SuperHalfs conclusion

Back in the good ol' days, in 2019, 5 European half marathons - Prague, Lisbon, Copenhagen, Cardiff and Valencia - announced they got together to give runners an opportunity to earn a fancy medal if you completed all 5 within 36 months from 2020 onward. Off course such a thing was right up my alley and I quickly signed up for all of them. And then that happened, so they were all cancelled and/or postponed. 

And postponed a bit more.

Until towards the end of 2021 where the first started again; Copenhagen and Valencia. So I participated in those though after the Copenhagen run I realized that they wouldn't start counting until the beginning of 2022. They argued they wanted a fresh start and fresh year, and while some of the community complained about this - the communication about this decision hadn't been clear before the Copenhagen run - they held onto that decision and I would have to also run them in 2022 despite completing them in 2021. The horror!

So getting through 2022 I have finally run and completed all 5 Superhalfs.

Prague (2nd of April); 1:44:41
Lisbon (8th of May); 1:46:35
Copenhagen (18th of September); 1:40:05 (PR)
Cardiff (2nd of October); 1:45:11
Valencia (23rd of October); 1:48:08

My goal on the half marathon distance is 1:45 which I didn't achieve for 3 of the runs. Fortunately, due to my fast time in Copenhagen I still managed to stay below 1:45 on average, more exactly 1:44:56. This meant that in Valencia I had 18 seconds to spare. A bit close to comfort, but I am happy I managed and it is now over and done with.

The SuperHalfs medal next to the Valencia HM medal.

23rd – 24th – Post-race and return home

Walking back to the hotel, goodie bag on my back and trying to prevent the two medals from rattling too much against each other, I relished in the thought that this was the last run in a row of many and I was looked forward to a month with no running and just relaxation. While the conditions during today’s run definitely had something to do with it I was looking forward to getting back to the hotel, have a shower and then lie down until going out for dinner somewhere. On arrival I passed by the kitchen where they were still serving breakfast, so filling my plate and going to my room I did exactly as planned; shower and relaxation, snacking on breakfast and goodie bag snacks. Trotting out for dinner I (obviously) ended up at a place where I managed to grab another pile of paella. And yes; smallest serving was for 2.

Having a flight just past noon fit perfectly with leaving the hotel in the morning, checking out (the receptionist recognized me from my visit last year – (not so) surprisingly not many people with my last name visit) and taking the train back to the airport where I checked in and had a nice flight home. Had quite a bit of a layover but fortunately there was plenty of food available. Not bad at all.

Having already visited Valencia once I feel like I have had enough of the city for now; the old part is really charming and nice to walk around in, but after two visits that feels like a done deal. The city is definitely worth a visit, I think, but going twice I feel is overdoing it. But I had a blast, the food was great and the half marathon there is done. Time to plan another one!

Full album can be seen here.

23rd – Valencia half-marathon

Staying in a hotel only 20 minutes’ walk from the starting area I relaxed with setting the alarm for 0630. With a snooze and slow shuffle around in the hotel room before leaving at 0715 I realized when coming outside that it was still dark (I had an internal room so I had no view of the outside). Arriving at the starting area, still dark, I shuffled around for a bit more waiting for the start at 0840 (with the elites leaving at 0825). Had I known that there wasn’t any water stations in the area I would definitely have waited a bit before leaving the hotel room. No water at the start (unless you brought it yourself) was a huge surprise to me. That was a first.

It turned out they had only installed speakers near the starting line so if you were anywhere else – and the area was huge – you didn’t have a chance to hear the music or the announcers. Coming up to the starting line it turned out I wasn’t missing much; it was all in Spanish and the announcers sounded like DJs on coke. 

Due to long lines at the porta potties I only made it to my starting group a few minutes before we were brought forward to the starting line. The group I was in contained the 1:30-1:45-runners and I only saw one pacer: the 1:45’er. While I would have preferred a more diverse pace team it was ok, but who’s idea was it to put him in the front of the group instead of somewhere in the middle?!

