Travelling on marathon day or stay overnight?

Hi all,

Doing first (and probably only) VLM this year.  What advice would you give re. travelling on the day or staying over?  I am travelling from Milton Keynes.  Is travelling up in the morning advisable?

Thanks.

I'm near you and I always come down to London on the Friday so I can relax on the Saturday. I wouldn't advise travelling on the day, unless you're good at getting up extremely early!

When are you going to the expo? Is it worth doing 2 separate trips when you can just stay over (assuming you've got somewhere to stay)?

Hi, I'm travelling from Huntingdon and have decided to stay in London on the Saturday to save the hassle and stress of travelling on the day.

If you decide to travel on the day the advice I received was to allow loads more time than you would think in order to get to the start line.

Maybe it would be worth contacting a local running club to see if the have a coach running?

When will you register at the Excel? (This will need to be done prior to race day)

If you decide to book a hotel it may be worth looking at Expedia. I booked one of their 'Secret Saver' hotels in the Docklands area and was pleased to get the Novotel Excel for £81.56 (plus cashback through Quidco) so will travel to the start using the DLR.

There was also a thread on here offering B&B accommodation for charity think it was titled London Marathon accommodation at the start (I can't post links,sorry) which may be of use.

Good luck with whatever you decide.

Hope this helps. 

The other thing to prepare for if travelling on the day is the possibility that you may miss the race altogether should anything go wrong.  You really need to be OK with that when you make your decision.

Hi Shoenut100,

 I would definetly stay overnight, you will have enough to worry about and get sorted without the added stress of catching trains on time. When i travelled down in 2009 the train was held up as someone had commited suicide and jumped in front of train at wainfleet, and all trains were cancelled, and they had to sot out buses for the journey which put us back at least 2-3 hrs, if that had happened on the day of the marathon ????????????. but the choice is yours.

 Cheers Billyboy,x