Wheelchairs, Perjury and the London Marathon

by Tim Marshall

  There were no time constraints, this wasn’t a race, but the complete circuit, at over 28 miles, was about twice the length of the previously-longest lake, Bassenthwaite. We didn’t want to be caught in the middle of heavy tourist traffic, and it was the middle of the tourist season, so it was imperative to get the busiest part of the route out of the way as soon as possible. Hence we went clockwise, down the A591 to Windermere, or at least to the junction with the road coming down from the Kirkstone Pass (itself done from the other side over 20 years later), where we turned onto the A592 to Bowness and, more or less hugging the shore, on to the bottom end of the lake at Newby Bridge. We left at exactly 6 o’clock, and Wendy played the same role as had Dee, my post-graduate student, in going round Bassenthwaite: she drove the car, and every five miles or so stopped in a convenient lay-bay to feed us nuts, raisins, dates and drink. Stupidly (again), I didn’t record intermediate times.

  The first half of the circuit was on bigger roads with better surfaces than the return half up the west side, and was correspondingly quicker. The return offered several options between Graythwaite Hall and Hawkshead. The one I think I took held to the left at the Hall, then three kilometres further north kept to the left again at Eel House, bringing me along the west side of Esthwaite Water and so up to Hawkshead, where all the possible routes merged.

  By Hawkshead I remember feeling a bit tired, with what I had anticipated to be the steepest part yet to come: the climb off the minor roads I’d been on ever since Newby Bridge, and on to the main A-road between Coniston and Ambleside at Clappersgate. With more than a marathon already gone, I was tired, but there was only 1½ miles to go. I had to zig-zag to get up the hill (an uphill slalom – interesting) – and Stephen was quite busy over this stretch and on into Ambleside, fending off traffic which by now was quite as busy as we had anticipated. But we pulled into the Waterside car park at 4 minutes to 12; 5 hours 56 minutes. Wendy had managed to find a parking space despite all the tourist traffic. Was this a good time? Who knew? How could you tell? Eight hours would have felt – and would have been – inordinately long, whilst four hours would have been implausibly short; so there weren’t really any meaningful comparisons to be made.

  Except that – I had in mind a report in “Sports ’n Spokes” from a year or two back about two wheelchair users who had pushed round the Great Salt Lake in Utah. (Actually, it might not have been the whole way round, because the complete circuit is about 180 miles.) I remembered the distance as 116 miles, which might be incorrect but it was certainly in three figures. And their time was in the upper teens of hours. It rather put Windermere into the shade.

  And then Stephen, seeking for further excursions to do, suggested the long trip – John o’ Groats to Land’s End. At this stage I hadn’t heard of anyone who had done this, and not even the grapevine revealed anything. In any case it would need a longer stretch of time than I usually had for holidays, and that might be tricky to negotiate. It was something to think about, anyway. Then came news of further heroics from across the pond (again reported in “Sports ’n Spokes”), because after the 1981 Boston Marathon, and in celebration of the United Nations having declared 1981 to be the International Year of Disabled People, two prominent American wheelchair athletes, George Murray and Phil Carpenter, challenged each other to do the American equivalent of our long trip, one which, however, was done rather less frequently than ours: Los Angeles to New York, finishing on the top floor of the UN building. This trans-America challenge got me thinking about a European equivalent, Istanbul to London or, more specifically, the Bosporus Bridge to Tower Bridge, an expedition which finally came to fruition in 1986. But that was five years away. Returning to local possibilities, Stephen said that, in spite of the lack of a road all the way round, he’d think further about Ullswater.

  The marathon scene seemed to be calming down, with only a few left in places that held little attraction for me. Except that, at what seemed fairly short notice, Birmingham announced the City of Birmingham Marathon, to be held in early- to mid-September. Not one I could miss, really, and so I entered along with Mark (he’d had a very bad Great North Run) and a number of others who had been at the People’s Marathon and other, shorter races from here and there.

