pickupthepacepaul

On 23 February 2025, I completed the Seville Marathon for the second time. After taking part in Seville Marathon 2024, I was unsure if I would return this year. Forever having the dilemma of wanting to return to take part in events, but also experience new events, it simply is not possible to take part in them all. However, when I mentioned to my family that it was an option, I was met with “we like Seville.” With the children at the end of their school holiday and the travel package not too expensive, it was decided that Seville Marathon would be my first international event of 2025.

Seville Marathon was my 163rd marathon (plus), and my 120th event as an official pacer (57 marathons). I am really pleased that we decided to return to Seville for a second time. The weather was beautiful (despite the rain forecast) and there is a great range of things to do, from shops, nice places to eat and drink, and other sights to explore.

We travelled early on the Friday, and I’m glad I checked plans before going to the hotel, as the expo was on the way. So we took a 10 minute taxi (bus also available) from the airport straight to the expo, which cost 25 euro for 4 of us. I didn’t spend much time at the expo. It was fairly large but didn’t seem as good as last year. This may have been because we were there early on the first day, but also, I’ve been to hundreds of expo now that there really isn’t much appeal for me personally unless something stands out. Bib collection was quick and simple, and we also received a decent race t-shirt. The 5km t-shirt looked even better, but I didn’t enter it, instead choosing to make the most of the holiday with my family.

We could have gotten the bus back to our hotel, but an Uber was only 14 euro and took less than half the time. We then had a couple of days free of the marathon to enjoy Seville. I found a lovely spot with great food and Sangria. The kids were entertained just running around small parks.

We also went to Plaza de Espãna and took a boat for a row. It was really cheap at 6 euro a boat, but we had to queue for about an hour. There were a few arguments on the boat because the kids just wanted to do it themselves, but in places, it got a little crowded, so I needed to navigate us through. Kirsty was great at shouting orders at me. It came very naturally.

Seville Marathon

Race morning was more relaxed than normal. The race started at 08:30, and the pace team needed to meet 1 hour before. This is much more laid back than other races, and as my hotel was only about 20 minutes walk from the start / finish, I didn’t get out of bed until about 07:00. The bag drop is well organised, and it was easy for me to find the Pace Team because of the large balloons.

I made my way to the start with giant balloons securely attached and started to motivate the runners around me. I met two other sub 4 pacers, who told me at the start they were aiming for “gun time” rather than “chip time.” So as we started, they pulled ahead of me, and I advised runners around me what they were doing and that I would be aiming for 03:59:30 according to my watch, not start time (which would have required a 03:54:30).

Annoyingly, after only 2km, my balloon flew away. The string was still securely attached to me, which I had to wrap up to stop people standing on it. So I ran most of the marathon without the balloon, but I had a good group of runners with me, and I communicated with everyone, so it was clear I was pacing.

In each pace group, there were 2 pacers with balloons and 1 with a flag, and I could see the other balloon and flag disappear into the distance as they slowly went for the gun time.

Seville is easily one of the flattest and fastest marathons I have run. If I was going for a PB, this would certainly be on my list. The whole route was decent, with regular water stations. It did get a little warm earlier than expected, but as far as heat goes, I found the whole event comfortable.

At around 30km, I seemed to catch up with the other pacers, so I assumed at this point they had decided to aim for chip time. I had a good dozen runners who had been with me from the start, and 3 that were by my side the whole way, 2 of whom were running their first marathon.

At 33km, the pacer with the flag stopped, so I checked he was OK and took his flag off him. It was a quick transition, and I found more runners came to run with me for the last 9km. A few were starting to struggle, but I reminded everyone that if they slowed down now, they would not find it easier, but it would hurt for longer. This advice seemed to work.

At 37km, the other pacers balloon seemed to disappear, and then at 38km, she was running in the opposite direction, so I’m not entirely sure what happened.

The final section of the race had great crowd support, and everyone stuck together. The course markers were accurate, which made it very simple to pace. I finished cheering runners over the finish line in 03:59:39 and am pleased to see so many first-time marathon runners hitting sub 4.

I would definitely recommend Seville, and not just because of the Sangria.