And, on time, off we went! At 21°-23°C along the way the temps were ok though maybe on the high side. The main issue was the high levels of humidity which made me struggle throughout most of the run. I didn’t seem to be the only one – only a few kilometers into the run I saw runners all over completely drenched in sweat.

The streets used for the course were quite narrow relative to the number of runners and how many they sent off at a time. That meant that it wasn’t until around the half-way point it felt like you could settle into your own pace instead of having to constantly adjust your pace and position due to the others. It was so frustrating. On top of this while running there were only water stations at 5, 10, 15 and 19km. For a warm and humid run like this it felt a bit underwhelming and certainly something you had to plan accordingly for. Personally I would honestly have preferred maybe 1-2 stations more along the way.

The support was good – a lot of people had shown up and stood along the course but there were few signs and the noise level was not near what I had gotten used to from my previous runs. On the other hand that just meant it was easier to concentrate on not crashing into the other runners.

The run was going quite well, the course is flat and turns are relatively easy, but with 5-6km to go my legs started feeling very heavy. I ended up getting in at 1:48:08, slower than my goal of 1:45. I came in as 7128 out of 16915 in total (top 42,14%) and 1324 out of 2383 M40 (top 55,56%). I couldn’t find the number for the position among men. Not the result I had hoped for, but I keep reminding myself that because this was the 4th run in 6 weeks (3 halfs and on full marathon) and the fact I don’t do well in high humidity these were far from optimal record-setting conditions. On the other hand I stayed below 1:48:26 which was the limit if I wanted my SuperHalfs average to be below 1:45. So a win overall. 

Crossing the finish line and getting a medal, snacks and drinks in (another) bag, I located the SuperHalfs desk (very inconspicuous – somebody just sitting at a table in the middle of the crowd of finished runners) where I got handed my medal for running all 5 half marathons within 36 months. As the runs didn’t count towards the medal until the start of the year it meant that this was the first time one could collect this medal.  

20th – 22nd of October – Valencia pre-race

Returning to Valencia from last year to run the half marathon again – last year it didn’t count towards the SuperHalfs collection so I had to return and run it again to get the “necessary” medal. 

The flight was uneventful apart from the part where I had a 4+ hour layover in Frankfurt. Fortunately it turned out the lounge had food that was surprisingly good so time was spent eating that (and making sure everything was good) while enjoying the view of the apron outside. This meant I didn’t get to check into the hotel until the evening after dark so I hadn’t planned to do anything on arrival. I still ended taking a walk down to and around the aquarium, tech museum, IMAX theater and stage to once again enjoy the illuminated buildings in the night. They are so peculiar so I’d say they are always worth a look in the dark.

The following day I headed out to the runners’ expo. As opposed to last year it wasn’t located in the starting area for the run, instead it was now in a conference building a fair bit further away in the opposite direction (I assume this is where it usually has been, but due to Covid it had been moved out into the open temporarily). So I wandered off, passing through a large part of the park surrounding the central city area and through an older part of the city further north with a lot of small random streets which kept you on your toes, I was keeping an constant eye on the map to make sure I wasn’t suddenly going off in a completely wrong direction.

Arriving at the expo there weren’t a lot of people so getting my number and goodie bag was a smooth process. And the goodie bag surprised me just like last year with regards to how much stuff they put into it. Leaving the expo I returned to the center via a different path – part of it brought me out along a road without sidewalks going through what looked like onion fields. A slightly different view from the old buildings lining narrow streets. I ended up walking around a bit and booking a table for dinner before returning to the hotel for an hour’s break before returning for dinner – paella was obviously on the menu. And the smallest portion was “for 2” so yup: delicious. 

The following day I went to the IMAX to watch a movie about the Amazon jungle and a British explorer exploring it in the 1800s. I wasn’t too impressed – it seemed more like a movie filmed normally and converted to IMAX; I didn’t really see it using the strengths of the IMAX Dome format. From there I visited the aquarium, apparently the largest in Europe. It’s a large open area with various buildings spread out containing the pools and aquariums, with also a few pools outside. With regards to size it did seem larger than many others – my impression is that aquariums usually are contained within one large building with limited outside areas. A large part of the out door space was taken up by the dolphin show stage, and lots of cafes and restaurants. Nothing bad per se but overall it didn’t feel as good as advertised. It felt a bit like quantity over quality. 

