Mikey
Email reports from MMR –
11/4/06 – It’s Saturday morning. Clear and cold – around 40. Weather for tomorrow a little uncertain because of fast moving fronts – it’s been snowing to the north – but either the same as this morning, or cloudy and warmer. Hard to say which is better. Should have brought my capilene gloves, he said. Body is staying healthy so far, had several 40 min runs around the area of the hotel, which is 1/2 mile from stadium – same place as last year.
Hired a car and drove the course yesterday morning. If you think of it as four 10K’s, the first is flat and along the water of the Bay of Marathon. (Think Athenian defeat of Persians in 490 BC.) The second and third are hilly with a net gain of 500-600 feet. The fourth is downhill along a main boulevard to the stadium. So, all else being equal, the strategy seems to be to warm up well in the first, push fairly hard in the second and third, and coast – so to speak – in the fourth. 🙂 We’ll see.
Even though the venue is incredibly historic, the urbanization of Athens has turned the road into pretty much continuous strip commercial the whole way. Napa and Big Sur win the scenic prize any day.
Lots of history all about. The Greeks and Romans get the publicity, but actually there are lots of Bronze Age (4000 BC) and earlier Neolithic sites in the general vicinity. So, safe to say people hereabout since the end of last Ice Age. I suppose this last is true at home too, but we missed out on the Greeks and Romans! Not mention the Byzantines, Franks, Turks, Venetians and assorted others. It was the Venetians who stored ammunition in the Parthenon, which was bombarded by the Turks and exploded in the 16th C., destroying the roof and lots of the rest. When you read stories about local history, it’s amazing any of it was left standing at all.
11/5/06 – The results aren’t posted yet, so I don’t know how I did competitively, but my chip time was 4:35. Hard, hard, hard. Not the Boston heat of two years ago, but the hills took a lot of energy. My half was right on two hours. but the next 10K to 20 miles was continuously uphill, so by the time I got to the last 10K, advertised yesterday as “coasting,” there wasn’t much left in the aging legs. But with lots of Galloway sanctioned “walking breaks,” we hoofed it in at a respectable time.
Heard others saying they were slower than game plan. A great crowd to run with – teams in colorful jerseys from all over, including Japan. About 90% male out of 3000, but lots of very athletic females, many of whom passed me in last lap of race!
11/6/06 – The age division results aren’t posted yet this morning, but by hand scanning through the full list, it looks like I was sixth in 70-74 and 1717 out of 2600 overall. I was beaten by four Greeks and a Russian, who was fastest at 3:48. Very unofficial until the age list is up. So, better than I thought and felt yesterday. Goodbye to Athens, it’s been a good trip. And thanks again to my training partners and the SMATBRAW support of Team Ladera, even if we only had one entrant!