9th – Leaving Lisbon

Having a flight at noon it still gave me time for breakfast at the hotel before leaving for the airport. Everything went smooth; the metro was a direct connection to the airport, check-in and security was uneventful and had a moment kicking back in the lounge before boarding and flying home.

Lisbon is such a nice city; there is the obvious new and modern buildings, but reaching the city center you have these beautiful old buildings. While some of them look run down the large majority seem well maintained and you get some great views walking the streets. While the weather was nice, it might have been a bit too nice, especially on race day. I hope to not run in that kind of heat again. It was fun to try, but I won’t be sad if I don’t get to do that again. In any case, second of my 5 Superhalfs runs was hereby done.

Coming home, seeing the bridge/tunnel between Denmark and Sweden, with Denmark in the top part of the photo.

Full album can be found here.

8th – Lisbon half marathon

When the alarm went off I got out of bed, got dressed, and left for the metro & train to get to the starting area.

Hah. Who am I kidding?

When the alarm went off at 0730 I snoozed it a couple of times before I grumbling trotted to the bathroom before getting dressed and leaving for the metro. A couple of stops later all the runners got out, bumbled around confused in one big group until someone, with the rest of the group following like lemmings, went up and out where we saw the train station across the street. Success!

Because the run starts with crossing the 5th of April Bridge from the far side only trains are able to cross it before noon, so that is the only way to get there if you are located in the city. As the train naturally was crowded I ended up in a hallway between two carriages making it impossible for me to see anything outside during the ride across. 

On arrival there was another 15 minutes’ walk from the station to the starting area. The sun was out at full force at around 0930 and the few shades found along the way were already filled by people who managed to squeeze into the already crowded spots. The starting area itself was just a big empty space with surprisingly few portapotties, so when I arrived there was a steady flow of people going to and from the bushes along the sides, men and women alike. There were no corrals or waves, and getting ready for the start I realized the 5:00-pacer was far up ahead, and with the crowd already gathered I would have no chance of ever getting to him before the start.

When the start went off at 1020 it had gotten warmer (mid-20’s) and the 5:00-pacer left almost simultaneously with the 4:30 and 4:45-pacers. What’s the point of having them if they don’t spread out?

The first 5km, with the exception of a few 100m, it was all downhill – but due to being stuck in crowds of slow runners and selfie-obsessed people wanting to document the view of the city (granted; it wasn’t bad) and running on the bridge I had to do a lot of swerving and sudden changes in pace (because it’s absolutely fine to just stop in the middle of everything to take photos!) I lost more than a minute on the first kilometer. After that I managed to get a bit away and things loosened a bit up and the remainder of the downhill part went so much smoother. But it was such a frustrating start.

From then on the course was flat. We ran east until we hit the 7,6km mark, did a 180 degree turn, ran until reaching the 17,1km mark, did a 180 degree turn again and 50 meters before hitting the HM mark we turned and finished at Centro Cultural de Belén – where the expo was located – and the Mosteiro dos Jerónimos. Reaching the flat part of the course there were water posts every app. 2km. As opposed to other runs you were given 1/3 liter water bottles instead of small paper cups. It felt like a bit of waste, but in the increasing heat you quickly realized that it was all needed. Perfect for a combination of drinking and pouring it over yourself (buffs were handed out near the starting area and I ended up using one on my head to try and protect it from the sun – it had the unexpected bonus of retaining the water I poured out over myself thus prolonging the cooling effect). I was happy to see that firefighters had set up a couple of places on the course and spraying the runners as they came along. Any cooldown was appreciated. According to the forecast when returning to the hotel the temps were around 28°-29°C and with no clouds or shade on the course the sun was most definitely felt along the way.

My face is a perfect representation of how it felt running in the heat.

Unfortunately, despite running parallel with the coast for most of the run we didn’t really see much for the water; main roads and train tracks were between us and the sea, and on the opposite side it was mostly infrastructure, a few parks or large buildings. So the course, while flat, wasn’t the most interesting. On the other hand; had we been running through the old parts of the city it would have been a horribly hilly experience, especially in this heat, so I guess I prefer the less charming, at times somewhat narrow, course we ran instead. 

