Why you should never enter a race when drunk

At my tri club’s Christmas do last year, I, as is traditional, got hammered on budget wine. I arrived home in the small hours and, as is traditional, set about making toast using every utensil in the kitchen while making a racket loud enough to wake the neighbour’s dog.

I then tiptoed noisily to bed to a frosty atmosphere of silent disapproval from the long-suffering Mrs B, as is traditional.

The following morning I was idly scrolling through my phone while clutching my head and listening to the deafening sound of the kettle, when I noticed I’d received an unusual amount of emails in the small hours of Sunday morning.

That sinking feeling

I immediately experienced an all-too-familiar sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach when I saw that I’d received three emails at 2:40am, 2:43am and 2:45am, the gist of which was to thank me for entering the 2023 Reykjavik Marathon.

Long-time readers will know that I have form for this sort of thing, the most spectacular example being when I entered Stockholm Marathon while off my face on mulled wine, and then realised it was on the same day as Mrs B’s birthday.

Lacking the Victoria Cross levels of bravery required to break the news to her that I had booked a race on her special day, I instead told her I had arranged a weekend away in Sweden for her, and didn’t own up that the real reason we were going was that I was doing a race and that I would be missing for several hours on her very-evidently-not-special day until we were on the flight out.

Despite my running the whole race at a pace faster than when I leave a supermarket checkout to retrieve something I’ve forgotten, her displeasure was not assuaged and her revenge was to take me straight from the finish line to the Ice Bar where I was made to drink vodka in -5°C while still in my shorts.

Under the influence

Anyway, as Britney said, “Oops I did it again” and I’m now faced with the prospect of having to own up that I’ve entered yet another race while under the influence. At the time of writing I still haven’t confessed, so the main purpose of this column is actually to place my cards on the table in print and wait for her to read it while I’m not there.

As the saying goes, light blue touchpaper and retire to a safe distance. The irony that I only drank loads of wine in the first place was to give me an excuse for not going on the club cycle ride that some spiteful obsessive always organises for the following morning, is not lost on me.

However, things could be worse, of course – at least this time it isn’t on her birthday. And neither of us has ever been to Iceland before, which looks like an absolutely lovely place if the programme I was watching about it shortly before going out and getting ‘refreshed’ is anything to go by.

And at least it’s only (only!) a marathon – other races I have entered in the early hours while under the influence have included Ironman Lanzarote, Ironman France, the Superman Triathlon Vlaanderen, Stockholm Marathon of course, the National Cold Water Swimming Championships, and the Telford ultramarathon, a 50-mile jaunt around the many, many, many, many hills of Shropshire.

Even a modest amount of Liebfraumilch turns us into devil-may-care athletes of steel who laugh in the face of danger and debt

Common among triathletes

I’ve often wondered if I’m alone in entering a disturbing number of races during hours beginning 00 or 0, but if social media is to be believed it seems to be a fairly common trait among triathletes.

This could be because our multisport lifestyles lead to a general lack of tolerance for alcohol, but I think it’s more likely that even a modest amount of Liebfraumilch is enough to silence the voices of doubt in your head that the race you’ve had your eye on might be a bit too difficult/far away/expensive to enter, and turn us instead into devil-may-care athletes of steel who laugh in the face of danger and debt.

So anyway, Martyn, like mum, is off to Iceland, and you know about this before my wife does, despite the fact that she will be coming with me.

At some point soon I should probably tell her that I’ve also entered something called the ‘Weak at the Knees’ which involves running seven marathons in seven days. But we’ll leave that for another day.

Top illustration credit: Daniel Seex