Running marathons and three games in one day: The maddest things we do for Leicester City
After Leicester travelled thousands of miles across the world for a cancelled friendly, it got us thinking.
So we asked our writers, what’s the maddest or most dedicated thing you’ve ever done for Leicester City?
Becky Taylor
I'm not usually a superstitious person, but I am when it comes to Leicester City. In 2021, I realised I had been for a run on the day of every game in our FA Cup run (pun intended), so I decided I needed to do another to fit the magnitude of Final day.
After initially laughing off someone's suggestion that the only way to do it in style was to run a marathon, I persuaded myself that was exactly what I had to do to ensure I'd done my part in Leicester lifting their first FA Cup.
For context, the furthest I'd ever run in one go prior to that day was 18 miles, so I had no idea if I'd actually manage it. Attempting a marathon without proper training was one of the maddest things I'd ever done in my life, let alone purely to help Leicester win a game.
I set my alarm for 3:47am to allow time to get up and fuelled before heading out at 5am. I stepped out the door without a clear route but with the idea that if I did complete it Leicester would win the FA Cup, that was the focus.
The only spot I 100% wanted to include on the route was King Power Stadium, which upon reaching definitely gave me another kick to keep running.
The balance of keeping to my planned pace and persuading myself to just keep making the next mile for the sake of us all was definitely a battle.
Long story short, I managed to complete the marathon - special thanks to the incentive of a jelly baby each mile after 18 - arriving home just before 9am. I had to be home in time to get on the coaches down to London for the game so that pressurised everything!
The whole rest of the day was lived on pure adrenaline (and blisters) of both being a marathon runner and that I was getting to watch Leicester City in an FA Cup final.
53844 steps were clocked that day, it was ridiculous from start to finish but it was completely worth it. By the time we were home my body was done and I crashed, I don't think I moved the next day.
To everyone who enjoyed that FA Cup win, you're welcome.
David Bevan
There are a few things now that I look back on and wonder whether it was a different person who did them.
The first one that springs to mind is making the 400-mile round trip to Hartlepool on a Tuesday night for a Johnstone's Paint Trophy match. And there were 400 of us there that night, although one of those was a chap called Lawrence who apparently used to turn up to every Hartlepool game in the away end to support the visiting team. So I'm not sure he counted as "us", but he enjoyed our 3-0 win either way.
I've mentioned this before on this site but seeing three Leicester games in one day was another good one - a reserve friendly at Loughborough, a first team friendly at Tamworth and the Masters team at a tournament in Nottingham.
Maddest of all has to be April and May 2016 though - working from 8 til 4 from Monday to Friday, then going home and writing thousands of words each evening until gone midnight and interviewing people like Emile Heskey and Martin O'Neill to hit a book publication deadline (The Unbelievables: The Amazing Story of Leicester's 2015/16 Season is available from all good bookshops - Ed). Plus actually going to every game home and away. The whole experience somehow made what the club achieved that year feel even more surreal.
James Knight
Mine pale in comparison with some of the others, but as someone who lives in London it’s the long round trips even to home games on weekday evenings that are the real killers. In the Championship dead zone in the noughties there were a few horror shows, days that make you contemplate the futility of life.
The last Megson game at home to Sheffield United was bleak. A team that never scored any goals to start with, Tuesday evening, they’d closed the bridge over the river so we had to take a massive detour to walk to and from the ground. Lost 1-0. Long trip home after that one.
Like many of us, the other ones that stick out are dragging people to dismal pubs in a desperate search for a Sky subscription. I was on holiday in Mexico in autumn 2016 and had to head out in a tropical rainstorm first thing in the morning to find a sports bar that was showing us play West Brom. I was the only one there, Danny Drinkwater played them in for the winner.
The other one that stands out is watching us lose to Manchester United last season in a pub in Fort William, almost literally at the end of the earth. The only other person I thought might be interested in the game, given he was wearing a United shirt, spent the entire 90 minutes pouring money into a slot machine. I don’t think we had a shot.