  It was a loop course, and the wheelchairs were allowed a headstart. Beginning at the National Exhibition Centre, it wound its way through the outer suburbs of the east side of the city, into the centre and along Colmore Row, and past the Council House and the Town Hall (half way, for those wishing to do only a half marathon). There, a commentator for the local radio seemed to be utterly astonished when a wheelchair hove into view, screaming with excitement and attempting a live interview as I pushed past him at a pace far faster than he could keep up; I wasn’t going to slow down for him, or anyone else come to that. The route went out of the city on the Stratford road, winding through further outer suburbs before reaching the NEC again. The finish was inside one of the main exhibition halls, but there was a pavement which you had to be lifted onto. Fortunately, someone in the organisation was prepared for this, and there were three or four men ready to lift me up and over the kerb.

  The time? 3h 37m 19s, almost 50 minutes faster than my People’s Marathon time, one which at the time I thought was probably a British record, and said so to the interviewer at the finish. Curiously, they didn’t seem particularly interested in the idea, so I let it drop. In any case, to put my time in an international context, in April the year before (1980) Boston had been done in 1h 55m, so it was all too obvious we were light years behind. Later, maybe even the following year, I heard that Gerry had done the Humber Bridge marathon in 3h 15m, the same day as the Birmingham race, or a week later, so I decided to have a go at that in 1982, always assuming the race would be run again that year.

  As far as I was concerned that was it for the inaugural wheelchair road-racing season. No one had a complete overview of what races were being done by whom, when, and in what time; but whatever races I went to I asked the organisers to send me a list of the finishing times, and asked the racers themselves to let me know what they had done in events elsewhere. And always, there was the question “Are you going to (try to) enter London next year?”

  There was, however, an important development regarding the general case for wheelchair racing as part of mass fun-running. In an article in “Sports ’n Spokes”, the (American) National Wheelchair Athletic Association set out the case for why, and how, races should and could include wheelchair sections. All the elements which we had discovered by trial and error were set out with a clear explanation of what was needed (basically, a headstart, no kerbs or steps, and an open-minded attitude by the race organisers). The article was called “Sharing the Road” and was to prove useful in making the case in future for the inclusion of a wheelchair section in road races. I never thought to send it to “Running” magazine.

  A Final Interlude

  A few weeks after the Birmingham marathon there was an approach from Stoke about winter sports. There was a centre in Norway, Beitostolen, dedicated to developing and promoting winter sports for disabled people, and more was beginning to be reported from America in “Sports ’n Spokes”. The American reports revolved around the use on snow of the pulk, the Norwegian sledge I had seen at the spinal unit in Denver three years earlier; and on developments in design (the Arroya) which provided a sharper edge to the runners underneath, giving greater control laterally when going downhill. It was not, however, a proper downhill piece of equipment, and couldn’t be controlled the way skis could.

  Stoke had sent a couple of people out to Norway to see what was going on, and they returned with information about the pulk and two other pieces of equipment for use on ice rinks: one, a sledge propelled by short sticks which was used for ice hockey, and the other, a different kind of sledge also propelled by sticks, but much longer and used for racing. There wasn’t, isn’t and I would guess never will be, a proper 400 metre ice-racing track in Britain, but the prospects for sl
edge ice-hockey were much brighter – after all, there are many ice-rinks in Britain, and many ice-hockey clubs, so the idea of the sport wasn’t completely foreign.

  Whatever the circulation list was, I was one of those invited to Solihull ice-rink one Saturday evening to be introduced to the sports and the equipment and, as far as possible, to try them out. Over the next few years I became involved with both hockey and racing, but for me the most important development was getting access, not to a pulk itself, but to the mould from which they were made. My climbing club friends had been talking about getting me out to the Alps at New Year on their skiing trip, though how they thought I might spend my time with no real means of propulsion for the wheelchair in, on or across snow I cannot now remember. But using a pulk – here was something that opened up new possibilities.

