The London Marathon

Requirement

Attended by over 35,000 runners, watched by over 4 million people and taking in some the UK capital’s best loved landmarks, the London Marathon is far from an ordinary race. This year’s marathon saw not only the millionth runner cross the finish line, but featured the marathon debut of double-Olympic champ Kelly Holmes, and saw the first runner in space take part; as astronaut Tim Peake ran the marathon via iPad from the International Space Station.

An event of this scale and status needs reliable suppliers to ensure the day goes without a hitch; and the Wernick Events Team were on hand to provide an efficient high quality service.

Senior Operations Manager for the Marathon, Andrew Smith told commented; “We’ve worked with Wernick for a number of years and they never fail to deliver. The Events team always provide a friendly, efficient service, which is why we’ve returned to them again and again as suppliers.”

Wernick Events have maintained an excellent relationship with the London Marathon since first supplying for them in 2009, and this year provided 25 cabins at the start and finish lines and 230 chemical toilets along the course for runners and spectators.

If it wasn’t tough enough to be providing facilities for a world famous sporting event watched by millions, the team had to supply this equipment under very strict deadlines. As the course passes famous London landmarks and uses busy London roads, the units needed to be installed, checked and removed as quickly as possible to minimise disruption.

The facilities at the finish line were set up on the morning of the race from 6am. The Event’s Team needed everything in place and ready for the first runner to cross the finish line. With the first race starting at 10am, that’s a very tight time frame.

The toilets along the race’s route were an even bigger challenge. These were set up on the Saturday before the race, between 12 midday and 6pm. That’s 6 hours to install 26 miles of toilets! On the morning of the race a 2-man team checked every toilet from 3am onward, making sure they were safe, clean and ready to go. These inspections needed to be completed by 7am when the crowds began to arrive around the course. As soon as the final runner crossed the start line, the Event’s team were hot on their heels, clearing up cabins as quickly as possible to get the course cleared and the roads returned to normal for the Monday morning commuters.

Gavin Cook, Site Manager, told us; “it’s a busy weekend but the day of the marathon is full on. We’re working from morning ‘til night getting everything ready and then cleared away again. Thankfully I have an excellent team with me; everyone knows their jobs, and when we pull together, everything falls into place.”