Eilish McColgan has spent the past seven weeks safe in the knowledge of two things.
Firstly, she can finally call herself a marathon runner.
And secondly, she’ll almost certainly never tackle a marathon that challenges her as much as her debut did.
McColgan has a stellar record on both the track and the road, but having decided she was going to move up to the marathon, it took her literally years to reach the start line.
A number of injuries, including knee surgery in late-2023, served to delay and further delay her marathon debut. But finally, at the London Marathon in April of this year, McColgan ran her first marathon.
And from almost the second she crossed the finish line, a wave of relief crashed over McColgan and she’s spent the past weeks basking in a pressure-free state that she’s never before experienced in the entirety of her decade-long elite career.
“This is the first time in my career I'm in no rush to get back into things. It's nice not to feel that intense pressure or stress because so often, I've been rushing to get ready for the next thing,” the 34-year-old says.
“Last year, I was rushing to get back from knee surgery to make it to the Paris Olympics then almost immediately, I felt like I was constantly fighting against time to be ready for the London Marathon.
“So this is the first time ever that I've felt like okay, I’ve ticked my box for the year and so if I do another marathon in 2025 then great but if I don't then it doesn't actually matter.
"It’s now up to me what I want to do for the rest of the year instead of feeling like I'm constantly rushing to get ready for the next championship and running out of time.
“It means I now feel the least pressure I’ve felt during my whole career, and that's really, really nice.”
From the outside, McColgan’s run in London was something close to a dream marathon debut; an eighth-place finish, top British female and a new Scottish record of 2 hours 24 minutes 25 seconds was an impressive performance. And given the way the race panned out - McColgan was forced to run almost the entirety of the 26.2 miles alone - the Dundonian appeared to be coping admirably with her maiden marathon run.
Appearances can be deceiving, though, and how she appeared to spectators could not have been more contrasting to how she felt.
“From very early in the race, I felt rough. Literally as soon as I started running, I was concerned about how heavy my legs felt and that's obviously a big worry when you've got 26 miles to go,” she says.
“That feeling didn't ever really go away and if anything, it just gradually got worse so mentally I found that tough. I knew it was going to be a very long slog, and it was made even harder given I was running by myself because I had never visualised doing the whole race solo.
“I definitely had moments of thinking of stopping. From halfway, I had cramp in my right quad so in my head I was just telling myself to keep putting one foot in front of the other.
“So I honestly don't think I'll ever run a marathon that feels as hard as that again.
“It wasn't until I got in that last half mile stretch heading on to the Mall that I actually believed I was going to be able to finish.”
Despite her struggles throughout the two-and-a-half hours of the race, though, McColgan admits her first marathon experience was something she’ll treasure.
Despite having raced on the biggest stages of them all - she’s a four-time Olympian and produced one of the most memorable moments of the Commonwealth Games in 2022 when she won 10,000m gold - the experience and the atmosphere of her debut marathon was, she admits, unique.
“London was very different from track racing because people were cheering specifically for me. I could hear people shouting ‘Go Eilish’, people were shouting my mum's name or were shouting Dundee Hawks. It was very different from the Commonwealth Games when it was very noisy but you can't pick out what people are saying. The crowd was the only thing that kept me going.”
McColgan was, she thought, in shape to go faster but as the weeks since the race have passed, she’s begun to realise that finally making her marathon debut after two heavy disrupted years of injury, and battling to the finishing line feeling far from perfect is a remarkable achievement.
“I've been trying to get on the start line of a marathon for two years and it had never happened so of course there was a little bit of doubt in my own mind wondering if it's going to happen,” she says.
“So, on reflection, I'm really proud of finishing it because it would have been much easier to have called it a day early doors.”
There is, unsurprisingly, a number of things McColgan will take from her run in London into her upcoming training, and into future marathons.
The Scot will focus almost exclusively on the road going forwards and while she remains uncertain quite when her next marathon appearance will be, she’s sure of what she wants to achieve on her hermit outing over 26.2 miles.
“Sub 2 hours 20 minutes is a big goal - that’s when you start becoming more competitive and giving yourself a chance of being on the podium at the major marathons,” she says.
“I definitely feel like 2:20 could potentially be the next step for me given how tough London felt so next time, if I could feel normal until halfway, I think that would make a big difference to me and to my time.
“I don’t know exactly where my next marathon will be but the great thing is there’s a major marathon every few weeks so if I aim for Berlin but amn’t quite ready, I can push it back to New York or Chicago or even London next year.
“So I feel like I’m in a great position.”
