A record number of Dumfries Running Club members took part in the annual Marcothon race

Dumfries Running Club

The Marcothon

The Marcothon is a deceptively difficult running challenge that has been taking place for several years now and requires people to run every day in December for a minimum of three miles or 25 minutes.

Marco Consani is one of Scotland’s foremost ultra runners and he devised this personal challenge to encourage runners to push themselves in the winter months and to complete extra distance.

In 2023 five club members took part but for December 2024 this was expanded to an incredible 29 who started and 16 who managed to run every single day. There is no entry fee, no prizes and no reward beyond the personal satisfaction of completing something that is difficult and requires substantial personal motivation.

In all, the group managed 2,500 miles between them and with Robert Gordon and Rebecca Queen at the heart of it, a WhatsApp group helped keep people on target as many had to attempt this whilst balancing family life, work commitments and the usual stresses and strains. Finding time in the most hectic of months was always difficult with cold wet weather and the 60mph winds of Storm Darragh. This meant many of the runs were done solo, with the nagging feeling that there were many better things to do than run in the dark but weekly group runs as well as regular parkruns at the Crichton helped push people on.

Fiona Gonlag, for example, had never even run two days together and Nicola Ross was pleased to reach seven and both were absolutely delighted to complete 100 miles in the whole of December.

For Claire McLaren, daily runs had to be fitted in at 5.30am before a 12 hour shift as a midwife and for Kerry Precious, John Currie and Liz Scarfe, each new club members for 2024, feeling part of a