27. vattenfall berliner halbmarathon
15° celsius. sunny and slightly windy. 10:48 (1:33:29)
i woke up this morning with the great feeling that i couldn't care less whatever time i would achieve later during the run. after almost 2 weeks of suffering, that is, painful experience with both legs, i wasn't that optimistic of getting any new best time for today. after getting ready, i went out and took a bus towards the hauptbahnhof. it was still cold outside.
scene at the hackescher markt bahnhof : runners, skaters, walkers and nordic walkers marching towards the starting point
as i reached the hauptbahnhof, i was joined by few runners going up the escalator. when the train came, the whole wagon was filled with runners. i had to squeeze through to get in. even though the starting point was all the same for us - runners, skaters, walkers and nordic walkers - some alight earlier at the friedrichstrasse bahnhof while the rest at alexanderplatz. but most of us alight at hackescher markt bahnhof. a german family father asked me while i was going down the stairs, why were there so many people at this hour of the morning. i told him that it was the berlin halfmarathon which started at 10:45 am near the palast der republik. they must be tourist i guess.
i was supposed to meet my running mates am zeughaus at 10:00 am. i was the first to be there at about 9:55 am. then came jens-uwe together with axel. soon came the rest, - gisela, carsten, karin and stephan. a few minutes later joachim and anina together with her father arrived at our meeting point. anina's dad was supposed to do his first ever halfmarathon at the golden age of 67 yrs old (later i found out that he did quite well in 2:17:22 hrs). anina's goal today was to run sub-1:30 and she had 2 strong pacers, joachim (56) and norbert (45), with her. although these two could run sub-1:22 hrs, they decided to help anina to realise her dream.
before they start with their warming up run (yes, that's right without me cos i still have to give up my bag and i wished to be relax without all this excitement before the run and of course more phototaking), we had our small phototaking session to commemorate today's event. i then took my own sweet time to go to the bag deposit counter! along the way, i managed to take as many photos as possible cos i wouldn't be carrying the camera during the run.
skaters and runners getting ready - the starting point is about 500 meters ahead
nervous faces before the run
i started to walk slowly towards the starting point after the bag was safely in the hands of the volunteers. as you can see from the photos below, i wouldn't even dream of queueing up to pee at the portable toilets. it was just a waste of time. so i did what the rest of the runners do - peeing somewhere else (at the bushes). this act of rebellion wasn't practiced only my the male athletes, women did it too even though the numbers who did it was relatively small compared to the guys.
sorry the toilets were fully booked
as i was doing my stretching exercise, there was a group of runners (male and female) doing their peeing at the bushes near to a building's wall which was about 30 meters away from where i was. then came someone squatting down (i thought it was a woman but it was a guy) and shit right there and then. oh no... why do i have to see this before my run! i could see the other pee'ers were smiling and laughing. okay, just for the record, i wasn't looking at them at all. only when i stretched to the right that i could see these pee'ers.
my right ankle hurt as i did my slow run-up towards the starting point. great! i really slowed down a lot and then it was okay. as i reached the starting point it was full. totally full. how was i supposed to get behind the barricades? i walked down a few steps towards the starting block "c" and finally got in. after a few minutes of waiting in the crowd, it finally started. of course i had to wait a little while before the whole mass in front of me got on their way, to be exact, about 2.5 minutes of waiting!
route from my gf 305 (i should have recharged the damn battery), the original course and starting point from the internet.
as expected many "slow runners" did manage to get in front and block the rest.
i had to zigzag and did some "dangerous manouvres" just to get pass through them. soon enough i saw 3 of my "relatively slower" running colleagues in front of me and overtook them. a friend of my mine told me earlier that he was waiting at the ernst reuter platz (the 5 km mark) to cheer me up. at that point, i was looking up for him and almost caused an accident to the runners behind me. how inconsiderate of me! i did see him and shouted 'hi' while he took my photo with his mobile phones. everything was okay with my legs and finally had my first sip of water at the 5.5 km mark. i forgot to drink water this morning!
photos taken from a mobile phone - hey, i could still smile after 5 km!
i felt better and better and increased my tempo slowly but steadily. the only thing about this berlin halfmarathon which i didn't like was the turns, left and right and some of them was really a sharp turn, and of course the wind, especially between 10 to 13 km mark. i couldn't hide behind someone who would act as my windbreaker cos their pace was slower than mine. i wouldn't want to slow down! there were few short slopes but not as "deadly" as in rosengarten 3 weeks ago.
