Last Sunday, Newport & District Running Club colours were represented in Eastern Europe in the 39th Telekom Budapest 10KM by Mark McEvilly and Martin Murdoch. Unfortunately, Liz McEvilly fell poorly on the morning of the race so was unable to run, but despite this Liz, with Debbie Murdoch, were able to support their other halves during the race, which had 3,500 participants.

Headquarters for the race were on Margaret Island which is a 2.5Km x 500m island located in the middle of the River Danube to the north of the city. Numbers and race t-shirts were collected on the previous Friday when a sightseeing excursion of the Danube stopped unexpectedly at the island allowing for a quick dash to collect numbers returning to catch the next excursion boat 45 minutes later.

(Left to right): Martin Murdoch, Mark McEvilly

The 10Km was part of a race weekend that also included a 7Km, Half Marathon and Half Marathon Relay. The last race to take place was the 10Km starting at 1pm on the Sunday and typically, just as the race started, the sun decided to escape from the cloud and stayed during the entirety of the race.

The race left Margaret Island to the north crossing the bridge to the Pest side of the river. Interesting fact: Budapest is named after each side of the river – Buda on the west and Pest on the east. The route had three drinks stations on route and a wide array of musical areas ranging from Thrash Metal to Hungarian Bagpipes. The majority of the route was alongside the river in residential areas before it headed southwards and crossed the Margaret Bridge before finishing the last 2.5km on Margaret Island before picking up the goodie bag including finishers medal, an apple, selection of chocolate bars and water. The route was relatively flat, and although it didn’t go through the historical architectural area, it was very enjoyable and well supported along the route.

Mark took the club honours, finishing in position 2,861st with a time of 1 hour, 9 minutes, 28 seconds, and Martin following in 3,290th place in 1:16:31. This is the first of two overseas adventures this year for these runners, with the Benidorm race weekend already booked in for later this year.