I’ve had the idea of these “Gold Medal Leggings” in my head for months now.
I’d originally envisioned myself swooping through the Paris half wearing them, making Chanel-ed sunglasses tilt down as I sped past in a blur! “Oh my! Who eez zat magnificent femme with ze gold leggings??”
Or something like that. But then I got ridiculously sick with the shingles in January and still couldn’t run it come March, so these got their debut in the East London half on Sunday instead. Not quite as glamorous, but they did cause quite a stir.
I used my leggings draft from the Kristina Shin book again, teamed with Suzie Spandex “Spirographix” lycra in yellow. This makes these sister leggings to my Liberace pair (which were in the comparatively sedate “charcoal” colourway!), which I wear ALL the time. I had Arielle buy this fabric, plus some Suziplex for me when she was in Montreal and they were hand-carried in a series of suitcases across multiple borders, so I’m very glad to make good use of it!
It also appeared that Suzie Spandex cut a very generous length because it was more like 1.4m than the 1m I ordered, woop (so there’s plenty left for accents on Jalie running skirts or tops). Believe it or not, I sewed these up on my jet lag day after our red-eye flight back from the States when I was trying to stay awake until local bedtime!
The leggings certainly got the reception I was after – I’m not exaggerating when I say that my leggings got more cheers on the route than I did, I swear!
I really needed the crowd support, too, because it was a tough, two-lap industrial course with a lot of switchbacks and narrow paths. My friend Chris and I run together most Saturdays and decided we’d try for sub-1:45, sticking together for the entire route (or at least within sight of each other, because we know each other well enough to not have to be on top of each other!).
Did you notice in this last photo the matching running arm band pocket I made to hold my gels? A few of you have made these but had some questions on my tutorial, and I agree, so I think I need to clean it up a bit! I might just re-draft it as a pdf pattern to simplify matters…
We didn’t quite get the time we were after, but we both learned a lot in the run-up to our marathons next month (he’s running his first full in Edinburgh the week after I run Copenhagen full marathon). My official time was 1:50:40 – not a PB, but I was the 80th woman out of 700+, so I don’t think that’s too shabby!
Here’s a group shot of everyone from Run dem Crew who ran it, not counting everyone who cheered or those off running other races on the same day! The course looped back on itself quite a few times, which meant we could high-five and cheer each other on as we ran, which really helped.
I was really pleased with how the leggings performed – this is definitely the longest distance I’d attempt in non-wicking fabric. I was a little concerned when the sun came out on the second lap, but the fabric didn’t bother me at all, and they didn’t shift around for the whole run, so they’ll certainly be fine for shorter distances.
I’ve had a few people ask if I’m running the London marathon on Sunday – I’m not, but I’m cheering on about 40 of my crew running. I’m actually planning to run it next year, since I ran a qualifying “Good for Age” time in Amsterdam, which means I get a guaranteed spot without having to raise thousands of pounds for charity. BUT, even though I’m not running it on Sunday, a pair of leggings I made are! It’s my first custom-drafted, custom-designed running leggings, which I’ll try to get photos of afterwards!