The bag we received when crossing the finish line contained a bottle of water, a banana, a protein drink which tasted absolutely atrocious and the medal. It took me a while to realize the latter – I saw no one handing out medals and it wasn’t because I had missed it as almost no one else were wearing one, either, and it took a bit of digging before realizing that it had just been included with everything else. I was a bit disappointed, though, that you couldn’t get more water to drink and there were no snacks apart from the banana. 

My finish time ended up being 1:46:35, not quite reaching my goal of 1:45. Even without the terrible beginning I wouldn’t have made it, and considering the good conditions the weather definitely had something to do with the performance. Of course the official numbers weren’t accessible until later as the tracking site crashed during and after the run. Who would have thought they would see a lot of traffic at that time?

8378 people completed the half marathon; 5491 men and 2887 women. Overall I came in as no. 1550 (top 18,5%), among men I came in as no. 1407 (top 25,62%) and in my age group M35 I came in as 244 out of 755 (top 32,32%). So in spite of being slow compared to my goal my result relative to the other runners is probably among the best I’ve had so far – the Royal Parks run where I got my PR is the only one I can think of where I managed to get a better relative result.

Taking the train and metro back to the hotel went surprisingly smooth. Being among a bunch of hot and sweaty runners inside a confined space was wonderful, and I can’t imagine it was any better for all the ordinary non-running passengers. After a quick shower I went down to a café around the corner (called Hygge Kaffe) and got a smoked salmon bun and what turned out to be a huge slice – chunk, rather – of apple pie. Resting for the remainder of the afternoon before going out for what was a disappointing paella and a traditional cod ball with cheese which was a nice end to the dinner before retuning to the hotel and kicked back for the rest of the night.

Always nice with a small piece of pie.

5th – 7th of May – Lisbon, pre-run

As usual the flight was as uneventful as such a flight can be. The second leg did get delayed for an hour; the first half hour was due to technical difficulties, the second was due to missing our window and got put at the back of the queue in a crowded air. But as soon as we were off everything went smooth.

Arriving in Lisbon and taking the metro to the hotel was easy, and after checking in I spent a short moment resting and recovering from the flight before leaving and trying to get a feel of the area in the diminishing light. I found myself ending up waterside in the central part of the city – as intended – and the timing was unintended near perfect as I got to see the sun set behind the 5th of April Bridge. The entire construction is very dominant and basically looks like a smaller version of the Golden Gate Bridge. I had a walk down along the water and beach, but I soon retuned to the hotel – a return that ended up taking half an hour – to rest for the remainder of the night.

5th of April Bridge in the sunset.

The following two days, Friday and Saturday, I spent wandering the city and encountering constantly appearing hills. I started off going to the runners’ expo, which was also the location of the run’s finish line, to pick up my bib and t-shirt before exploring the surrounding area. Having the expo approximately 8 km from the hotel there was plenty of distance to zig-zag my way back to the city center.

Buildings covered in tiles.

Padrão dos Descobrimentos, statue built in 1940 to mark the 500 year anniversary of Henry the Navigator's death.

With the expo being west of the center, I went east on the Saturday. Without knowing for certain it did feel as if it was way more hilly here than in the western part. Having walked around a bit and getting lost multiple times I ended up at Castelo De S. Jorge, the castle of Sao Jorge, a large castle overlooking the central part of the city. Entering and walking around on the walls gave some stunning views of the center of Lisbon and surrounding areas. And with clear weather there was nothing obstructing the far away views – except for the occasional tree towering over the castle’s walls.

View of central Lisbon from Castelo De S. Jorge.

Lisbon is a nice and beautiful city; old buildings line the streets in the old part of the city and while some of them look like the safest thing to do is to tear them down, many of the better-maintained buildings are either painted in bright colours or are covered in tiles – making them almost look like huge inside-out bathrooms. Some of the streets are very narrow, and combining that with the hilly environment the city gets a very special (in a good way) feel. Leaving the old center it gets less erratically hilly, the streets widen and get a more modern size, and building turn more and more ordinary.