I left and continued trotting around town before finding a place for dinner. I managed to finish in a timely manner so I returned to the IMAX Dome to watch the “Secrets of the Universe” which sounded promising and that it would compensate for the disappointing experience I had with the Amazon movie. It turned out to be a dry CERN documentary about when they tried, according to the sceptics, to create a black hole and flashbacks to scientists who made big & important discoveries. The headphones had various languages, but they mounted on your head in a way they didn’t sit close to your ears which meant that you could actually hear the sound from others’ headphones, all different languages. Also, there was a delay of almost a second between the visuals and audio which made it so much more frustrating. 

I had hoped to watch something that made me forget the previous movie – instead the second movie made the first so much better.

9th – 11th – Post race and going home

Having arrived back at the hotel and showered (thankfully I didn’t have a bathtub so I could just walk into the shower without having to lift my legs) I splayed out on the bed and moved as little as possible until it was time for dinner. I waddled along until I arrived at a restaurant where I could get (another) Chicago style pizza. Disgustingly beautiful. While the previous pizza I had had been 6 inches and for one, they didn’t have anything smaller than 12 inches here. Oh, well, the sacrifices you must endure on vacation. Unfortunately this was a challenge I couldn’t handle and had to leave a quarter of it. And I even skipped dessert! 

Returning to the hotel I managed to arrange a late checkout which could not be any later than noon. This meant that I’d still have time to kill before returning to the airport to catch my flight at 2200, and I wasn’t planning on spending most of the afternoon at the airport. 

Cars lining up for the Columbus Day parade.

Leaving the hotel at noon I deposited my bag and hobbled about for a few hours around town without any real purpose other than trying to get my legs moving normally again. I ended up going back to the hotel and spend an hour in the reception relaxing before retrieving my bag and leaving for the airport.

Check-in was quick and efficient but security not so much. Long queue and only two security stations tested your patience, but finally getting through the lounge turned out to be located literally across the hall so that was easy to find. It was probably the smallest lounge I have ever been in a very limited selection of food, and if you had to use the toilet you had to leave and find one somewhere else in the airport.

Apart from that everything went smooth – we took off on time, the flight was uneventful and arriving in Copenhagen arrival was perfectly timed with the trains so I was back home only 1,5 hours later.

Full album can be see here.

9th – Chicago marathon

My alarm went off at 0530 (I do this voluntarily…) but it was made easier by me waking up a few minutes before. I stumbled about for a bit and got ready – the temps were just a few degrees above 0 but I decided to skip long pants over my shorts and settled with a shirt and jacket to stay warm. Walking the 20 minutes to the starting area I found my choice of clothing wasn’t completely off, though my legs did notice the lack of covering.

I had expected it to be similar to the starting area for the New York marathon where you could get snacks, light food and various drinks (and dogs to pet!), but there was just water filling stations, the bag check tents and porta potties. Considering the size of the arrangement it just seemed a bit lazy to not have anything. Though I do seem to remember the NY starting area being bigger so they had room for more, I still think there’d be room for various booths here. Oh, well.

Around 0700 it was time to get rid of my warm clothes and hand in my bag, and wearing only my running shorts and t-shirt I really got to feel this morning temperature. Definitely close to freezing. I got stuck in the queue to a porta potty for 20 minutes (why is it that outdoor urinals are never used in the US? Is it really such a taboo to pee even if no one’s able to see your penis?! If you take out your penis to pee and nobody sees it, is it still sexual assault?).

After the long and cold wait I shuffled over to my starting corral and realized with absolute – sarcastic – joy that the pacers were carrying a small sign on a stick in their hand. So also here you completely lost sight of the pacers only a few meters away, and none of them were able to hold their arm out to keep the sign elevated for even a short while before the sign was swinging all over the place out of sight. The corral closed at 0745 and as the first wave were sent off we were slowly shuffled forward until it was our turn to stand at the starting line. And, as scheduled, at 0800 we were sent off.

