Memorial Marathon

stats of the week: run 21km

After last Sunday's long run in Dublin my thigh once again hardened and forced me to rest. I don't worry any more ... I'll just give it a try next Sunday in New York City. We'll see what happens.

Regards from Washington where I again guide an interAir group of runners around the marathon. It's quite a big event with 22,000 finishers on the classic distance and additional 7,000 on the 10K. With very few people from abroad it's a very American day. The race is organised by the Marines ... I have never seen so many wheel chair participants in a marathon. It's truly the army's day.

Washington appears to me as the world's capital of heroism and patriotism. It's not a common city - it's a museum of war glorification. As a European visitor you try hard to get along with it.

Marine Corps Marathon

A friendly place to be

stats of the week: run 41km, gym 2hrs

With more visits to the hospital my mileage kept rather limited. I now got the feeling I had to reduce my NYC target in direction of 4 hrs. A 10-mile-run today let my legs hurt quite a lot and I don't think I'm in the state of running a satisfying marathon. However, I'm not really focussed on running these days.

Regards from Dublin where I guide a group of interair runners doing the 31st Dublin Marathon. It's promoted "the friendly marathon" and I admit that's perfectly right. Irish people are the most friendliest at least within Europe, the event is very well organised without being restrictive in any way. From the expo via friendship run to the marathon and the post race party, it's easy going all the way. It's my 4th time to watch it. Next year I want to run it!

Is there any other place in the world but Dublin where people queue to get into a bookshop?!

Today's Dublin is modern and vivid.

Next year the marathon takes place on Halloween!

Race the training

stats of the week: run 42km, gym 3hrs

It was a week of obstacles with a happy end. It took my muscles half the week to recover from last weekend's half marathon. Then I caught my first cold of the year but got over it in time to be fit again to do another race! I intended to do it as the scheduled long training run. Alas - like most times when training within a race the run resulted in higher speed than it was planned. However, I enjoyed 2.5 hrs of running through the beautiful countryside of the Teutoburger Wald.

This photo was taken after 6km. Interesting to see that the young lady to the very left is the one who finished just behind me after 29km.

Finishing 11th in my age group is nothing to be proud of ... but is reason enough to be very happy. There were just 41 chaps of my age doing the distance on a rather tough route. You are even more grateful being that fit when you see a person close to you struggling to be able to walk.

Run and move

stats of the week: run 41km, cycled 118km, gym 2hrs

With 4 weeks to go to New York it was a convienent weekend to test my speed on half the distance at our home town event, the Ruhrtal-Marathon. There was even a group from UK at the start, some runners from the Cambridge area.

Finishing after 1:38:35 I was just 1 minute slower than 2 years ago. Projecting this to a full distance leads to time of around 3:35 hrs. This allows another 10 min for the hills of Manhattan and my target of 3:45. I still have to build up more performance to be on a safer side.

Yesterday's photos - Fighting to the finish line (it was downhill):

It wasn't my ranking what made me standing on the podium! The audiance serenaded to celebrate 10 years of http://www.laufen-in-witten.de/! I was moved but didn't feel really comfortable ...

Preparing for the Blue Day

stats of the week: run 49km, cycled 103km, gym 4hrs

Finally it was my first somewhat good week since long. Completed an interval workout on the treadmill and a long run on Sunday morning.

Only 5 weeks left until New York City Marathon! I am happy to be placed at the Blue Start, 1st wave. Blue is best, it is the one where the professionals start and where you experience the opening ceremonial at its best.