  No one at Solihull wanted the mould, so I took it. A friend at work was into glass fibre, having just designed and built a racing dinghy, so making a pulk was as easy as a picnic in the park. So we did. And I took it to Switzerland in late December for a fortnight’s holiday, the like of which I couldn’t even have imagined a few months earlier. The next year, the original pulk being demonstrably a bit short for me, we built another, longer model, made a mould from the model, and then pressed out a new, longer pulk, which served for 25 years until late complications of my original injury put a stop to all the winter sporting activities. The original mould ended up in a special school on the east side of Birmingham under the guardianship of one of the city Outdoor Education advisors.

  Next Steps

  There was no central organisation or information point where people could find out what races had been done and with what times, what races had turned wheelchair applicants down, for those races which had accepted wheelchairs what the courses were like (flat or hilly, twisty or with long straights, open or closed roads and so on). But information percolated through in a rather patchwork manner, giving some information about some races which might be useful for the following year, if the race was going to be staged again (not all were). For example, Gerry Kinsella’s 3h 15m on the Humber Bridge marathon, some time in late September, removed whatever pretensions I had to holding the fastest time in Britain; if asked, I said I held it for a week, though it could have been two weeks or not at all. And somehow, we needed wheelchair marathoning to be taken seriously, above the level of individual races accepting the odd wheelchair applicant. I had no idea how to set about doing this, but one or two things occurred, almost like drips on a stone which eventually wear a a hole, which slowly nudged things forward. And rather quicker than water on a stone.

  In July 1981, Liz Dendy (from the Water Sports Division of the Sports Council) wrote to me:

  “Dear Tim, Kath Pollitt of our North West region approached me some time ago saying that the Manchester Marathon had refused to accept wheelchair applicants. I then wrote to the Secretary of the British Marathon Runners Club, asking them whether they had a policy on this. I enclose a copy of his reply, and I wondered whether you might feel like writing an article for their magazine. Please don’t feel you have to!”

  There ensued some correspondence with the secretary to the BMRC, Terry Lewins, about why and how wheelchair athletes could be included in “ordinary” marathons (or road races in general). He pointed out that the BMRC was more an information source than anything else, and suggested that I write to the AAA, who, as the governing body for athletics, could issue a policy statement about the inclusion of wheelchairs. My files failed to reveal any interaction with the AAA, though it’s worth pointing out that they hadn’t made a big noise about the Great North Run, which they had fully accredited, and with wheelchairs starting in front, too. This last point was still an issue two years later.

  These exchanges led to other contacts, because late in 1981 “Running” magazine asked me to write an article about wheelchair marathoning (I don’t have the original request, but do have the article I wrote and the acceptance letter by a sub-editor, Alison Turnbull, dated January 6th 1982). “Running” had exploded in popularity quite as much as the activity it reported on; that it had accepted the article could only do good for the cause, since I assumed the magazine would be read by any race organiser wanting to pick up tips, and generally to find out what was going on elsewhere; including, I supposed, Brasher and Disley.

  Entering the 1982 London race was the next step. I don’t remember the details of how you were supposed to do this, but clearly whatever method had been used in 1981 was deemed inadequate. I do remember that you had to queue at a main post office and hand your form in at some unearthly hour in the morning, so I set the alarm clock for a suitably early time. But then, on the local radio late in the evening, I heard that queues were already forming for the handing-in time several hours later. So, a quick wash, and into town clutching an entry form and, almost inevitably, bumping into both university staff and medical students bent on the same mission. And by the time that a special section of the office opened at (?) 6 in the morning, there were hundreds, if not thousands, of marathon hopefuls waiting to hand in the form. As with all AAA-accredited events, you had to sign at the end of the form to say that you would abide by AAA laws regarding the running of the race. I did sign it, but in the light of what could be described as the frosty reception by Chris Brasher to the prospect of a wheelchair section in his race, didn’t state that I was a wheelchair user.