The first 5km was spent going a bit back and forth in the center of the city before heading north, passing among other things the zoo. At the 8 mile mark (app. 13km) we did a u-turn and returned towards the center where we hit the mid-way point before turning west, another u-turn at around 25km with a few kilometers return before turning south until just past the 37km mark where we once again turned around and headed back north, into the center and finishing in the opposite end of the park from where we started, another marathon done.

Photo by MarathonFoto.

While it was cold waiting for the run to start it was clear it had already started heating up at that point (either that or I was slowly loosing all sensation in my body from the cold) making it more comfortable standing around. After the start it took a few hours for the temps to reach around 15-17°C making the entire thing much more bearable. It was also quite windy throughout the run, and while the buildings shielded us from the worst part, when we did get hit directly by it, it lowered the temperatures quite significantly.

Photo by MarathonFoto.

As with the previous runs in the US the support along the way was impressive for the majority of the course. There were parts where we ran “alone”, but when people were lined up there was a lot of energy among them. And I bet there will be a few worn-out vocal cords tomorrow; I’m impressed by the volume some of them were able to produce! A lot of great encouraging posters: “Blisters are braille for awesome”, “At least you’re not at work”, “World’s worst parade” and “You have stamina – call me!”. The latter I saw first fairly early on and having not seen that poster before I instinctively gave the girl (young woman?) holding a quick smile – and passing her and her friend I heard a shy giggling and “did you see that guy??”. Short interactions with the onlookers can be fun.

Photo by MarathonFoto.

There was also multiple posters warning against trusting farts during the run and puckering up instead. Last turn before the finish line, 400m to go, I gained on someone who was running funny. Which, for the record, a lot of people were doing at this point. Having noticed him and returned to my normal empty “who’s idea was this please let it be over soon”-gaze my mind started churning; “he’s struggling hard, legs also covered in mud, wait – when did we run through mud, that isn’t… sniff-sniff… that isn’t mud at all!”. Poor guy. Didn’t pay attention to the posters. I just hope it had only happened recently.

Glad it was over.

Photo by MarathonFoto.

I crossed the finish line in 3:58:02. This put me as no. 14033 out of 39301 total (top 35,71%), 9712 out of 20844 men (top 46,59%) and 1796 out of 3488 M4044 (top 51,49%). For Danish runners I came in 55 out of 101 total (top 54,46%), 46 out of 78 men (top 58,97%) and 9 out of 15 M4044 (top 60%). I had hoped for a new PR (sub-3:55:34) considering the flat course but at around 25-30km it was as if my body started realizing what it was being put through and started complaining so I was suddenly facing a massive mental hurdle. Combined with the two half marathons 1 and 3 weeks ago (the latter being a new PR)  I was happy with getting in below 4 hours. But crossing the finish line everything below my waist just felt like overcooked noodles. A few steps past the line I had slowed down and started zig-zagging, having to lean against a fence to not topple over. A volunteer came over and grabbed my arm – I reassured her I was ok but just needed a moment to recover, thinking that she would tell me to sit down. Instead she reached into her pocket and grabbed a water bottle which she shoved into my hand and ordered me to drink. Apparently I was pretty thirsty – it disappeared in only a few gulps. The water, that is, not the bottle.

I waddled slowly on, collected drinks, snacks and my medal before I lined up to get my bag. From there I slowly started towards my hotel, wincing every time I was faced with a curb or even worse: stairs. It took almost two hours for me to be back in my hotel room after crossing the finish line, a walk that under normal circumstances would probably have taken half an hour or so. 

The slower pace was definitely because of traffic and the large crowds making it hard to move around.

Definitely.

