2nd of June – On the run

The run didn’t start until 1300 (I am assuming that it’s because the morning weather here tends to be questionable) so I decided to sleep in and relax until leaving the hotel to go to the starting area. I had a few short walks around to keep an eye on the weather, but the forecast seemed more and more clear: 6-8°C, 6-10 m/s winds and constant light rain. So quite dull weather with clouds at 200-300 meters wouldn’t give great views one could have hoped for in such a beautiful place. 

In total 600 people had signed up for the event, but that was in total for all the 5,5km, 10km, half-marathon and marathon distances. Only 121 people joined the marathon run so it would be a small nice run. We got sent off on time, and after circling the town once we took the main road out northbound, following the coast around into an inlet before continuing back out on the other side reaching Kaldbak where the turnaround point was, and then the same way back to Torshavn again, though just the direct way and no circling around.

I was a bit worried about how things would go as I had just run my first marathon ever two weeks previously, so I expected my legs to still be slightly wobbly. Luckily I felt none of that, and I could instead spend my energy overcoming the resistance of running into the wind and rain for most of the run. There was 538m of total altitude gain along the way, so that went straight to my legs, too. And to add to the challenge the highest hills to conquer were on the last 7km coming back into Torshavn – against the wind. But to my surprise I ended up completing in 4:12:54, a fair bit faster than expected, so I was very happy when I crossed the finish line.

This meant that I was 17/32 in my class (men 18-39), 56/89 among men and 70/121 overall. The winner came in at 2:36:30 (a small improvement from last year and a new track record), the second came in 20 minutes later. First woman across the finish line was at 3:18:8. And the last runner came in at 5:36:03, a big improvement from last year's 6:59:07.

And we are off! And it is as wet as it looks.

Photo taken by faroephoto.com.

A gentle wet hill on the way out of Tórshavn. Coming back it felt less gentle.

Photo taken by faroephoto.com.

Feeling better than expected when crossing the line!

Photo taken by Jens Kristian Vang.

On completion you got served fish soup with chunks of delicious salmon and plenty of home-made cake to grab. It was a great end to a fun run. Hobbling back to the hotel which luckily was only a few hundred meters away, had a nice long warm shower before getting dressed and went out to have a quick and easy dinner. Staying on second floor I definitely used the elevator up and down.