The weather is really nice, especially if you’re not planning to run a half marathon. Around noon the temps were up in the 25-27 degree area, and with practically no clouds and only very little breeze, it gets hot and priority ends up being walking on the side of the road with the most shade. Unless you are out at a time where your shadow is less than 20cm long, then you’re pretty much out of luck unless you find a tree. My timing could be better; wanting slow and relaxing mornings I don’t get too much time outside in the cool morning air before getting hit by the sun and heat. No wonder the locals seem to disappear until mid-afternoon. Also, after these two days parts of my skin is getting a bit itchy.

19th – 21st – Post-run and return home

Waking up Tuesday I felt like I had run a marathon the previous day. Funny thing, that. Legs were sore and stiff and the body felt worn out. I managed to hobble my way out of bed, shower and down to have a hearty breakfast in the hotel.

The poster at the hotel where you could write greetings for the runners. 

In spite of my legs’ protest I left the hotel for a walk around without real purpose other than to see parts of the city I hadn’t yet seen and to stretch my legs. The weather was nice for it; clear and ok temperatures but very windy at times. 

My walk ended up lasting only 3-ish hours before I had returned to the hotel to rest; it didn’t feel worth the soreness to continue. And it was so much more comfortable doing nothing in the afternoon.

I ended up going for an early dinner near the hotel where I had a lobster roll, lobster mac & cheese and a clam chowder – the latter what Boston is known for. It was all very tasty but damn, you got to pay for it, too! I spent another hour after dinner to have a small walk around the neighborhood, but that was definitely not a failed attempt to find a place to get dessert. Returning to the hotel I grabbed a couple of chocolate chip cookies before returning to my room to kick back for the remainder of the night.

Clam chowder. Tastes better than it looks.

Lobster mac & cheese and lobster roll.

The last day in Boston was almost a full day – we wouldn’t be meeting at the hotel until late afternoon, so I checked out at noon and returned to the streets. Random walking around brought me past Hanover Street which could easily have been Boston’s Little Italy; the street was packed with Italian restaurants side by side, and everywhere there were a majority of people speaking Italian. Having lunch there was highly satisfactory. During the meal I realized that the USS Constitution was near by (a bit further away on marathon legs) so I headed that way after finishing. 

Sunset.

A beautiful old ship, it’s a the oldest still floating war ship in the world, having been launched in 1797. There is the old philosophical question; “if you change the blade on an axe, and then change the handle, is it still the same axe?”, and I felt it could be related to the ship, as I overheard one of the staff members point out that only around 10% of the ship was original wood, everything else had been replaced at some point. Oh well. Returning to the hotel I met up with the group and together we left for the airport, another short 15 minute drive, quickly went through security (the face of people when you pass them in the priority lane is almost worth the extra price of the ticket!), relaxed and apart from being slightly chaotic in the Reykjavik airport lounge due to getting there at breakfast before all the morning flights it was a very uneventful trip home.

The USS Constitution.

Full album can be seen here.

18th of April – Boston Marathon

The Boston Marathon is a point-to-point course, starting in Hopkinton west of Boston and concluding on Boylston Street in Boston near Arlington station. This also meant two different weather forecasts and the situation made it surprisingly hard for me to figure out how to dress. We would start at 1115 as part of the last wave with clear skies, no wind and 10-12°C – near perfect conditions. The weather in Boston app. 4 hours later would be 5-6°C, cold winds from east and overcast. I ended up with shorts and the official long-sleeved shirt. 

The buses departed for the starting area at 0900, less than 10 minutes’ walk from the hotel. We were loaded into a bus (they were all yellow school buses) and we were off west-bound. It took a bit more than an hour to get to our destination and it seemed like we drove for much more than 42km. Also we barely saw another bus on the way, despite being sent off in groups. But we arrived as planned and were led into a large waiting area with just porta potties, info tent and a medical tent. Not much more than that – apart of a large number of runners. The previous wave was still being sent off into the corrals when we arrived so it was a perfect time to spend 15 minutes to queue to use the toilets. 