shortly before the 18 km point, i saw someone wearing the blue t-shirt with our club's logo on it, who was about 100 meters in front of me. i wasn't sure who he was but was determined to catch up to that person. i didn't burst into sprinting but just held my pace as it was, not slowing down whatsoever. soon enough i came slowly behind him and said hi and waved him goodbye. it was mario. he told me later that i just zoomed past him and even though he wanted to run together, he just couldn't follow and keep up with my pace.
i've been running in my automatic mode, which means that i could neither run a lot faster nor lot slower. my legs just move by itself. i didn't feel tired at all. luckily for me the pain that hindered me all this time wasn't there. i felt very relieved. there was this final slope right towards the 20 km point but the "rosengarten experience" told me that this was nothing. how i wished that there were more slopes to be tackled with cos i knew that i had been overtaking lots of people just by running "uphill".
just before the 21 km point, i saw another guy wearing our club's t-shirt. it was carsten, who was about 20 meters in front of me. i didn't sprint to the finishing line even though i did increase my pace slightly higher. i almost overtook carsten at the end but it wasn't meant to be. nevertheless i still ran about 1.5 minutes faster than he was for the nett timing.
after collecting my medal, i saw my teammates posing for the camera. i shouted at them and we hi-fived! we were all very happy that all of us had almost the same finishing time. talking about teamwork. only anina wasn't that happy cos she was too slow. then came mario and jens-uwe, who was absolutely very happy cos he just broke his personal best by more than 7 minutes! all in all 7 of us were within the 1:33 and 1:37 range. only johanna & gisela were slower at 1:44 & 1:50 respectively. the rest of my teammates had better timing, that is, 1 ran 1:25, 2 ran in 1:26, another ran 1:28 and another 2 managed a 1:30 timing. it was really amazing to see that the faster runners weren't that far from the rest of us at all! there's hope for improvement!
after collecting my bag, i met johanna with her right leg being bandaged. it was a chaotic day for her who just arrived that morning from hamburg, collected her bib number and had to box through from behind at the start. she told us that she still had some twitching problem with her leg and no doctor could tell her why. she wasn't interested in giving up running and practiced other sport like swimming and cycling, whereby she would be taking part in the cyclassics (155 km) and the triathlon later in summer.
no thanks, the beer tastes awful! and mario, sorry about leaving you behind, don't get mad please!
later at the massage area, we (me & norbert) met gisela together with jens-uwe who were waiting for their turn. jens-uwe offered his berliner kindl beer which i immediately turned down, cos it wasn't my taste. i told him it tasted horrible. another runner who too was waiting for a massage, overheard my comment and laughed. gisela told us that while she was running, she saw a doctor trying to help reanimate a person but unfortunately (which i heard in the radio later) the person died due to a heart attack. the first ever case for the berlin halfmarathon.
there were only 3 or 4 shower tents (i wasn't sure cos i didn't check it out). i guess it wasn't that many shower tents compared to marathon because many runners would go straight home or to their hotel to shower. one of the shower tent was a mixed shower tent - for males & females, i almost went in but decided to go to the all male shower tent (not for long cos there was a lady that showered with us)!
after i got myself freshened up, i went to collect my soforturkunde (unofficial immediate certificate). as i looked at my time i just smiled and laughed. not a bad timing. the time that i saw at the finishing line (after i stopped my stopwatch) wasn't correct. i must have been blind. it was 20 seconds faster! gee... i was perfectly happy.
such a nice weather to relax after a hard day's run!
only for DO! cheerleaders as decorative motives.
the winners' ceremony was held on a small stage near the finishing line. the male winner, patrick musyoki of kenya, managed to finish within a time of 58:56 mins (4th best time in the world and third fastest runner). i wonder where i was when he crossed the line. benita johnson of australia won the woman's category in 68:28 mins.
winners of male skaters, women and men category.
photos : berlin halfmarathon 2007
after taking all the photos and watching the ceremony, i went off to have my breakfast(!) with my friend at our favourite café. breakfast time : 09:00 till 23:00 - my kind of breakfast time.
