Jess Warner-Judd reflects on her marathon debut in New York

Stuart Weir speaks to the British runner after her 2:24:45 clocking in the Big Apple.

Jess Warner-Judd excelled on her marathon debut in New York City earlier this month, clocking 2:24:45 for seventh place overall.

The Brit, who has a half-marathon best of 67:06, is now ninth on the UK marathon all-time rankings.

What were your thoughts standing on the start line ?

It felt like a different chapter, if that makes sense. I felt like I’d done all the track stuff and then it was like, ‘I wonder what I can do on the road’. I think a half marathon is very different because you do that alongside your track training, whereas for a marathon, you have to really focus on that one race.

What were your expectations: did you have a time target or placing?

I had no expectations. I think New York is such a hard course. I thought I was in good shape, but you never know as I’d never trained for a marathon before. I didn’t know whether my training sessions translated to a good marathon.

So what’s the New York atmosphere like?

Oh, it was amazing. It was all weekend. I’ve never experienced anything like that. So to start with Frank Sinatra playing New York, New York, going across Staten Island, that bridge and then running 10 miles in Brooklyn was just the best experience of my life. I think the crowds, the music, everything. If anything, I think I probably was like, ‘you need to calm down a bit’.

How did you run the marathon?

I’d been doing all my long sessions and like my 20-milers where I live in Lancashire which is hilly. And I think it gave me an appreciation that this is hard. You don’t want to go too hard too soon because if your legs go on these hills, they’re going to really go.

To start with, I was with the leading group. There was a group about 15 of us quite early on and it was a group together. So I’d say for about 10 miles, that group would sort of split a little bit. When you come to a water station, you might get like a five second gap and then it come back together and it kept doing that, I’d say for about 10 miles, 11 miles. And then at halfway at 13, it was very much like on your own. You could see people up ahead, but you weren’t in a group as such.

I think I treated it as 16 miles was halfway for me. So I was like, if I can get to 16, then you can start, working a bit harder. And I’m really glad I did that because there were a couple of moves made quite early on, I think around like 5, 6 miles and then at 10 miles, where I think they ran like a 5:12 mile. And I was just like, I’m not going to go with that. I think I ran like a 5:18, 5:20. And I was like, that’s fine, that’s even quicker than I want to go, but I’m not matching that. So I tried not to surge and just be as patient as I could and run as smoothly as I could. And then I think I probably got to 16 and was like, yes, now let’s get going.

Did you hit a wall?

If anything, I might have overdone it slightly (from mile 16) because I think I got to 21 and was like, ‘oh, this is pretty hard and you’ve still got a good five miles to go’. Then my legs completely went at 24 miles. I thought I was going to have to stop, honestly. I was like, I’m really struggling. But I knew then that I’d get into Central Park, I knew I’d get to the finish. So I think I’d just got it right. I think if you’d have asked me to run another mile, I might have been like, absolutely not. But I think we’d just got it right. So it was definitely worth being conservative.

At 24 miles it was like someone just like took my legs away and I was like, ‘just try and finish’. It was a very different feeling. And I think it’s more that feeling of like your muscles breaking down. Whereas normally you get fatigue in a race or you can feel the lactic but that was not what I was experiencing. It was more like the sheer impact and like breaking down my quads. That was horrible to have. That was my first experience of that ever happening. So I was like, I’m not gonna finish this. But then you learn a lot about yourself because you somehow make it to the finish.

From what you’re saying, you seem to feel comfortable most of the way round.

Yeah, I really did. It was a weird thing because I think in a 10km, sometimes you’re like, ‘I feel okay’. And then you go through a bit of a rough patch and then you come back. And same with a half marathon in a way, like there might be some miles where it feels really easy, some miles where it feels a bit difficult and then you get back to feeling good again. And I didn’t really have that in the marathon. I think it was more like I felt really good. Then I could start to feel, like, ‘I’m working hard, but I can sustain this’. And then I’d say it was like a switch. Literally at 24, And I can’t really remember much about the last two miles apart from thinking ‘one foot in front of the other, just shuffle to the finish, even if you have to walk, like you’ve got to get there’. But luckily, yeah, somehow I still ran a 5:40 mile through Central Park, which when I thought I was running about seven minutes, honestly. So I was pleasantly surprised.

So what did you learn about the marathon?

I learned that it’s just unlike anything else I’ve done. Honestly, I think I’ve been really lucky in, how many years have I been, like 12 years I’ve been like at major championships or on the world stage in a way. So I’ve been really lucky to have that, but I’d say the marathon was completely different. The amount of training that goes into it, you’re not just springboarding from one track race to the other. So I think it teaches you to be quite strong mentally because it’s week by week. You have to just keep putting the miles in and you’re not really getting the reward, as you can’t just jump into a race and be like, right, ‘I’m going to do this’ because you’re exhausted. I think that was what was hard because you’re just constantly training and hoping that it will all come good at the end. It’s very different from a track season where you kind of race yourself into shape. I learned to be so mentally strong. I think on the track season, from your last workout, you kind of have an idea of what you’re going to do in a race. Whereas on the marathon, if that was anything to go by, I wouldn’t have finished. When it comes to race day, that doesn’t mean anything.

What was your reaction when you finished?

I was slightly disappointed not to come top five, because I put myself in a position to come top five. But seventh, I was so happy with it. And then when I saw the time, I honestly couldn’t believe it. I wouldn’t have dreamed of running that well. So it was the best debut I could have asked for.

Also it was an odd race because it had never gone out that fast previously. And then of course the year I did it, the course record was broken by like two minutes! I think 2:24 normally would have got me on the podium and then I come seventh. So it’s one of those where you’re like, that’s just typical. Of course that happened when I did it. But I learned a lot and I think it was nice running in a group, but it was also nice being on my own because I think it’s quite good practice for if that happens in another marathon as well.

You’re just two seconds behind Sifan Hassan

I was so upset actually because with one kilometre to go, I went past her and probably had about a 10-metre gap. And I thought, ‘oh, this is good. Like I’ve never beaten her before’. So I was like, right, head down.

I beat her at Budapest, but she fell over. So I guess that doesn’t really count. But I was like, I’m actually going to beat her here. And then she had a sprint finish in that last 200 metres that I could only dream of. So when she came back past, I was like, yeah, two seconds isn’t bad. And it’s just, it was just amazing, you know, like racing against people like that, like Hellen Obiri, and Sharon Lokedi, people who are seasoned marathoners and to be on the same start line was just a dream and then to actually not be too far behind was, was great too.