Lisbon half marathon

My husband and I, along with several members of our running club, recently ran Lisbon half marathon. Lisbon half marathon is one of the six Superhalfs and was the second race in the series for my husband and I. We ran our first Superhalf in Cardiff in 2024, and I must admit it was one of my least favourite races ever! But I liked the idea of visiting European cities and running races, so we decided to give the series a go.

Then we got stuck. We applied for Copenhagen in 2025 and 2026, and Valencia in 2025 and 2026. But the races had got really popular. We didn’t get a place. We didn’t get a place at Lisbon either. Then one day we got an email out of the blue to say we’d got a place.

Initially, the Superhalfs were supposed to be completed within 60 months of your first race, but those rules have changed due to the difficulty of getting a place. There is now unlimited time to complete the series.

We were excited to get our place at Lisbon and actually feel like the Superhalfs was really happening. But all we heard about it was that it was really badly organised. Everyone else in our running club was staying at a hotel close to the Sete-Rios railway station, so they could get a train easily on the morning. By all accounts, you had to get a train very early and the trains were all really packed. There was no choice but to get a train. The race starts in Almada – on the other side of the famous Ponte 25 de Abril (25th April bridge) – and everyone had to get there by train.

I can’t tell you how much I stressed about this. It was in my thoughts way too much in the six months between booking the race and running it. I was worried that our hotel was nowhere near the railway station. My husband booked us into Hotel Mundial, where we stayed three years ago, before I’d even had chance to explain about the train situation.

We arrived in Lisbon late on Friday night, ready to run the race on Sunday morning. On Saturday, we walked along the river to the expo to pick up our bib numbers, Tshirts and the other items in our goody bag. I must admit, I was buzzing to be at an expo, as I’ve never done a race big enough to have one before!

On Saturday evening, the receptionist at our hotel told us there was a taxi rank right outside, with taxis there from 6am. It should be no problem to get a taxi to the railway station.

I got up at 5am to try to eat a reasonable breakfast. We’ve never run a race abroad before and the only time we’ve ever stayed in our hotel before a race was for Birmingham half marathon last year – which we travelled to after dinner at home. Neither of us are very good at running if we don’t eat safe foods. Wheat is complete no-no before a race and I can’t do spice either. I’d eaten pad thai the night before with a portion of rice. For breakfast, I ate a couple of rice cakes with thick peanut butter and some granola (given to us at the expo!) dropped in a couple of yogurts. I just had to hope for the best.

We left the hotel at 6:45am and actually got an Uber rather than a taxi. We got to the station with no problems and actually arrived at the same time as a group of runners from our club. The train was busy, but some of us even managed to get seats. None of the predicted problems had happened.

The walk to the start was longer than it said in the race information, but that wasn’t really a problem, as we’d arrived nearly two hours before the race, which started at 9:30. There were some portaloos with short queues soon after the railway station, so we took advantage of those. They were rather old fashioned ones – with no flush, just a pit (don’t look down!) and no hand sanitiser. I always carry hand sanitiser with me for a race. Every single club member was grateful that I do.

We walked to the starting area, where there were massive toilet queues. The information we’d had before the race suggested there were toilets all the way down both sides of the start line. That wasn’t true. There were blocks of six or seven toilets, with big gaps between them. And over 16,000 runners for the half marathon alone. There was also a 10k. We queued for about 40 minutes for the toilet. A lot of people didn’t bother. They just walked up the hill behind the toilets and went al fresco. Not just men. And not just number 1s, apparently.

Runners were in six waves for the half marathon. My husband and I, and the fastest man from our club, were in wave 1 – the fastest wave. My husband is still making a slow comeback from a nasty hamstring injury at Christmas. Our coach had said he could run eight miles and walk five. His physio said he could run 10 and walk three. He decided to follow his physio’s advice and break it up by running 2.5 miles, then walking one. As I’m deep into marathon training, the coach had advised me to run fairly fast, but not PB pace. I needed to be able to get back to a big week of running, with no niggles. We’d agreed on 8:20 min/ mile – to give me a time of just under 1:50.

At 9:3o precisely, we were off and running across the iconic bridge. The sky was blue, the sun was shining and it was still pleasantly cool. Most people ran a bit slowly initially, just to appreciate the bridge (and take pictures). I stayed with my husband for about half a mile, before speeding up. The trick with the bridge was to run on the tarmac and avoid the grating which ran along either side.

The bridge was more than a mile over the water, and nearly two miles in total before it hit ground level. There was a very pleasant downhill coming off the bridge. I was aware that I was running a bit faster than I should, and kept trying to slow myself down a bit. But I felt comfortable and I was being dragged along by the fast runners around me.

At three miles, there was an abrupt turn and we started going back on ourselves. On the way out, I saw the fast man from the club and on the way back, I saw my husband. Then we veered off towards the left and away from the bridge. This was the only brief uphill in the whole race, followed by another pleasant downhill.

There was a real lack of spectators, as it’s not a city centre race.  But there were some crowds between about four and five miles. Being in Europe, all the distance markers were in kilometres rather than miles, although I always work in miles! There were six water stations – one of which also gave out energy drinks and one which also gave out gels.

I’m working on improving my hydration and fuelling for the marathon, so I had my own water and electrolytes with me, plus gels. I still took water from three of the aid stations, partly so I could tip it on myself! The sun was getting hot and I wasn’t thrilled I had my hydration vest on. I much prefer to carry things in a belt, but there was no bag drop, so I’d got a warm top in my backpack for before and after the race. I was also running in my glasses, which I don’t normally do, because I knew I needed them to negotiate public transport and buy food.

There was another out and back section of the course between five and seven miles. We passed back under the bridge at seven miles and I was surprised to see that people were still walking across it.

Then we headed out towards Torre de Belem and beyond. From mile five onwards, the race was essentially on a dual carriageway alongside the railway and parallel to the river. It’s not the most scenic run (we couldn’t actually see the river) and it can be tough mentally, but it was flat, which is always a good thing. Mile nine to mile 13 was yet another out and back. All I could think about was when I was going to turn. There was a water spray across the course, which was very pleasant, but it all felt like it took a very long time.

The turn came at mile 11 and then it was just back to the finish line in the Belem area of the city, with a small left turn off the main course. I was happy to cross the line in 1:47:30. That was an average pace of 8:11 minute/ miles, so hopefully my coach wouldn’t mind too much. I was some way behind the winner, Jacob Kiplimo, who completed Lisbon half marathon in 57:20 and broke the half marathon world record!

My husband’s run and walk technique worked well and he finished just half an hour behind me. He’d felt really comfortable and was pleased with how it went.

Now to go into the ballot for next year’s Superhalfs!