I wondered how I should prepare myself and how much training I would need to be able to run a marathon. And then the question- running a marathon was one thing but what time could I expect or what time would I target?
Nobody I knew had ever run a marathon. So I could not get any help. I found a magazine in a shop that was called something like marathon and when I flipped through it I realized that they had training tips inside on how to prepare and how much, how far and how fast to train to achieve the times between 3.30h an 5.30h. This is what I needed!
They said that with a 6 months training you should manage to finish it-well at this point I knew that finishing was not the target but I wanted to come in under 4hrs. I followed the training for months and subscribed to the Lausanne Marathon in October 2006. My nights in Vienna for my employer meant now that I needed to find a suitable training track and indeed there was this lake which was a few hundred meters away from the hotel. As from now on there was no more any evening where I'd go out for a meal or a drink directly, training first. I bought training gear that held me warm and a headlamp to run during the night. I started to enjoy running, especially as I always targeted other runners to either follow them or to clearly beat them. My competitive spirit was back again.
At home I was seeking for the right training track and simply chose to run up the road to Biere and return for my 14km run and to run through the beginning of the arboretum in Aubonne, St Livres for a speedy 10km track with some steep parts.
I pushed my training through and started to have pain under the foot from the 14km runs on the concrete but ignored this until the marathon.
October 22nd 2006 was the day, it looked very sunny and I decided to run with shorts and short sleeves. I had never done any run longer than 25 km before, during the autumn vacation I had trained in Mallorca (yes back in the heat again) performing every day between 20 and 25kms and trying to beat my time every run (??).
The marathon went quite well and my fear of meeting the man with the hammer at the 30KMs mark was not met. BUT there was one thing that was not as I wanted it to be: I needed to stop 3 times to pee. I initially followed the 4hrs balloon and quickly decided to take it over.
And even if the man with the hammer did not come, I felt the temperature like in hell ( it was maybe 25degrees) and after the 35th km I had the feeling that the pavements were 1m high, I was seeking the shadow wherever I could, not realizing that I was a lot off the ideal line.
My GPS showed me that there were only a few hundred meters to go and I continued to run , then at the last corner before turning to the lake into the direction of the Olympic museum my colleague waited for me ( he was just spectator). He ran with me and I saw the arrival—and decided that I would still have more power than him and sprinted away. What a shock when I realized that this wasn’t the arrival but just a first arch and the arrival was still some 200ms away. My heart was exploding and then someone made it up to me----NO NOBODY will overtake me now. I reaccelerated and came in running over the finishing line at 3.42h. My target was beaten easily!
How did I feel? Well proud, empty, out powered and more than that I had the palm hurting and my hip and legs were bad. I f one watched me he would have seen John Wayne walking away from his horse. At home I took a bath and felt tired. What a bad idea to having invited my colleague for a coffee afterwards. I thought: this was my first and last marathon.
In the next days and weeks my palm hurt enormously and each time I got up from my bed the first step hurt like hell. Never ever again.
Well after a few weeks I started to run again and as the pain was not going away I wasn’t really happy. After all I did not feel that bad and thought 3.42---why shouldn't I be able to do the 3.30h next year? If my feet would allow it ..I decided to pay whatever price for the best shoes and to get professional advice on my shoes. There was this running test that some shops performed , let's see. The shoes I was wearing until now were some Adidas and I had not even a clue if they were suited for long distance runs.