8th – Chicago 5k

The following morning started off with the official 5k run at 0730 from the Millennium Park and around the loop in the center. Meant as a social run as a warmup for tomorrow’s marathon there is no reason to push yourself in any way. The weather was nice but cold, and it stayed dry with only a breeze. Quite nice conditions everything considered. App 7300 runners participated and the fastest ran it in app. 15 minutes. I ended up finishing in 25:48, putting me as 1072 out of 7115 overall (top 15,01%), 814 out of 3455 men (top 23,56%) and 140 out of 594 in M4044 (top 23,57%). I obviously didn’t catch the part where it wasn’t a competitive run – it probably wouldn’t have hurt to relax a bit along the way. Oh, well – it’s nice getting a good result, and it was only a 5k after all. Crossing the finish line you were handed drinks and snacks, and to my surprise you were also handed a medal. I did not see that latter part coming!

Photo by MarathonFoto.

After having returned to the hotel for a shower I went out for breakfast. Following that I decided to just visit the Institute of Art, apparently a very famous and large museum at the park that has a large variety of stuff. And yes – from the old classics from Europe (and especially the Netherlands) including a lot by Monet to modern stuff that at best could be defined as “odd”. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to understand modern art. A rock cut into three pieces. It was a nice Japanese rock, but apparently the artistry was through the roof because you could “see how beautiful the pieces are as how they fit perfectly together”. Or the self portrait that was just a pile of sweets. “Optimal amount: 175lb”. Or the self portrait “White acrylic paint on wall”. The wall was white. There was no difference between the color of the wall and the paint, so the resulting “art” was basically just a blank wall. The a collection of statues that each were accompanied by three questions that the artists had answered to explain their creations. One of them a wiggly shape forming a circle and the question was “Is it wiggly or circular” (which one could say is a reasonable question) but the answer was “The onlooker does not know what they are looking at. But it is grounded like they are.”. And the rest were equally if not even more out there. I couldn’t help but think they were high on their own supply. Maybe I wasn’t high enough? A more reasonable explanation (in my mind) is that they are having a bet among themselves trying to see who can come up with the most outrageous idea and still manage to sell it as “art”. 

Or maybe I just don’t understand modern art. 

The good weather brings everyone out to the Bean.

After a somewhat confusing visit to the museum I returned to the hotel where I relaxed until dinner. Fastest service ever. Arrived at 1800 and left 45 minutes later after having both lasagna and tiramisu. I can be an efficient eater when I want to, I admit, but it was the wait time for the food that was the shocking part – 2 minutes was the longest I had to wait at any time throughout the meal. And the food was genuinely good and didn’t seem rushed. 

6th – 7th – Chicago pre-race(s)

Slightly jetlagged I woke up before the alarm went off, though at that point I had had more than 10 hours of sleep, so one could argue it was time to go.

Leaving the hotel I found my way to Millennium Park to figure out how long it would take to get to the starting area on Sunday, and from there slowly made my way to the runner’s expo. Walking the main concourse in the massively huge facility I passed multiple ridiculously large halls (several of them were larger than the hall at Royal Arena in Copenhagen) before crossing a walk bridge into an equally large building where the expo was held.

When I arrived there were multiple long queues to get in and they didn’t move at all. It took me a moment to realize that today, on the first day of the expo, they didn’t open until 1100 and I arrived maybe 10 minutes before that. When they did open the queues started moving at a decent pace which effectively funneled people through security before being directed to the booth that had your bib. After having received my bib I also picked up my kit for the 5k morning run on the day before the marathon before entering the expo hall. Here I picked up the marathon kit (which contained my t-shirt and mostly just vouchers) and had a walk around looking at the booths of various more or less running-relevant stuff. There was nothing really interesting, though I did leave with two boxes of energy bars which were pretty much tossed at me when passing by the booth.

The Bean.

Walking the waterfront.

Leaving the expo I wandered through Chinatown before circling around and ended up back in Millennium Park and seeing The Bean (I am a tourist after all). And while the official name is Cloud Gate everybody calls it The Bean, and seeing it that name makes perfect sense. Crossing through The Loop and walking the Chicago Riverwalk brought me to the waterfront where I continued a bit north before crossing through Millennium park and returning to the hotel. Perfect timing, as it had just started raining when I entered the building. A few hours later I left for dinner, something I had been looking forward to; Chicago style pizza. It’s basically a cheese pie with pizza toppings, so when you cut it the melted cheese, while still relatively firm, lightly oozes out. For dessert I had a cookie which ended up bigger than I would ever been able to imagine. It turned out it was made in a individual-size pizza pan (6 inches), filled up the pan and topped with ice cream and whipped cream. Just like the pizza it was disgustingly obscene and I loved every single bite of it. And I am pretty sure it’ll prevent me from getting a sub-4 hour time on Sunday.

