From Saturday 1st to Sunday 2nd October 2022
On the 1st October 2022, I was ‘tearing down the tarmac’ as I ran the length of Heathrow’s runway at midnight. This is all for a great cause for the Heathrow Community Trust which provides funding to communities around Heathrow Airport. The charity is committed to a vision of happy, healthy, inclusive, sustainable local communities where everyone has the opportunity to live a rewarding and fulfilled life.
It was such a great honour to run on the runway and to raise money for the Heathrow Community Trust Charity. The experience is somewhat surreal but fun to be out there in the darkness running on the tarmac. Fortunately, I didn’t have to dodge through any 747 jumbo jets as they closed the runways overnight so as each team with up to 12 runners, we ran the length of the run which is about 2.2 miles to a combined marathon distance of 26.4 miles.
This event is available to Heathrow employees, suppliers, operation & emergency service partners. My employer Atkins is one of Heathrow’s suppliers hence we were invited to take part in this event. There were over 400 participants plus many volunteers.
I arrived at Heathrow Terminal 5 at about 9pm and parked at the Short Stay carpark. Although I picked up a parking permit, I exchanged it to a free parking permit later after the event. I met up with my team at the landside and we proceeded to registration before transferring to airside. We had to go through the bag and body scan before we were allowed to the airside. There was a Runner’s Village at the departure gates. The atmosphere was fantastic with live band performing pop music. Shortly before midnight, we were led by a fitness instructor on stage to do some warm up aerobic dance exercise. Before we boarded on the bus, we were told to leave all our belongings to the manned bag drop area. Due to strict rules on the runway, we were not allowed to carry our phone or watch or Fitbit or headphone or jewellery with us. We couldn’t even carry water or tissue with us.
Since we didn’t have watch or phone with us, we didn’t know exactly what time we started. I just remember we did mingle at the start of the runway for quite a long time before hearing the sound of a start siren. Since we were all issued an ankle band with the time chip, everybody would get a chip time. The runway was quite dark, I just follow the cat’s eyes on the floor to make sure I was running on a straight line. Upon crossing the finish line, I came the 6th in my team in exactly 23 minutes. We then waited for the rest of 3 team members. Since one of our team members is a wheelchair user and the maximum speed of her wheelchair is 2.5 miles an hour, we all waited for her to cross the finish line before we boarded the bus to return to the terminal. Due to the one-way system at Heathrow, the bus had to travel a big loop outside Terminal 5 before reaching the same place where we left the terminal. We then returned to the Runner’s Village to receive our well-earned finisher’s medal, post-race drinks and refreshment. The live band was performing the famous Kool and the Gang’s Celebration. The post-race atmosphere was fantastic. Some runners even started dancing. When I collected my bag and looked at my phone, it was already 01:53am. I couldn’t believe it was nearly 2am. I felt like it was 10pm as I didn’t feel sleepy at all. I hanged around for a little while before driving home shortly after 2am.
What a night! What a fantastic experience lasting for a life time. 💜💜💜🏃🏻🏃🏻♀️🏃🏻🏃🏻♀️🏃🏻🏃🏻♀️
