Last September, the World Championships delivered a dreamlike moment when Julia Paternain won bronze in the women’s marathon. In April, a childhood dream will turn to reality as Julia races the TCS London Marathon. She spoke to James Rhodes about returning to the country she grew up in, her Cambridge & Coleridge roots and much more.

Early morning, Sunday 23 April 2017. Thousands of runners – full of excitement and nerves – headed to Blackheath to start a 26.2 mile adventure. A few miles westward, many younger athletes were simultaneously getting ready for their own adventure. The final three miles of the London Marathon course, warming the roads up before the greats via the Mini London Marathon.

One of those was a seventeen-year-old Julia Paternain. That day, her love of the roads was born. Nine years – and one World Championships bronze medal – later, she returns to the same streets for the full distance. If there is one word that describes how she feels about the prospect of a first race in England since 2018, and a first visit in nearly five years, it is excited.

“I’m extremely excited, I grew up watching the London Marathon! I grew up only an hour away from London, so I’m very familiar with it. My mum worked in London. It’ll be fun just to be able to go home. I have a lot of friends that I’m already planning on seeing after the race”.

Growing Up

Julia now lives in Flagstaff (Arizona), coached by Jack Polerecky as part of the McKirdy Trained group. However, it was at Cambridge & Coleridge that her love for the sport was nurtured, under the guidance of Mark Vile and Ric Park. It is a club and environment to which she places a great deal of gratitude.

“Ric Park and Mark Vile created such a great atmosphere, it was a great community and such a great environment. Everyone at the track was there for a common purpose, everyone just wanted to put in the hard work. Sometimes the weather would suck, it was gross, cold, miserable. But we were all out there, just trying to get better. They instilled in me that you get out what you put in.

I really like Mark, he was a no excuses type of coach. He instilled this mental toughness in me from a young age and I will forever be grateful for that. I remember one time, someone came up to him at training and said, ‘Mark, I’m really tired today’. He was like, ‘You’re a distance runner. You wake up tired, you got to sleep tired, what do you expect?’. Obviously, within reason, he’s not crazy!

I loved that attitude, C&C really did a lot for me. They are people who want to be there for the love of the sport, I think that is great”.

One of her training partners was Tom Keen, who had English Schools success at the same time as Julia. It is nice that, in the same year Julia made her senior international debut Tom did too, at the European Indoor Championships. Running is a small world, as the pair recently met for the first time since.

“I ran into him on the treadmill in a gym a mile from my house! I haven’t seen him since we both won English Schools when we were 15 or 16. It was really cool, a full circle moment”.

Julia & Tom Keen at the English Schools. Photo: Mark Vile

Lighting A Spark

There are many highlights to Julia’s junior career, too many to mention all. Perhaps at the top is back-to-back English Schools titles over 3000m in 2017 and 2018. However, it was a second-place finish at the 2017 Mini London Marathon – on the day Mary Keitany set a (women’s only) World Record – that helped light the spark that led to April’s London debut.

Back then, the Mini London Marathon required qualification and saw the best of the UK’s junior athletes race against each other. It covered the final three miles of the marathon course and was run on marathon morning. A race like little other, at that age at least.

“It’s kind of crazy when I think about it. I think it was one of the first road races that I ever did. I had a great race, it was probably one of the best races of my junior career. I remember finishing and thinking, ‘man, I like the roads, that was cool!’. I remember being really starstruck with the elites running the London Marathon and just thinking about how cool the whole environment was.

I remember really enjoying those last three miles and just the atmosphere. Everything was something I’d never experienced before. It’s going to be amazing to be able to enjoy that for a full marathon.

To look back at it, and to get to live out my childhood dream, is really special. I’m very excited”.

Running at the 2017 Mini London Marathon. Photo: Mark Vile

Early Preparations

There are more similarities between that race and those of a professional athlete than might initially appear. For those reading this who experienced the Mini London Marathon, perhaps memories are flooding back. Early morning coach journeys, hundreds of athletes getting ready in one confined space, plenty of pent-up nerves and excitement. Experiencing that at a young age, including at other races in England, provided a useful grounding for Julia’s professional journey.

“I think the Mini Marathon was a really great experience. It was one of those races where I had no idea what was happening! I remember getting on a warm-up bus and then being with all the other athletes. I was really nervous, just happy to be there.

It was a really great experience because that is truly what a lot of road races are like. There was a warm-up bus in Japan. You’re around a bunch of other athletes. Everyone’s kind of nervous and you’re making small talk.

I think it really did prepare me well. I have to credit a lot to growing up in England and the British races I did. The way they are set up prepares you very well for once you get to the bigger races in your senior career”.

The Road to Tokyo

If the Mini London Marathon was the best race of Julia’s junior career, then last September’s was the best of her senior career. So far.

Much has changed in the eight and a half years between the two. Life is lived in Flagstaff with the McKirdy Trained group. It was at the McKirdy Micro: The Road to Tokyo that Julia made her marathon debut, finishing in 2:27:09.

The race’s name is apt, given six months later it was where Julia found herself. The World Championships, as (literally) the last qualifier. After two- and a-bit hours on the roads of the Japanese capital and one lap of the Olympic Stadium, a bronze medal awaited. The first for Uruguay in World Championships history. Disbelief, for Julia and those watching, made for a heartwarming reaction. It was a proud moment, and one that took a while to sink in.

“I had a lot of moments in my career where I very nearly quit running, so it was a really just great experience to be able to put together this huge body of work that I feel like I’ve trained for my whole life. It sounds cliche, but it was really, really satisfying to kind of see it all come together.

Only in the last month has it sunk in. It was all kind of ‘go, go, go’, it didn’t feel real. I was on cloud nine for a very long time. During Christmas and New Year, I think life and the world has kind of moved on. It’s allowed me time for it to sink in and realise, oh, that really did happen!”.

Photo: James Rhodes

Full Trust

Jack Polerecky and James McKirdy guide Julia through her senior and professional career, just as Cambridge & Coleridge did when a junior. It’s a close-knit group, and Julia credits their guidance as the biggest factor in her Tokyo success.

“My team out here is great. I would consider all my teammates as friends and then teammates. It’s really enjoyable, because I get to show up to training and enjoy the people I’m around. I really enjoy the people I have around me. Not only are they just great people to be around, but I trust everything that they tell me so, so much.

They really know what they’re doing, especially when it comes to the marathon. In preparing for Tokyo, they knew the key thing was to stay cool and get all your fuelling in. You could really see that that was one of the main things that helped in my race.

I truly trust all the advice they give me. I can stand on that start line without thinking, ‘did I do this right, did I do that right?’. I know I did everything in my power to be here and I did the best I could. Just having that blind faith in them is this really great. Mentally, it really helps give me a lot of confidence.

They’re just great people. After the Worlds, for example, my agent said it will be a bit of an emotional roller coaster. It is a really great thing, but there’s the highs and the lows, the post-Olympic blues people call it. Just having someone that fully understands that is really is really useful”.

Photo: Bjorn Paree

Back to London

After running 2:27 in her first two marathons, Julia’s primary goal for London is to run faster than she has before. Continuing to learn too, given the event is still relatively new. As Julia puts it, “going through the process of the marathon build and seeing what I can get out of myself is what really excites me”. There is more to the race than that, however. Reconnecting with the younger self whose dreams were born in London all those years ago.

“I am excited to be able to go back and almost reconnect with like the younger athlete in me. I haven’t been home in so long and I’m excited to experience the British distance running scene again. It’s such a great environment back home, everyone really does it for the love of the sport.

I’m just excited I’m getting to run the London Marathon. It’ll be very special, regardless of whatever the outcome is”.