Race Date: 23 February 2025

Seville has proved to be fruitful destination for Steel City over the years with 2025 seeing a motley crew from across the city enjoying the sunshine. Matt Spoor won’t be known to many with this only his third outing in the green and gold vest and he introduces himself more fully with this report.

I moved to Sheffield in the summer of 2022 with a background in Triathlon and the intention of running on the hills with Dark Peak. I was quickly introduced to Steel City by my then-boss, Pierre McCarthy and began my journey of what my family might consider taking running far too seriously. In the first spring I was yet to be a regular attendee to the Thursday track group, but I ran Manchester marathon in 2:58 on the back of 60km weeks and a heap of cluelessness. I was of the belief before this that 3 hours was as fast as anyone could reasonably be expected to run, but as I got to know the group much better I had my horizons blown wide open by the exploits of my by now friends.

After Manchester, I enjoyed myself out in the hills in the latter half of 2023 and 2024 but continued to run on the track as I’d developed a love for running at speed. I surprised myself with improving road times over shorter distances despite it not being my focus, and so the temptations steadily grew for a ‘proper’ go at the marathon. With the arrogance of naivety I wanted to run 2:40 and qualify for London Championship entry. With a lack of experience in the distance, selecting a target time is I suppose necessarily based around such benchmarks but the wise heads in the group seemed to suggest it might be possible.

Why Seville?

For my ambitious plans I needed somewhere quick. In my head this meant Manchester with a decently quick course, low stress with the proximity and easy entry. However, this turned out to be an unsurprisingly tough sell to other friends that were keen for their own marathons – something entirely unreasonable about wanting warm weather and a holiday too?? After much discussion plans were made to go out to Seville with lovely group of close friends. It offered a flat and fast course with great added holiday potential.

Training

I first confessed my intentions when some of us went training in the Peak over a weekend in September 2024. This was an incredible opportunity to pick experienced brains about what I was planning and provide valuable training insight. With a long term tendency for running less rather than more (and making up my plans on the fly) I’d been very resistant previously to big volume weeks and long runs at tempo due to a perceived risk of injury. Unfortunately from my perspective at the time (though very much fortunately in retrospect) everyone was equivocal about these being the cornerstone of a good block. I found after a knackering weekend that I could in fact absorb a greater training volume than I’d realised and so after advice planned to run a Pfitzinger 18 week 70 mile plan. I ran Manchester Half (74:38) two weeks before marathon training started in much better condition than expected given a neglect of road miles over previous months.

I knew in advance that I’d be likely down on mileage with the elevation I’d run and around shifts at work. (Editor: Matt, like many of the Thursday group is a Resident Doctor. How to combine serious training with nights is quite unfathomable). I’d prioritised the sessions and long runs each week without stressing the shorter ‘volume’ runs – it was these I found bringing niggles when having to be squeezed in without proper recovery opportunity. This regrettably meant running nearly all my long runs from my front door (rather than getting out into the countryside) which became somewhat dull but felt very quickly great on my increased volume after a couple of weeks adjusting. I ended up almost 10k down on prescribed distance every week of the plan (peaking at 102k) though continued to run some reasonable elevation as I had The Trigger booked in in January (later cancelled) where I had some unfinished business. I used this as a justification to skimp on gym work which in retrospect I think was a big error and the cause perhaps for issues experienced.

Finally, and even more boringly, having had heat stroke a number of times in races, I was also a bit twitchy about this in the marathon. To the hilarity of other members of the group, this involved a portable greenhouse set up around my turbo trainer for a couple of sessions as I’d seen the strategy recommended in the cycling world. Any run in the two weeks leading up to the race was spent in a minimum of three layers, tights and a coat. It looks hilarious (and is deeply unpleasant) but it certainly gets a sweat on and is a growing area of research with some serious benefits recorded. 

Nutrition

Heeding Naeem Stevens’ advice, Maurten gels are hands down the best of any I’ve had with their added tech giving none of the consequence of other brands. It’s a shame they’re so good because they’re ludicrously expensive but fortunately I’ve used them in other races enough to know they work and don’t still need to spend £10 per training run to prove this to myself. I preloaded with electrolytes over the previous day, and had my usual porridge breakfast from home three hours pre start with 2 coffees. I took one 40g maurten on the start line, then five more over the race every 25 minutes with a 100mg caffeine pill at 25k. I’d follow this strategy again – I had no issues aside from a transient period of nausea after each gel for a few minutes as might be expected.

The race

Zero wind, 10 degrees and blue skies to start – you couldn’t dream of anything better. In this, kilometres 0-10 felt as wonderful as you’d hope – buoyed by cheers from members of the club I regrettably don’t yet know. I’d plugged into the watch 2:35:30 pace and was running a touch quick, but it felt easy and the pack at that pace was huge. From 15k, the legs felt better and better, but I steadily became aware of developing blisters on the soles of both feet. Rookie error  –  having only run in the shoes once prior for a short jog at marathon pace, they were quite loose around the toe box and the resulting slide was slowly eroding my feet. Despite this, by the time we hit halfway I was 30-40s up on pace and I realised I still felt fresh now that the dullness of the taper had been shaken out. By the time I hit 30k I’d made another 30s up but with no warning I then got a serious bout of cramp in my right hamstring. It shook out after a few strides but it would flare up again on any corner or cobble of both of which occurred upsettingly frequently. I suspect this was partly down to the heat (which had kicked up to 20 by this time) combined with some dehydration – bottles after the first station had turned to cups of water which I’d managed to drink very little of on the way through. From here I entered survival mode, and ended very grateful to make it over the line before rigor mortis set in. 

The Chart of Shame. If there were only a magic potion to prevent the bonk at 30k. With names removed to protect the guilty, everyone seems to have had a dip at around 20km but with a virtually pancake flat course this is probably due the timing mats being a out. Most managed a last hurrah whilst, as usual, the most successful are those who ran an even pace. One even ran a negative split.

Post Race

The warmth then facilitated a delightful evening catching up with others out there racing in a beautiful sunny square with cheap beer. Maybe not possible in Manchester!

And the others who ran:

Louis Wood’s effort was intended to be a ‘training run’ for Manchester in April but he got over excited at the start and ran the first half in 1:33. Aiming for a negative split all was on track until the wheels came off very fast and hard at 37km with a painful last few miles jogging in. (Editor: Louis knows that he can get the trip and you won’t find running the marathon distance, except in the actual race, in many training plans).

Tom Bassindale: “Run walk and a negative split! Enjoyed the last few km overtaking”.

Alex Shepherd, knowing that he was short of twenty milers: “Training was completely hit and miss due to a collection of injuries along the way, despite an attempt at strength and conditioning. Final stages of aggravated an old ankle injury whilst training I had to manage to even run it. First twelve miles were fine at pretty much target 8/min pace, then ankle went which then annoyed opposite quad!”