Marathon of Marathons 2010 - PEI Media

More documents

Recommendations

Info

Notes from the road In the footsteps of Pheidippides | Athens, 31 October 2010 36 Paul Malan, Deutsche Bank Global Markets, Infrastructure Investment Group My Big Fat Greek Catharsis This chronicle of Paul’s MoM experience is an extract from a personal note of thanks he sent to his sponsors who gave generously to the worthy MoM causes. My biggest fan Max with me after I had picked myself up off the ground The self-deception started early and endured: T minus 7 years - Cease all form of physical exercise - the daily 5 minute walks to and from the Tube should be enough to keep me in peak physical condition! T minus 8 months - Signing up for this escapade had nothing to do with turning 40! T minus 6 months - Training Strategy Number 1: Halve the risk of injury by procrastinating commencement of training to 3 months prior to the event instead of recommended 6 months - it’s simple algebra! T minus 2 months - Training Strategy Number 2: Lots of short runs should amount to the same as fewer long runs (not to mention sooo much easier) T minus 1 month - Training Strategy Number 3: Always round up distances covered to the nearest 5 miles and quote in kilometres - larger numbers are far more impressive provided you don’t have to run them! T minus 3 weeks - Training Strategy Number 4: Cramming worked at university, so surely marathon training can be crammed around a busy travelling schedule. Mental note: Catch the Heathrow Express rather than running home from Terminal 5 - I have now done both and can assure you that the train offers excellent value for money. T minus 2 weeks - Better start fund raising (in earnest) as looks increasingly likely I may actually end up having to attempt this madness! T minus 1.5 weeks - Training Strategy Number 5: Rigorously adhere to the accepted wisdom of tapering early (and comprehensively). Verdict: Sophisticated training regime successful - got me to the start line but would it get me to the finish? After eating more spaghetti carbonara in a week than would be medically advisable, I was ready to find out... Athens, 31 October 2010, 3.45am London time. A great time to get up to run 42.196m. Best to start the day as you plan to end it - so completely out of it don’t know whether coming or going. 4.00am London time. Balanced breakfast of half a dozen bananas and blue Powerade - feels like a good time to conduct an untried nutritional experiment. Pack enough energy bars to feed the Titanic - appropriate given the sinking feeling in my stomach. Don’t forget the nipple protectors - one of two parts of my body that I would like to see survive the day. Alternative Insight
Notes from the road In the footsteps of Pheidippides | Athens, 31 October 2010 37 Couldn’t find anything in Runners Need to protect the other critical appendage so decide on the spot to apply copious quantities of the runner’s equivalent of KY Jelly. While I’m at it, seems like a good idea to grease my feet. I literally slide out of the hotel room. Not bad, 15 minutes and only broken the cardinal runners’ rule (“only do on race day what you have practiced in training”) three times. 4.45am London time. Bus journey following racecourse to the start line provides further (redundant) confirmation that the marathon is a distance best covered in a motorised vehicle. Greek guide announces that only supplies left in his stash are Band-aids and Vaseline - unclear if they were meant for us or left from a previous tour. No takers. Was sure the topographic map had “downs” as well as “ups” but all can hear ringing in my ears is the screech of the bus’ air brakes as it descends hills to be climbed later on two legs. Small envy felt of the participants walking but tempered by implications for them of spending 7-8 hours under the increasingly (and unseasonally) strong sun - so much for the relevance of training runs in freezing Oslo in October, this feels like midsummer! If looking for inspiration, will not find it in the scenery - Pheidippides was clearly not a sightseeing tour operator. 7.45am Athens time. Arrive at start. Anarchy - Deep Heat covered bodies up hill and down dale contorting unnaturally in an unfamiliar and unsettling ritual. Struck by the amazing number of Portaloos - all occupied by individuals apparently experiencing the same existential crisis as me. God a cigarette feels appropriate - 12,500 people and not a single smoker to bum a fag from! Not too late to make that bus journey a return trip. Increasingly hysterical pleas from loudspeaker announcer for contestants to deposit their belongings and get into their allotted departure blocks. Possibly because we are in Greece, attempts at organisation treated with amused indifference. Greek disco music starts booming from speakers and achieves unity that announcer could not. Vision eerily reminiscent of the underground party scene in the Matrix - the entire field starts pulsating in dance and popping energy sachets. Not lost on me that everyone bar a select group of the superstars in that Matrix scene suffers a gruesome death - pretty clear what role us mere mortals in my final starting Block 7 are expected to fulfill. I am beginning to understand how those foot soldiers now stuck in the Marathon funeral mound must have felt 2,500 years ago. 9.00am. Starting gun lets off an insipid, disappointing puff and elite athletes are off in the 2,500th anniversary running of race. Something merciful in the fact that the good athletes run away from us normal folk – saves us from having our noses rubbed in our physical mediocrity. Begin our slow march forward to the start line past barriers covered in abandoned clothes, the wise/experienced seemingly knowing that they don’t need worldly possessions where they are going! 9.25am “Last and definitely least”, Block 7 is let loose to do our worst by the final whimper from the starter’s gun. Lead runners already over 10km down the road - sobering thought! 1km - 2.4% complete, only 97.6% to go. This is like human dodgem cars - bodies everywhere. 4km - Notwithstanding advertised as the “original course”, pretty certain that Phidippides did not take a right angled left turn to run around the Marathon funeral mound only to have to turn round and run back to the main route - but then he was clearly mad as a hatter. 5km - First drinks station. Some of that bus driver’s Vaseline would have come in useful for the Greco-Roman wrestling match that ensues as hundreds of runners converge on the first drinks table (contrary to all pre-race advice). Water and bottles everywhere - why not add a swimming Alternative Insight
Page 1 and 2: Athens, 31 October 2010 In the foot
Page 3 and 4: Greeting from Euan McGregor In the
Page 5 and 6: Letter from John Campbell In the fo
Page 7 and 8: RUNNERS AND RIDERS In the footsteps
Page 9 and 10: ORGANISATIONS REPRESENTED BY INDIVI
Page 11 and 12: The Marathon of Marathons charities
Page 19 and 20: THE TRAINING In the footsteps of Ph
Page 21 and 22: The pre-race luncheon In the footst
Page 23 and 24: The pre-race luncheon In the footst
Page 25 and 26: Notes from the Road In the footstep
Page 37: Clash of the editors In the footste
Page 41 and 42: Notes from the road In the footstep
Page 43 and 44: THe Dinner In the footsteps of Phei
Page 45 and 46: The results In the footsteps of Phe
Page 47 and 48: Closing note In the footsteps of Ph

Marathon of Marathons 2010 - PEI Media

You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles

Delete template?

Save as template?