London Marathon’s journey from the Observer to a national institution

http://www.theguardian.com/sport/2015/apr/25/london-marathon-observer-national-institution

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It started, officially, at 9am on Sunday 29 March 1981 with cannon-fire across Greenwich Park and the quixotic sight of 7,055 people – mostly men, in impossibly tight shorts – weaving interrupted from east to west through the capital’s streets and towards the finish at Constitution Hill. But those involved in its embryonic stages recall that without another sound – wine glasses being clinked at a boozy Observer lunch – it would have taken far longer to be born.

Staging a marathon in London was the idea of the Observer’s athletics writer Chris Brasher, who returned from running the New York marathon in 1979 with the zeal of the convert. “To believe this story you must believe that the human race can become one joyous family, working together, laughing together, achieving the impossible,” he wrote, before asking his readers to peer into the future: “I wonder whether London would stage such a festival? We have the course, a magnificent course – but do we have the heart and hospitality to welcome the world?”

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The answer from the police, the Greater London Council and the Amateur Athletics Association – all of whom had a say in awarding any race the green light – could not have been more of a fudge if it had been made with sugar, butter and cream and served at a sweet shop. Yes, maybe, perhaps – only not yet, was the gist. As the former Observer editor Donald Trelford explains: “Chris was a great enthusiast for the marathon but he was absolutely frustrated because he couldn’t get the various bodies together. So I said to him, why don’t you bring them all to a proper Observer lunch? We’ll see if we can knock their heads together.”

Trelford remembers discussions at the lunch slowly advancing from the formal to the convivial, without a deal being struck. “The police particularly tucked into the wine, which amused me, and it helped break down their resistance I think,” he says. “But they were still playing it slow by saying: ‘We must talk about this again next year.’

“But then Horace Cutler, the chairman of Greater London Council, just shouted: ‘Nonsense! It’s going to be next April!’ And called them to heel. But it was Brasher and his great friend John Disley, who drove it through. Because they had studied all the technicalities, they could counter every argument and objection.”

Disley is 86 but his memories of that day are undimmed. “That Observer lunch was the turning point,” he says. “Although the police were not the only ones enjoying the wine – myself and Chris had a few glasses too.”

Two weeks later, Disley presented his plan to the police, who approved a route that took in much of London’s major sights including Cutty Sark, Tower Bridge, Embankment, Big Ben and Buckingham Palace. They weren’t the only ones. “There were some parts of London, like the Isle of Dogs, which had not been redeveloped,” says Disley. “I remember this woman came out and said: ‘Thank God you are coming and using our street – now we might get it cleaned.’

“There were very few objections from motoring bodies either. There weren’t nearly as many cars in London in 1981, and it was a quieter place on a Sunday.”

To publicise the race, the Observer asked readers if they wanted to be guinea pigs for the race. Volunteers had to complete “a training diary which includes notes on their physical and mental progress and/or setbacks” and mail it in. Brasher had this advice for readers: “NEVER RUN WITH A COLD OR FEVER. Protect your feet with good training shoes. Keep warm – a decent jogging suit can cost as little as £13.95.”

But the physical challenges the first-time runners faced were nothing compared to the financial and logistical issues that Brasher and Disley were wrestling with. At one point Brasher suggested to his wife they take out a second mortgage to funnel more money into the race. The suggestion was emphatically rejected. Fortunately for the race – and perhaps the marriage – Gillette stepped in after their sponsorship of cricket’s one-day trophy ended, signing a deal worth £75,000 over three years.

Disley, meanwhile, used his wits to find 1,000 volunteers to staff the drinks stations. “Because I was a school inspector I had something to lean on,” he says. “I could go into schools and get them to promise to turn out with 30 youngsters at a certain spot, and they did.”

Things did not always go to plan. While they were contemplating how to process the results of 7,000 runners, Brasher and Disley were invited to Zetters, to see how they handled 100,000 pools forms a week. “Chris and I were thinking, this will be great – we are going to see state of the art computers whirring away,” says Disley. “We got there and there were 100 ladies sitting at tables with pencils and paper. That was the sum of the technology.”

Instead, the 6,255 finishers was given their times by hand. “We didn’t have timing mats in those days,” says Disley. “People crossing the line were given a number and told to go to a table.”

Among the competitors were those who quickly wished that the road from Athens to Marathon was a good deal shorter – including Dave Bedford, the former 10,000m world record holder. The night before, while consuming several beers at the Mad Hatter nightclub he owned in Luton, he accepted a £250 bet to compete in the race – even though he had not run for a year.

“Through my rose-tinted beer goggles, the bet seemed too good to refuse,” Bedford says. “I telephoned Chris Brasher to ask for a race number. His somewhat succinct reply was that it was too late to get a number but why not run anyway and I began my buildup in earnest, turning to a more healthy beverage. I downed four piña coladas. The club closed at 2am but because the clocks went forward to mark the start of British summer time I therefore turned my attention to carb-loading and headed to my local curry house.”