Do you want some pizza with that cheese?

When leaving the hotel the following morning I went to grab breakfast nearby; 2 pancakes, sausages and eggs before heading north. My plan was to go along the waterfront but the weather made that a miserable idea. It had gotten windy from east-ish and it varied between drizzling, pouring down and the occasional break until past noon. So instead I wandered through the city streets until crossing the Chicago River where I headed towards the water to see Navy Pier. It is basically a large recreational area built on top of a very large pier, but as it was out of season and morning everything was closed, and the few other people out there looked like me; having a look around trying to ignore the disappointing weather.

Standing in the center below the Bean looking up.

I continued north and found myself up alongside the zoo which is free to enter which meant I ended up entering and had a walk around to see what they had to offer. Nothing really spectacular, but I assume if you have a zoo which rely entirely on donations it does limit you one way or another.

Returning south towards downtown I took a couple of hours rest in the hotel before returning outside to grab dinner. It was surprisingly hard to find an Italian place with room for one (third time was the charm and I still ended up sitting outside) so when returning to the hotel in the evening I found a place online and secured myself a table for Saturday night. Or tried – it took half an hour just to find a place that had room for one and was willing to book only one! The dinner was pretty great, but I am baffled by the size of the desserts. The piece of cheesecake was enormous – and dense – and I am sure the calorie contents dwarfed that of the creamy pasta with bacon I had as a main.

5th of October – Arriving in Chicago

In spite of it being an almost 9-hour flight getting to Chicago was (almost) without issues along the way. Obviously, as we are in Denmark, there were problems with the train signals towards Copenhagen so only one train departed my station every hour which didn’t leave any margin for error going to the airport. Also, the flight didn’t have internet. What is this? The stone age?

Arriving in Chicago it was fairly uneventful getting through immigration. The officer did point out it was suspicious that I had been in Iran in ’17 while eyeing me up and down, and I had just started worrying about if this would be the end of the trip for me, until he continued grinning pointing out the suspicious part was that I still had my head on my shoulders. Hah-hah. Humor of airport security. 

Arriving in Chicago.

It took a bit to find the train to the city – it required a trip across terminals with the airport train before I could get settled into a seat on the train that took me on a 40-minute ride to the city center. From there it was a 5-minute walk from there to get to the hotel. 

The hotel has some weird quirks. There are rooms on floors 3 to 22, except for on floor 9 where the reception and restaurant is located. There are three elevators, and it seems like two of them stop at every three floors. It doesn’t open its doors – it just slows down and stops for maybe 4-6 seconds before it continues for another 3 floors until the next stop. Staying on the 18th floor and wanting to leave it was infuriating that the elevator stopped 5 times before reaching the ground level. The doors never opened until I had to exit. Leaving on the third elevator was mind-blowing – leaving the room and being able to leave the building only a few seconds later? Wild!

Despite having a room on the 18th floor I didn’t have much of a view; there was a taller building across the street blocking the view. Lots of large windows and it looks like most of the interior is apartments. And not all apartments have curtains so you have a fairly unobscured view into other people’s home. As someone who enjoys his privacy that concept gives me the willies. As an example; right now maybe one floor below me there is a woman lying on her carpet in the middle of the living room on her phone. Butt-naked. Not a care in the world. 

One would think that as this height you’d be far away from the street noise, but I suspect that being across from an even taller building the noises are just channeled up past my window giving me the full experience of the traffic. Also doesn’t help that the window doesn’t fully close/seal; I even had an employee up to see if I was doing something wrong but nope – couldn’t fully close, adding a slight draft throughout my stay. Marvelous!