  It was Liz Dendy who suggested that I write to John Disley about a wheelchair section in London – but please to keep her name out of it, because he was Vice-Chairman of the Sports Council, whilst she was an employee; an entirely reasonable request, I thought. Curiously, amidst three inches thick correspondence about the race, this is one exchange that I don’t have copies of; what happened to them, or why I didn’t keep the letters, I don’t know. But the gist of my letter to him will have been – the usual case: everyone else is doing it, the times, while slow by American standards, are respectable and can only improve, and it needs properly organising rather than coping with ad hoc participants as they turn up on the day. I can only imagine his reply, largely in the light of what ensued over the next 3–4 months, but it will have been very dismissive, and made clear that there was no place for wheelchairs, or a wheelchair section, in their foot-race. And that seemed to be that, as far as London and 1982 were concerned.

  At this point I should introduce several others who came to have some part to play over the next 15 months and beyond. I cannot pinpoint the exact time that they emerged as part of the story, nor the precise event which propelled them on stage; but they all did play a role which was important at the time.

  I first saw Philip Lewis on my first visit the “The Nationals” in 1973. He was a tetraplegic (a broken neck), but a formidable table-tennis player, and also a qualified solicitor. I met him on and off during 1981 at various conferences and workshops being staged as part of the Year of Disabled People. Of greater relevance is that he was a member of the Sports Council, having assumed the (formally unstated) role of disabled champion from Norman Croucher, and in this capacity he will have been well-known to John Disley. He was also quite high up in the hierarchy of BSAD, though I wasn’t aware of that, having little to do with the organisation per se. By the time of the 1983 race he had become Chairman.

  Mike O’Flynn retired from a senior officer post in the army in his 50s, and like many in a similar position looked around for something else to do (Douglas Hurndall at the RYA Seamanship Foundation, the sponsor of the Challenger trimaran, took a similar route). I don’t know, and it’s not relevant, which regiment Mike came from, but at some time in the early 1980s he was appointed as CEO of BSAD. Near the middle of the year, shortly after he had come across some of the waves I was creating, he bestowed on me the label “National Wheelchair Marathon Co-ordinator” and sent me some BSAD headed notepaper with the subtitle below it; it was a simple matter to produce more by photocopying as necessary.

  BSAD had a patchwork of officers round the regions, which I
never really understood. The West Midlands, for example, seemed to be run entirely by volunteers, with no paid staff at all. In the North-East, Carol Bradley was the queen bee, but whether she was a volunteer or a paid officer I never knew (by now, Bill Parkinson seemed to have disappeared off the scene altogether). And in London, +/- the South-East, Jenny Ward had a role in sports development for Disability Sport that I think was a paid job.

  I didn’t get a place in London, so the next thing to do was start entering other races. The “First Norfolk Marathon” sounded promising, to the uninitiated Norfolk being a flat county. It was, really. Norfolk was a point-to-point event, finishing in Norwich city centre but starting very near to the north coast, at a place called Holt. The organisers laid on buses to carry the runners from the town centre to the start; no special arrangements for the wheelies, so we had to bum our way up the steps and onto a seat. I say “we”: this was the first time I came across Denise Smith, who for many years flew the flag for women’s wheelchair road-racing in Britain.

  I don’t remember the start – how long a headstart we were given, if any – but the race itself was cursed by the weather, a south-westerly gale that blew strongly as we made our way south, along with cold flurries of rain; very cold flurries. I remember being surprised at the number of runners stopped by the side of the road waiting to be picked up – surely, if I could finish the thing, arm-powered, couldn’t they, leg-powered? After the dreadful race conditions, surpassed for me only by the Humber Bridge race in the autumn, the finish was, for quite different reasons, equally memorable. You went through the finish line and were then shepherded round to the left and – into the cathedral. Here was the aftercare: hot drinks, massage stations, blankets and so on. And all overseen by His Grace the Bishop, who wandered around helping where he could, giving encouraging words when that was all he could do, and so on. As an example of the church temporal, it was supreme.