When it was our turn at 1030 we were led toward the corral where we were separated into our respective starting areas. The walk from the waiting area to the start was maybe a 15 minutes’ walk where we passed through a small town along the way. Having found or places, at 1115, as planned, we were off!

Me not dead (yet) somewhere along the course.

Photo by MarathonFoto

Well… Sort of. I don’t know how they decided where the runners would be positioned for the start, but it seemed very not thought through; already within 2 km people were walking, barely running, and clearly much slower than runners behind them. Due to the number of runners and relatively narrow road it was quite the slow slog until it started loosening up at around 7-10 km. 

After the beginning crowd everything got much better – apart from the part where there are hills showing up on the course. Looking at the course profile the finish is app. 150m lower than the starting point, but in between there are plenty of hills going up, too (looking on the bright side that’s just even more going downhill!). The most famous is the last major hill called Heartbreak hill at the 33km marker, an app. 30m ascent over 500m. None of the hills were really steep ones, they were just long slogs which really ended up draining you. I could at least keep running up all albeit at a slower pace, but there were plenty of people who just downright walked up the hills – even in the beginning within the first 5 km. Without wanting to judge anyone I got the impression that there were a lot of people who were in way over their heads. It seemed like the “I can do what I want”-mentality trumped everything, including respect for peoples’ actual abilities. Someone had been spotted by someone else in the group at the 2-3km mark in an ambulance with a twisted ankle. Maybe this is typical for marathons, but because this is the first time I am starting in the back instead of somewhere in the middle this is just the first time I get to experience them? In any case it just feels weird.

The weather turned out to be a bit different than forecast. The beginning was – or at least felt – much warmer than the announced 10-12°C, and it stayed like that for the rest of the run. At around the mid-point the wind starting picking up and for the rest of the run we had cold head-winds, but with the temperatures and not a single cloud during the entire run it never really became a problem aside for the extra resistance. At least we had the sun at our backs for the run.

Taking the 3rd and last 90 degree turn, less than a kilometer from the finish line.

Photo by MarathonFoto.

While the course wasn’t a straight line it almost felt like that. There was a slight turn here or there, else we were pretty much heading east the entire way. Probably the only marathon (or at least one of very few) with only 3 90 degree turns – and two of them were both within a kilometer before the finish line inside Boston. It was interesting running through the various towns towards Boston; it was very clear that we started in relatively rural towns and the closer we got to Boston the more posh they got. One of the first towns had a large 2-story house where the entire end wall was covered by an equally huge American flag. It almost didn’t get more American than that. Maybe except… 

In the beginning I was running just behind a guy running with a 3 meter flag pole with the Stars & Stripes (how he was allowed to bring that I had no idea, it was way larger than the rules dictated), and passing through one of the first towns there was what looked like a trucker bar, where seemingly all the patrons – primarily large burly men – were standing outside watching the run with drinks in their hands. The moment the runner with the flag appeared most of the onlookers started loudly chanting “USA! USA! USA!” pumping their fists, one saluted it and two started singing the national anthem. It was so surreal. And it felt so American. And honestly? You know when you watch those documentaries about North Korea and we laugh at the amount of indoctrination that’s going on there? This felt eerily similar. I’m sorry, but looking in from the outside some of you have a pretty freaky relationship with identity and the symbols that represent said identity. Oh, well, all part of the experience.

Oh, and I got to see the runner with “Fauci is the Anti Christ!” painted on his shirt. Gotta flaunt your ignorance whenever you get the chance!

Only a few 100 meters left. Trinity Church in the background.

Photo by MarathonFoto.

The support along the entire run was so intense – I’d say even more so than what I experienced in New York. The marathon here seems to have a special place in peoples’ hearts and this is the first since the beginning of Covid, so there was a bit of catching up to do. People had BBQ-parties involving the entire neighborhood on their front lawns, everyone from kids to the elderly were waving flags or signs of encouragement. Live music everywhere. Outside Wellesley College there was a long line of screaming students screaming their hearts out (such a moral boost, but my ears couldn’t forgive me for high-fiving almost the entire row), aptly named the Scream Tunnel. The roar of people nearing the finish line was the conclusion of a run where the volume from the onlookers for the most of the run was overwhelming. 

