Australia / Sydney / 26–30 Aug 2026

Race week

Five days that were entirely about one Sunday morning: getting there, running easy, collecting a number with my name on it, lying very still, and then forty-two kilometres.

TCS Sydney Marathon
World Marathon Major
Bib 17821
Wave start 6:50
6 hours 22 minutes

This is the honest version. I signed up because my gym friends were going, I did not train, and the course was hillier than I had accounted for. All three of those facts show up in the finish time.

Runner in a white and maroon singlet giving a thumbs up while crossing the Sydney Harbour Bridge among other marathon runners — On the Harbour Bridge, early enough to still be enjoying it. The only photograph of the day where I look like I know what I am doing. Official race photograph.

Sydney is a World Marathon Major and I picked it because it is the closest one to Indonesia.

That is not a reason anybody puts in a race report, but it is the true one. My gym friends were going — this was their fifth or sixth major — and it was my first anything.

I want to be exact about the preparation, because “didn’t train much” is the kind of soft phrasing that makes this sound better than it was. Work took the year. My actual preparation was the last two or three weeks: running two or three times a week, longest run 10km. For a 42km race.

Arrival

The race gets real

A marathon advert in the arrivals hall, four days out.

Shakeout

Five easy kilometres

Out to Macquarie Point with people who knew what they were doing.

Day before

Coffee and a letdown

The pastries I had talked myself into for weeks.

Race day

Forty-two kilometres

Hard from early, which is where you meet it if you haven’t done the work.

It was hard from the beginning. Not from 30km, where you are supposed to meet the wall — from early, which is where you meet it if you haven’t done the work.
Race day, 30 August

26–27 Aug

Eight hours in Singapore, which I did not yet know was practice

The trip out went Jakarta–Singapore–Sydney with an eight-hour transit in the middle. There is no way to make an eight-hour layover interesting and I am not going to try. It is the tax you pay for the cheaper routing, and I paid it.

Departure hall at Soekarno-Hatta airport in Jakarta in the evening — The last easy part of the itinerary, and I didn’t know it.

City and river seen from an aircraft window on the descent — Somewhere on the descent, at the point where a trip stops being theoretical.

TCS Sydney Marathon advertising stand in the airport arrivals area — You land, you see this, and the entry confirmation in your inbox becomes a thing that is going to happen to your body.

Empty carriage on the Sydney airport train in the evening — Into the city around six or seven. Dinner was McDonald’s takeaway in the hotel room, which is not the opening meal a food trip wants, and pretending otherwise would be a lie the rest of this page doesn’t need.

28 Aug

Five kilometres with people who knew what they were doing

A shakeout run with my gym friends, out toward Macquarie Point, about 5km. They are the reason I was in Sydney at all. I turned back before they did, because I had a race pack to collect.

Runner in a singlet and tights standing on the harbour path with the Opera House and Harbour Bridge behind — Standing where the path turns, pretending the legs feel great. They felt fine. Fine is not the same thing.

Sydney Opera House and the Harbour Bridge framed by overhanging trees — The best photograph I took all week and I took it while catching my breath.

Sydney Tower rising above trees and lawn in Hyde Park under a clear sky — Cutting back through Hyde Park. Late August gave us this sky most days.

Sydney Marathon branded column printed with columns of participant names — Pack collection at Sydney Showground, late morning into the early afternoon. Your name on a wall is either motivating or alarming depending on how your training went. Mine had not gone.

29 Aug

Coffee, one disappointing pastry, and lying very still

Morning coffee at Alma. Then AP House, where the pastries were the letdown of the day — I had built them up and they didn’t hold. Lunch at Tao, then back to the hotel to do nothing on purpose.

Empty Sydney train platform in morning light with the Harbour Bridge in the distance — Out early on the day you are supposed to stay off your feet. Nobody is good at this part.

Entrance to Alma cafe with planting outside and warm lighting inside — Alma first, and Alma was good. The rest of the morning is where it went sideways.

AP House Roastery and Bakery sign mounted on a concrete wall — The building is beautiful. I want to be fair about which part disappointed.

Trolley rack of croissants, danishes and pastries behind glass — It looks like this and then it doesn’t taste like this, which is the specific disappointment I had travelled with.

A croissant and a pain au chocolat in a takeaway box next to a coffee cup — Fine. Just fine. On the day before a marathon that is arguably the correct outcome, and I still wanted more.

Cafe table with pastries, a slice of cake and iced drinks — The day before a marathon is mostly an exercise in not spending anything you will want tomorrow. I was better at this part than at the training part.

30 Aug

I ran my first marathon on three weeks of training. It went about as well as that sounds.

Left the hotel at 5am. Wave start at 6:50. Finished in 6 hours 22 minutes, on a course that turned out to be properly hilly, with elevation I hadn’t planned for because I hadn’t planned for anything. Afterwards: back to the hotel, then Doo Dee King for something light, then a proper dinner at Kagoshima Master Ultimo, which was very good and which I have no photographs of, because by that point I had stopped documenting anything.

Race kit laid out in rows: cap, sunglasses, singlet, shorts, socks, gels and race bib 17821 — Five in the morning. Laying it out like this is the only part of the process I did properly.

Runners spread across a closed Sydney street under trees in bright sun — By this point the crowd has thinned out and everyone left is having their own private conversation with the distance.

Runner in a white and maroon singlet filming on a phone while running through the finish area — Coming into the finish area, filming it, because after six hours the phone was the only thing I could still operate. Official race photograph.

Finisher selfie holding a TCS Sydney Marathon medal by the water with the Opera House behind — Twenty minutes after finishing, still wearing the cap, entirely unable to process it yet.

Worth it?

Yes, and I am still not satisfied with that time. Both are true. I finished a major on almost no preparation, which I am glad about, and I know exactly why the number looks the way it does, which is the part I would change. The next one I train for properly.

What didn’t work

The training, obviously — but specifically the hills. A 10km longest run tells you nothing about what a hilly 42km does to your legs at kilometre 25. That was the gap, and it was entirely mine.