FLM Course map

does anyone know if there is a text description of the FLM course?

I want to cycle the route in the next couple of weeks to spot sneaky hills etc but the map on the FLM website is impossible to read when printed out.

ta

Comments

  • Try having a look at the BBC website and type in London marathon.
    It has the whole route mapped out and pictures and descriptions of it all. You will be able to see it all
  • BF - it's not a hilly course at all. Only a few gentle inclines - so it's not really necessary.

    Really - I'd save it for the day - I find the surprise of not knowing exactly where I am helps.
  • cougie - I've run FLM a couple of times before so know the course reasonably well and as you say, it is hardly the Alps.

    what I'm hoping to do is to get a set of photos on my digital camera to help me properly visualise the race and prepare myself mentally as well as physically.

    also, a gentle incline at 22 miles may seem like an Alp and I'd like to know about it in advance!
  • Aaah - in that case - go ahead - ya nutter.

    For me - ignorance is bliss !

    (even if this is my fourth one !)
  • batfink, type in www.bbc.co.uk/london/sport/marathon/runners_guide/start.shtml this gives you a great visual tour of the course as well as notes to help. hope this does you some good, best of luck on the day, i envy you all, got to try again next year, ho, hum
  • cheers dave - I'll use that as a starting point. Only thing is that I don't have internet access at home and work would object to me taking half an hour to run through the course in my mind!

    good luck for next year's ballot, dave.
  • batfink, from memory, the first 3 miles are generally downhill. There is a slight rise as you approach Canada Water at about 8 iles and another at 9 miles. There's the climb over Tower Bridge of course and then a noticable climb as you go past Billingsgate just before Canary Wharfe. The next gradient is just before 20 miles as you come out of the underground roundabout near the City Pride Pub and the last one is not really an incline at all and is the ramp out of the subway on the embankment at around 24 miles, but as you say at that point anything feels like a mountain.

    Cheers

    Jenks
  • was running next to a guy at the Hastings 1/2 on Sunday who was doing a pretty good verbal description of the FLM course to his mate running next to him - he clearly knew the course well to name the roads, even down to describing things like "turn right into XYZ Road" etc........

    most bizarre

    or sad

    whichever way you look at it
  • thanks jenks and FB - i'd like to know the 'turn left on applesandpears street, then right onto corblimeyguvnor lane' level of detail. I think that is somewhere between 'sad' and 'preparing well'!

    Maybe I should have gone for the Hastings 1/2 instead of the Fleet 1/2 this weekend!
  • Jeez. OK - Start at some grassy bit.
    Few roundabouts, long road, fire station.
    Cutty Sark.
    Tower Bridge.
    Canary Wharf.
    Desolate loop round docklands.
    Used to be Tower of London.
    Erm.
    Dual carriageway and underpass.
    BIG BEN !
    Massively long road.......
    Corner
    Finish.

    As much as I can recall to be honest.

    Anyone else gonna miss the Tower of London ? I think that was a nice landmark.
  • cougie - miss the Tower, not one effing bit! It wasn't so much the cobbles as the bottlenecking that got on my wick. And you can get a view of it from Tower Bridge too.

    I think I'll bite the bullet and transcribe the route from a map that is too small to print. That way, i can navigate round on my bike at a leisurely pace over the easter break taking pretty pictures - obviously this does not apply in Docklands.
  • Awww- I liked the Tower. I fear that dual carriageway just got longer.....
  • by that point, the fewer changes of direction that have to be performed, the better. I seem to remember that trying to run round somebody on embankment felt like circumnavigating the globe compared to continuing in a very straight line.

    good riddance to the Tower, I say! the organisers reckon it will save 45 seconds for the elite folk - i bet that translates to about 1 second for the rest of us. But how important that 1 second might be1
  • Am I reading the route map in the brochure correctly? Have they changed the direction we run round the Isle of Dogs? Looks to me we'll be hitting the wall at a different part of the course. Anyone else noticed or is it me losing all sense of direction?
  • Here you go in words

    RED START

    Charlton Way
    Vanbrugh Park
    Charlton Road
    The Village
    Charlton Park
    Hill Reach
    Artillary Way
    John Wilson Street

    FOLLOW Merged Routes,

    BLUE START

    Shooters hill Road

    FOLLOW Blue and green Merged Routes,


    GREEN START

    St John's Park
    Dover Road

    FOLLOW Blue and green Merged Routes,

    BLUE AND GREEN MERGED ROUTES
    Charlton Park Lane
    Ha Ha Road
    Grand Depot

    FOLLOW Merged Routes,

    MERGED ROUTES
    Woolwich Church Street
    Woolwich Road
    Trafalgar Road
    Romney Road - turn right to Cutty sark run round cutty sark and then turn right into
    Creek Road
    Evlyn Street
    Lower Road
    Redcliff Road
    Quays Road
    Canada Street
    Quebec Road
    Redcliff Road
    Salter Road
    Brunnel Road
    Jamaica Road
    Southern Approach Road
    Tower Bridge
    Nothen Appraoch Road
    The Highway
    Narrow Street
    Limehouse Causeway
    West Ferry Road
    East Ferry Road
    Marsh Wall
    Heron Quay
    South Colonade
    North Colonade
    Trafalgar Way
    (Round about under Aspen Way) go straight on at roundabout then turn left into
    Poplar High Street continue straight on they take down the fence here and you come out at the traffic lights at
    West India Dock Road
    Commercial Street bear left under DLR and railway lines to rejoin
    The Highway
    Tower Hill
    Lower Thames Street
    Upper Thames Street
    Embankment
    Parlement Square
    Birdcage Walk
    Spur Road
    The Mall
  • Definitely going round Isle of Dogs other way round - that's 'cos of not going through the Tower this year so that those poor little elite runners don't fall over on the cobbles! Taking the south side of The Highway towards the IoD and coming back on the north side to go north of the Tower
  • Lyndylou or anyone who might know - Is the map on the BBC website last years route?
  • the small one on the pictorial course page is correct or as correct as it can be at that level
  • No - the map is this years route. The route is almost the same as last year's except that we don't go through the Tower, but around it to the north instead. That's why you have to go round the IoD the opposite way round.
  • Have you looked at the BBC photo tour of the route - it looks really boring when there are no crowds around. It's much, much better on the day - with all the people, balloons, bands and anything else you can think of.
    Can't wait now. Wish I didn't still have an 18 miler to do this weekend!
  • oh well i am going out for a 20 miler tonight...
  • Kind of getting excited and nervous at the same time!!
  • Fortunately, or unfortunately I live 1/4 mile into the red route, so know the route very well after using it for my training runs.

    Red Route : first 2 miles are flat, then steep downhill for 1/4 mile then steep uphill for 1/4 mile, downhill for 1 mile past the 3 mile marker then flat all the way to Tower Bridge, up and over bridge then flat until you return back to Tower of London, slight downhill onto embankment, uphill for 200m under Blackfriars bridge then it's flat all the way to the finish.

    Blue Route : first 2 miles are flat then very slight uphill for 1/2 mile, then it's downhill for next mile past 3 mile marker and join the red route.

    Personally I'm pleased the cobbles have gone after blistering up on them at 21 miles last year, but each to their own, I really like hills, so figure that out!

    Hope this helps & good luck.
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