Crossing the finish line. Never doing this again - until next time, that is.

Photo by MarathonFoto.

Having crossed the line in 3:59:30, just within my goal of 4 hours, I waddled back to the hotel, a route that took significantly longer than when I walked the same path in the morning. I slowly moved to my room (thank you for inventing elevators!) and had a much needed shower followed by a few hours’ rest. The group met up to go and have dinner at Hard Rock Café, and returning at around 2130 I returned once again to my room and as expected stopped doing anything for the rest of the night.

16th – 17th of April – Pre-run Boston

The flight to Boston was with a layover in Reykjavik which is itself wasn’t too bad. Sitting in the lounge in Reykjavik the departure screen heavily implied to leave for the gate 45 minutes ahead of time before boarding if you wanted to be sure to get through passport control in time. I left the lounge as suggested and within 5 minutes I was through and waiting at the gate.

Seats on the flight on BC are “normal” seats but bigger and with more legroom. This meant that while your knees weren’t rubbing against the seat if the passenger in front of you chose to recline their seat, you still get a close-up of the monitor.

Food was ok. I guess.

We arrived in Boston around 1800 and after people had retrieved their luggage (I was travelling as part of a group) we came outside and were picked up by a handful of vehicles which could be defined as borderline limos. 5 passengers each, luxurious interior and wifi. Getting to the hotel took 10-15 minutes where we quickly checked in, and around 2100 I had passed out on my bed.

Boston from 20th floor at night.

I woke up a bit before 0500 and ended up just milling about before going to breakfast. I found out afterwards that the meal wasn’t included in the hotel room’s price. Woops! Oh, well.

I met with some from the group at 1000 and left the hotel together to go to the runner’s expo to pick up out running numbers. On the way we passed the area where we would be getting picked up by busses to take us to the starting line tomorrow morning, and the finish line. They are both comfortably close to the hotel, though I am sure that the finish line will be feeling much further away tomorrow afternoon.

Where it all started.

The expo felt chaotic and slightly claustrophobic; a lot of booths and people wall-to-wall at the convention center, but it seems like I managed to at least physically survive the ordeal. The official shirt is long-sleeved, but for some reason they have absolutely zero options of buying a short-sleeved variant. The marathon jacket is insanely popular, including the hoodies for some reason, but no t-shirt. Weird.

Coming back outside I wandered around by myself for a few hours before returning to the hotel. At around 1800 I went down to the hotel restaurant to have dinner – it was originally supposed to be a pasta dinner at the city hall, but due to Covid that had been cancelled. Everyone in Boston seem to be very invested in the run, including the hotel; a lot of runners are staying at the hotel, a large poster in the reception with a photo of the 2018 finish (I believe) where it was pouring down where you could write greetings and encouragement for the runners, and they were having a pasta dinner/buffet which was the one I was coming down for. As the restaurant was fairly small, only open for 3 hours, and there was a quite a few runners wanting to eat, I ended up waiting 45 minutes before being seated with a few others from the group. It was good to get something to eat but the food was largely unimpressive. The tiramisu was pretty good, though.

The Holocaust memorial.

3rd – Return home

I didn’t have much of a plan on my last (half) day in town so I ended up sleeping in, having breakfast and checking out at the latest having a bit of a walk around town. The weather had turned into the best since I had arrived – warming and few clouds. Of course that would happen on the day I’m returning home.

Grabbed the subway and bus to the airport where I went through security without an issue and found a seat overlooking the apron and seeing the air traffic move by. It’s quite amazing seeing the size difference of the planes when they pass by each other.

The flights – and layover – went without a hitch and I was soon back home, after a train connection that probably was the worst timed connection ever. Oh, well. Home safe and sound, having completed the first of 5 SuperHalfs half marathons, and the first of 7 “I should have done this back in 2020”-runs.

Full album can be found here.