Marathon run in the ’Bridge

NOVEMBER 14 will see a rather strange marathon being run in Sixmilebridge, as 18 athletes complete the distance by repeatedly running a one-mile route.

Tom Enright, originally from Charleville but now living in the ’Bridge, is the organiser and says those taking part are fairly committed runners.
“There’s lads coming from Galway. Ray O’Connor, who is director of the Connemara marathon is coming down. There are guys coming from Offaly and Roscommon. There’s a lady coming from Cork, Joanne Fearon, who ran from Malin Head to Mizen Head this year. She ran it in five days, just under 100 miles a day.”
The event gives them the chance to get another 26-miler under their belts.
“It’s a novel idea for a marathon. The guys that are taking part in it all hope to reach a hundred marathons one day. Really what it’s about is to put on a low-key event that doesn’t cost much money, so we can get another marathon under our belt.”
It will be Tom’s 28th marathon and he hopes to reach 30 by the end of the year. He has made a lot of progress on his way to the hundred lately.
“This will be my 10th this year, including two ultra marathons. There was one in Connemara that was 39 miles and a 31 mile one in Portumna. This year they’ve all been in Ireland but in previous years I’ve been abroad. I’ve been to Seville, Paris, Hamburg and Florence,” he says.
His favourite marathon so far was in Belfast in May of this year, when he ran his second marathon in two days.
“I had done the Limerick marathon the day before and it was my first time doing back-to-back marathons. I wasn’t quite sure how it’d pan out, whether I’d survive it at all. But I felt really great on the day and it went really well for me. Getting over the line that day was a really nice feeling.”
While running more than 52 miles in less than two days may seem impossible to many, Tom says recovery isn’t as hard again, after you do your first marathon.
“The fitter you get and the more consistent you are with your training, the better your body can recover. I think the first marathon is the one that takes you longest to recover from because you haven’t had that experience before,” he believes.
Training for a marathon obviously requires a lot of work but Tom says it is rewarding too.
“It’s the challenge first of all. When you start out you’re not sure if you’ll be able to do it or not. You train away and very often for your first marathon you don’t train as well as you could train, you don’t have the knowledge.
“When you get over the first one, you say you’ll come back for another one and getting ready for a marathon is a great goal to have. Very often for a marathon you’re training on your own, so it builds up your discipline and it gives you a goal. Those are nice things about it,” he acknowledges.
While it may be demanding, the health benefits are great, he says.
“If you only go out running one day a week then that’s not really going to help you much. If you want to complete these events you have to train regularly. Your health really improves as a result.
“When I started running my resting pulse was about 75 and now it’s down to 45. I can see great benefits for myself and I’ve also lost about two stone,” he adds.
The marathon in Sixmilebridge will be started by local councillor John Crowe and entries for the event are now closed.