alsteration (week 13) : 58.005 km
alstering : 14.66 km
non-alstering : 43.345 km
total running (april) : 21.098 km
davon
alstering : 0.00 km
0.00% gehört zu alsteration
i woke up this morning with the great feeling that i couldn't care less whatever time i would achieve later during the run. after almost 2 weeks of suffering, that is, painful experience with both legs, i wasn't that optimistic of getting any new best time for today. after getting ready, i went out and took a bus towards the hauptbahnhof. it was still cold outside.
scene at the hackescher markt bahnhof : runners, skaters, walkers and nordic walkers marching towards the starting point
as i reached the hauptbahnhof, i was joined by few runners going up the escalator. when the train came, the whole wagon was filled with runners. i had to squeeze through to get in. even though the starting point was all the same for us - runners, skaters, walkers and nordic walkers - some alight earlier at the friedrichstrasse bahnhof while the rest at alexanderplatz. but most of us alight at hackescher markt bahnhof. a german family father asked me while i was going down the stairs, why were there so many people at this hour of the morning. i told him that it was the berlin halfmarathon which started at 10:45 am near the palast der republik. they must be tourist i guess.
i was supposed to meet my running mates am zeughaus at 10:00 am. i was the first to be there at about 9:55 am. then came jens-uwe together with axel. soon came the rest, - gisela, carsten, karin and stephan. a few minutes later joachim and anina together with her father arrived at our meeting point. anina's dad was supposed to do his first ever halfmarathon at the golden age of 67 yrs old (later i found out that he did quite well in 2:17:22 hrs). anina's goal today was to run sub-1:30 and she had 2 strong pacers, joachim (56) and norbert (45), with her. although these two could run sub-1:22 hrs, they decided to help anina to realise her dream.
before they start with their warming up run (yes, that's right without me cos i still have to give up my bag and i wished to be relax without all this excitement before the run and of course more phototaking), we had our small phototaking session to commemorate today's event. i then took my own sweet time to go to the bag deposit counter! along the way, i managed to take as many photos as possible cos i wouldn't be carrying the camera during the run.
skaters and runners getting ready - the starting point is about 500 meters ahead
nervous faces before the run
i started to walk slowly towards the starting point after the bag was safely in the hands of the volunteers. as you can see from the photos below, i wouldn't even dream of queueing up to pee at the portable toilets. it was just a waste of time. so i did what the rest of the runners do - peeing somewhere else (at the bushes). this act of rebellion wasn't practiced only my the male athletes, women did it too even though the numbers who did it was relatively small compared to the guys.
sorry the toilets were fully booked
as i was doing my stretching exercise, there was a group of runners (male and female) doing their peeing at the bushes near to a building's wall which was about 30 meters away from where i was. then came someone squatting down (i thought it was a woman but it was a guy) and shit right there and then. oh no... why do i have to see this before my run! i could see the other pee'ers were smiling and laughing. okay, just for the record, i wasn't looking at them at all. only when i stretched to the right that i could see these pee'ers.
my right ankle hurt as i did my slow run-up towards the starting point. great! i really slowed down a lot and then it was okay. as i reached the starting point it was full. totally full. how was i supposed to get behind the barricades? i walked down a few steps towards the starting block "c" and finally got in. after a few minutes of waiting in the crowd, it finally started. of course i had to wait a little while before the whole mass in front of me got on their way, to be exact, about 2.5 minutes of waiting!
route from my gf 305 (i should have recharged the damn battery), the original course and starting point from the internet.
as expected many "slow runners" did manage to get in front and block the rest.
i had to zigzag and did some "dangerous manouvres" just to get pass through them. soon enough i saw 3 of my "relatively slower" running colleagues in front of me and overtook them. a friend of my mine told me earlier that he was waiting at the ernst reuter platz (the 5 km mark) to cheer me up. at that point, i was looking up for him and almost caused an accident to the runners behind me. how inconsiderate of me! i did see him and shouted 'hi' while he took my photo with his mobile phones. everything was okay with my legs and finally had my first sip of water at the 5.5 km mark. i forgot to drink water this morning!
photos taken from a mobile phone - hey, i could still smile after 5 km!
i felt better and better and increased my tempo slowly but steadily. the only thing about this berlin halfmarathon which i didn't like was the turns, left and right and some of them was really a sharp turn, and of course the wind, especially between 10 to 13 km mark. i couldn't hide behind someone who would act as my windbreaker cos their pace was slower than mine. i wouldn't want to slow down! there were few short slopes but not as "deadly" as in rosengarten 3 weeks ago.