One king prawn curry and a pint of lager later, Bedford went to sleep – only to be woken up to leave for Greenwich 15 minutes later. He had assumed he would run the race in three hours and reached halfway on schedule in 90 minutes. “But the curry I had eaten was making me uncomfortable,” he says. “Three hours in, I started to walk, keeping my legs unnaturally apart, Wyatt Earp style, in order to reduce the chaffing effect. It took a further 45 painful minutes to get to the finish line. I headed back to Luton and took to my bed for two days.

“When I finally got up I could hardly walk. But the saddest part is the bloke who struck the bet never showed his face in the Mad Hatter again and I never got the £250.”

Ahead of him, the 43-year-old Joyce Smith was winning the women’s race in 2hr 29min 57sec, beating her nearest rival by nine minutes. In those days there was no appearance or prize money: Smith, one of the country’s elite runners, took the train to the start line.

Then there was race’s defining image: the American Dick Beardsley and the Norwegian Inge Simonsen grasping each other’s hands as they crossed the line to finish in a dead heat. “With about 500m to go I leaned over to Inge, and said: ‘What do you think? Should we go together,’” Beardsley says. “He said something but I didn’t quite hear him. I tried again. Then it just happened. It was quite spontaneous.”

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The picture was on the front pages of most newspapers the next day, but not everyone was convinced the race had been a success. In the Guardian, Nancy Banks-Smith seemed confused by the whole concept in her television review. “The idea of the London Marathon seems to be to run without actually winning,” she wrote. “Because it was more a parade than a race, BBC1 did not cover it live. Edited, it seemed, for one thing, small.”

The Amateur Athletics Association’s Doug Goodman was also sniffy, saying: “This is a fun run. I think we must preserve our championship in its present form.”

Disley laughs when reminded of Goodman’s remarks. “I went to watch the national marathon championships in 1980,” he says. “It was somewhere in Northamptonshire. There were more cows watching the race than people. There were a few wizened men – well, they looked old to me – in shorts and sleeves and that was it. It was pathetic. They were no competition for us.”

Disley is amazed just how much the race has mushroomed in the past 35 years. In 1981 there were 6,255 finishers – 5% of whom were women – very little fundraising for charity and nobody in fancy dress. This year’s edition will be run by 36,000 people raising around £50m for charity with millions watching on television and on the course. A large part of that is down to Brasher, the race’s driving force for so many years, who died in 2003.

Telford says: “You had to control Brasher because he could get over-excited, but here was something of the great Victorian about him. He had a kind of manic energy, and a bustling single-mindedness that brook no opposition. But at the same time he was an astonishing guy.

“He paced the first four-minute mile, he won a gold medal in the 3,000m steeplechase at the 1956 Melbourne Olympics and he was the founder of the London Marathon. Any one of those anybody would be proud of. But to do all three was remarkable.”

From the archive, 28 October 1979

World’s most human race, by Christopher Brasher

To believe this story you must believe that the human race can be one joyous family, working together, laughing together, achieving the impossible.

I believe it because I saw it happen. Last Sunday, in one of the most violent, trouble-stricken cities in the world, 11,532 men, women and children from 40 countries of the world, assisted by 2.5 million people, laughed, cheered and suffered during the greatest folk festival the world has seen. And at the end of it all the story was written in their faces – faces of contentment and happiness.

I’m sure that it was written in my face because I was one of those thousands who won the New York City Marathon. For the more than 10,000 of us who finished it was a greater personal victory over doubt and fear, body and mind; and for most of us we won only because 2.5 million New Yorkers came out of their homes and holes to feed and water us, to make music and brotherly love and to be Good Samaritans to all who felt like dropping by the wayside.

For mile after mile the route is yards deep in spectators. “Eight-six-eight, you’re looking great,” they shout. And 868, Mrs Joan Coles, a teacher in her fifties from Worcestershire way, is feeling great. So are we all. It feels so easy. No laboured breath, no agony in the legs, just plenty of time to look around and enjoy the sights and read the messages. “Bolivia needs a seaport,” on the back of one competitor. “Men of quality do not fear women’s equality,” over a compact American lady.

At the eight-mile mark I overtook a dinner-jacketed waiter, carrying a tray with a bottle of Perrier water, steady as a rock. He can’t run the whole distance, I thought, but he was, and he did.

“Make that scene on the Tavern on the Green,” they shout, and you know now that you will make it to the finish in Central Park at the Tavern on the Green.

And what a welcome it is. I have heard the crowd shouting Sir Gordon Richards home in the Derby; the roll of the winning goal at Wembley; Olympic chants in four continents: but I have never heard such fervour as from the crowd at the finish of the New York marathon.

Nearly 2,000 years ago Paul saw a vision on the road to Damascus. Last Sunday millions of us saw a vision of the human race, happy and united, willing their fellow human beings to a pointless but wonderful victory over mental doubt and bodily frailty,

I wonder whether London could stage such a festival? We have the course, a magnificent course, starting in the Mall and going clockwise around all the sights of London and across Tower Bridge and back past St Paul’s and into Trafalgar Square, under Admiralty Arch to finish in front of the Palace. But do we have the heart and hospitality to welcome the world?

Chris Brasher, who won Olympic gold in the steeplechase in 1956, was Observer sports editor from 1957-1961 and wrote on athletics for the paper until 1991. He died in 2003. This is an edited version of the article.