I can't deny that I'd love to run the London Marathon again one day, but until then I'll make do with spending marathon day somewhere in London supporting and taking photos . .

. . this year I chose somewhere new, for me, opposite Parliament Square in the final mile. What a location! I've run along here several times in the past, in both directions, and I don't remember running past all the statues and buildings and the history . . you can almost feel the momentous events that have taken place here for hundreds of years. What I do remember is the noise and waves of encouragement that came from the crowd I was part of . . what a fab way to spend a day . .

I arrived bright and early at Westminster tube station and spent a little while just clicking away at everything I could see, before finding a great spot to take my photos from . .

 . . some aspects of the course were still being finished . . and it was a bit of a surprise when the guy came back at 2.30 and started ripping the corporate banners down again . .

 . . I've never seen the Mini Marathons before so it was great fun watching the junior athletes giving their all to get to the Mall as quickly as possible . . whilst the crowds around me started to grow . .

 . . there was a brief lull whilst we waited for the first of the wheelchair athletes . . and then we noticed the tv camera boom thingummy at the end of Bridge Street moving up and down and there they were . . astonishingly, we thought, 6 guys going wheel to wheel, flat out towards the finish . . the winner was number 21 in the photo, David Weir, who took the title for a 6th time in 1.32.26 . .

 . . shortly after they'd whizzed past came the first of the helicopters . . which told us that the leading ladies were headed towards us . . and Kenya's Mary Keitany, dwarfed by the guys on their motorbikes, came by on her way to winning for the second year in a row in a time of 2.18.37, over a minute ahead of second placed Edna Kiplagat . .

. . the biggest cheer thus far came when Liz Yelling came by . . having realised by half way that her dream of a third Olympic Games wasn't going to happen and eased off the pace. It was great to see Liz respond with a smile to the crowd's encouragement . .

. . the second helicopter told us that the men were on their way along the Embankment towards us . . and for the second time in a short while a Kenyan athelte stormed by in a clear lead. Wilson Kipsang just missed out on a course record but his time of 2.04.44 was still the sort of thing that most of us can't even dream about . .

. . I'd been looking out for Anuradha Cooray, who runs for (local to me) Vale of Aylebury AC. He needed to run sub-2.18 to qualify to run for Sri Lanka in the Olympic Games and when he went by I realised it was going to be close. I needn't have worried however as he ran a great time of 2.17.50 . . Congratulations Anuradha . .

. . they'd obviously run out of helicopters because the next thing we saw above us was the Goodyear airship . . and almost before we knew it the road was filled with runners and the noise from the crowd went from one crescendo to another as we picked out one runner after another to cheer and cajole on their way towards Birdcage Walk and The Mall . .

. . we were treated to fancy dress of all sorts and some more unusual money raising feats . . such as Sasha Kenney who was raising money for the NSPCC, hoping to break the 6-hour mark for the quickest hula hooping runner . . Sasha achieved a great time of 5.05.57 and so blew her target away. And from time to time we were reminded of our priviledged location when a marathon tourist would stop, turn around, and take their own photo of Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament . .

. . eventually . . at around 3.45pm after the runners had been going for 6 hours, it became so dark that my camera couldn't cope . . here's the final in focus running shot of the day . .

. . and after a bit of a walk . . and an hour or so catching up with running friends at the pub . . I was on my way back to Marylebone . .