shortly before the 18 km point, i saw someone wearing the blue t-shirt with our club's logo on it, who was about 100 meters in front of me. i wasn't sure who he was but was determined to catch up to that person. i didn't burst into sprinting but just held my pace as it was, not slowing down whatsoever. soon enough i came slowly behind him and said hi and waved him goodbye. it was mario. he told me later that i just zoomed past him and even though he wanted to run together, he just couldn't follow and keep up with my pace.
i've been running in my automatic mode, which means that i could neither run a lot faster nor lot slower. my legs just move by itself. i didn't feel tired at all. luckily for me the pain that hindered me all this time wasn't there. i felt very relieved. there was this final slope right towards the 20 km point but the "rosengarten experience" told me that this was nothing. how i wished that there were more slopes to be tackled with cos i knew that i had been overtaking lots of people just by running "uphill".
just before the 21 km point, i saw another guy wearing our club's t-shirt. it was carsten, who was about 20 meters in front of me. i didn't sprint to the finishing line even though i did increase my pace slightly higher. i almost overtook carsten at the end but it wasn't meant to be. nevertheless i still ran about 1.5 minutes faster than he was for the nett timing.
after collecting my medal, i saw my teammates posing for the camera. i shouted at them and we hi-fived! we were all very happy that all of us had almost the same finishing time. talking about teamwork. only anina wasn't that happy cos she was too slow. then came mario and jens-uwe, who was absolutely very happy cos he just broke his personal best by more than 7 minutes! all in all 7 of us were within the 1:33 and 1:37 range. only johanna & gisela were slower at 1:44 & 1:50 respectively. the rest of my teammates had better timing, that is, 1 ran 1:25, 2 ran in 1:26, another ran 1:28 and another 2 managed a 1:30 timing. it was really amazing to see that the faster runners weren't that far from the rest of us at all! there's hope for improvement!
after collecting my bag, i met johanna with her right leg being bandaged. it was a chaotic day for her who just arrived that morning from hamburg, collected her bib number and had to box through from behind at the start. she told us that she still had some twitching problem with her leg and no doctor could tell her why. she wasn't interested in giving up running and practiced other sport like swimming and cycling, whereby she would be taking part in the cyclassics (155 km) and the triathlon later in summer.
no thanks, the beer tastes awful! and mario, sorry about leaving you behind, don't get mad please!
later at the massage area, we (me & norbert) met gisela together with jens-uwe who were waiting for their turn. jens-uwe offered his berliner kindl beer which i immediately turned down, cos it wasn't my taste. i told him it tasted horrible. another runner who too was waiting for a massage, overheard my comment and laughed. gisela told us that while she was running, she saw a doctor trying to help reanimate a person but unfortunately (which i heard in the radio later) the person died due to a heart attack. the first ever case for the berlin halfmarathon.
there were only 3 or 4 shower tents (i wasn't sure cos i didn't check it out). i guess it wasn't that many shower tents compared to marathon because many runners would go straight home or to their hotel to shower. one of the shower tent was a mixed shower tent - for males & females, i almost went in but decided to go to the all male shower tent (not for long cos there was a lady that showered with us)!
after i got myself freshened up, i went to collect my soforturkunde (unofficial immediate certificate). as i looked at my time i just smiled and laughed. not a bad timing. the time that i saw at the finishing line (after i stopped my stopwatch) wasn't correct. i must have been blind. it was 20 seconds faster! gee... i was perfectly happy.
such a nice weather to relax after a hard day's run!
only for DO! cheerleaders as decorative motives.
the winners' ceremony was held on a small stage near the finishing line. the male winner, patrick musyoki of kenya, managed to finish within a time of 58:56 mins (4th best time in the world and third fastest runner). i wonder where i was when he crossed the line. benita johnson of australia won the woman's category in 68:28 mins.
winners of male skaters, women and men category.
photos : berlin halfmarathon 2007
after taking all the photos and watching the ceremony, i went off to have my breakfast(!) with my friend at our favourite café. breakfast time : 09:00 till 23:00 - my kind of breakfast time.
alsteration (week 13) : 58.005 km
alstering : 14.66 km
non-alstering : 43.345 km
total running (april) : 21.098 km
davon
alstering : 0.00 km
0.00% gehört zu alsteration
0 Comments:
Kommentar veröffentlichen
<< Home