel of the North (but missing its wings).

After an exhausting but enthralling day full of photos and videos (which I have yet to go through and edit), and which involved the indecisive sunny/rainy weather, we received a text from our group leader to say that we could return to the station and sign out. We were told that we'd be getting our silver volunteers' medals soon (yes, we get medals!), and encouraged to take part in more events; and if this was anything to go by, you could count us in! You can learn so much about people just by being exposed to them, albeit for an average of three seconds each, but I've learnt much about myself as well; that helping complete strangers can sometimes give me the greatest satisfaction I can ever find.