3rd – Return home

I had a ticket for the train back to London at around noon but with a relatively early check-out time at the hotel I had a bit of time to kill before heading home. There wasn’t much to do and weather wasn’t really “walk-the-town”-weather though still dry. It resulted in some slightly bored trotting around before getting on the train and getting back to London and Heathrow airport. From there a break in the lounge before flying home – the end of a generally very uneventful trip home.

Cardiff was a nice old city (town?) with a very interesting and charming castle in the center. I was honestly surprised by how much I was into the tour there and would not have minded to be on a more extended tour to get to see more of it or being told more details of the rooms. But Cardiff is also part of the UK which means that having sun on the race day was near-miraculous. The weather most of the time was just moist and grey. But in spite of all that it was a very nice visit. And I completed the 4th of my 5 Superhalf runs.

Full album can be seen here.

2nd – Cardiff race day

Being so close to the starting area I was in no rush in the morning – I set the alarm to 08:00 so I could faff about at my leisure before leaving. I woke halfway up 20-30 minutes before the alarm went off and all I registered was what sounded like torrential rain coming down outside. What a day for a run! I nodded off again, and when the alarm did go off the rain had mostly quieted down and not long after completely ended.

Half an hour before start I left the hotel and joined the flow of people going to the starting area where I quickly found the section where my wave was located (which was pretty easy as it turned out it was at the end of the street where my hotel was located). I positioned myself in the middle of the group and shortly before start the 1:45 pacer moved up towards the front – and then he left and ended up in the rear of the 1:30-1:45 group with the 1:30 pacer in the front. As it wasn’t possible to move around in the now gathered crowd of runners I decided to run without a pacer – and if the 1:45’er passed me I’d hook up onto him and have him pull me home.

Wheelchair racers where sent off at 09:50 followed by elite and sub-1:30’ers at 10:00, and as they were leaving the starting area we were moved up towards the starting line and at 10:04 we were let go.

While waiting at the starting line it was getting obvious that the risk of rain was rapidly decreasing as the cloud cover was lightening and the sun was coming out. While waiting we were in the shade but somewhere between 2 and 3 km we took a 90 degree turn putting us straight towards the sun which meant that with all the water on the ground from the morning’s rain and the rapid increase in temperature the humidity skyrocketed. Not quite the start I had been hoping for. Throughout the race I overheard multiple locals comment on the weather noting that the current situation was far from what they had expected.

Around the half-way point it became a common sight to see people hand out either Haribo or Bassett winegums or Turkish delights. That was great! It was also around that time where runners finally had been spread out enough that it wasn’t uncomfortably congested anymore. It wasn’t because there were more runners than at similar runs, the streets were just quite narrow for the entire course so while they were quite nice it was a bit impractical with this many people gathered all at once. 

We circled south from the castle past and across Cardiff Bay over the Cardiff Bay bridge, which turned out to be significantly flatter than I had expected. From there we went through the center of the city and further north before doing a (roughly) 180 turn and returned to the center and the finish line behind the castle. While there weren’t spectators everywhere, where they were they were very supportive. 

Crossing the finish line you were handed your medal, (very pink) finisher t-shirt and various drinks and fruits. I managed to find my way through the finishing area and a short walk later I had returned to my hotel. Extra bonus: the receptionist noted that I was the first runner staying at the hotel to finish. Yay? 

I crossed the finish line in 1:45:11, right above my goal, but without a pacer I was pretty happy with the result. Also considering the Chicago marathon next weekend I tried not to push myself (too) hard. I came in as 1718 out of 12.783 overall (top 13,44%), 1528 out of 7236 men (top 21,12%) and 265 out of 956 M40 (top 27,72%). So relatively speaking it was a very nice result which I am pretty happy about. You had to get to M75+ or F60 to find a group winner who was slower than me!

Returning to the hotel I had a much needed shower and relaxed the rest of the day. I left again around 17:00 and walked around for maybe an hour before I found a place for dinner – a burger place named Fat Hippo seemed right up my alley.

Returning to the hotel – again – before 20:00 I indeed felt like a fat hippo and did absolutely nothing productive the rest of the evening.