Brussels Marathon 3h 35min!
Moikka kaikki! Hello everybody!
Video: lataa Flash-soitin videon katselemiseksi.
Brysselin maraton meni aikaan 3 tuntia ja 35 minuuttia. Olen iloinen, mutta samalla jäi paljon hampaankoloon. Selitys löytyy alla englanniksi.
I just finished the Brussels Marathon in 3 hours and 35 minutes. Can't help it, but I have mixed feelings.
I am happy that I improved my by 25 minutes in 8 weeks. At the same time I am gutted that I did not do better. Things were going really well until 32 km. I was following the 3h30min "rabbits" and we were approximately 3 minutes ahead of schedule.
My legs felt fresh, and I really felt that I could sprint towards a 3h 20min or at least 3h 25min. And then everything went wrong. I got a really painful stitch in my lower abdomen. It was impossible to run for more than a few hundred metres at a time.
I had to walk and when I ran I had to stay in a 90 degree angle. It was actually easier to do the long hill by Parc du Woluve, towards Montgommery (35-37km). I was really sprinting, albeit in a funny position.
My assistant, Tuomas Rautanen, ran the marathon with me. It was his first 42 195 metre race and he did fantastically well: 3h 39min, and basically without major training and 5 year old running shoes!
Before
Not only that, but he gave me encouragement to push harder when he saw me doubled over at 38 km. What a super assistant!
I draw three lessons from the marathon:
1. It pays off to train. I did not train properly for the Helsinki City Marathon. This time around I followed a programme that I got from a friend of mine, Simon Mordue (a 2h 39min man). It was a 16 week programme and I did 8 weeks of it.
2. Be patient. In Helsinki I started way too fast. This time around I followed the pacemakers. The half-way stage went in 1h 43min and the second half would not have been worse was it not for the stitch (aargh!).
3. If you get a stitch...well, good luck.
After
All the same, it always feels great to finish a marathon. I wonder which one I could do next...?
Henrik Ruso, also a superassistant of mine, came to the starting line to support us at 8.30. Respect! Not least because he came home from the football match at 4.00 this morning. We will put in some photos and a videoclip tomorrow morning.
Titta Anderson, also a superassistant, has also helped throughout the weekend with all the logistics.
Oh my God! I must look like some kind of a monster boss! One assistant runs a marathon with me. Another is forced out of bed on a Sunday after less than 4 hours of sleep. And the third has to pick up my friends son from the airport and wait for me to show up.
PS.The marathon served as a therapeutic session after Finland tied Belgium in the Euro 2008 qualifier yesterday. Despite yesterday's result I am convinced that we will make to the tournament, not least with Sisu (i.e. Finnish courage). Our team is fantastic and they will go all the way!
PPS. Good luck Joe and Manuela, who are running the Amsterdam Marathon next weekend!
14 kommenttia
Jan - sometimes when I read your comments I can but help to think that a Finn did something bad to you in some point in time. Or perhaps you could elaborate a bit on why you have such a huge chip on your shoulder about Finland?
I am now writing Alex a personal e-mail about this as it is too complex to write in a few lines.
Waking up early to experience all the excitement before a marathon is not a problem at all. Quite the contrary. The paradoxical words of Tuomas in the finishing line were also quite fascinating, "a man tends to do all sorts of stupid things like the marathon". When asking will he do it again I got an instant reply "definitely!"
Dear Alex,
Now I know for a fact that even in finnish pre-Ks they teach how to share. So just telling us that by following a sixteen week program for eights weeks and improving your time by nearly half an hour wont do: ergo, details please. What kind of program are we talking about?
Cheers
Paavo
Paavo K - ohjelma löytyy seuraavasta osoitteesta http://running.timeoutdoors.com/training/trainingPlan-Marathon.htm. Käytin 5 päivän ohjelmaa, jossa tavoiteaika 2.45-3.15. Se on maksullinen. Suosittelen myös Bill Piercen kirjaa "Run less, run faster".
Oma tavoiteaikani oli 3.30, josta siis jäin tuon harmittavat viisi minuuttia. Olen satavarma, että jalat olisivat vieneet kovaan loppukiriin, mutta kun vatsa ei halunnut tulla mukaan. Parannus olisi voinut olla 35-40 minuuttia. Jäipähän jotain hampaankoloon (ja minullahan on tunnetusti aika isonpuoleiset hampaat; koloista en tiedä).
Kiitos mahtavasta esiintymisestäsi Voionmaan lukiossa 12.10.2007. Teit syvän vaikutuksen minuun ja annoit paljon ajateltavaa niin EU:sta kuin mielenkiintoisesta ammatistasi. Toivottavasti tapaamme vielä uudelleen mielenkiintoisten keskustelujen merkeissä.
Suoritushan oli vallan mainio, kun vielä huomio, että HCM:stä ei ole pitkä aika. Sopiva maratontahti olisi ehkä pari kertaa vuodessa, esim. syksyllä ja keväällä. Välillä sitten vaikka puolikkaita ja kymppejä antamaan vaihtelua harjoitteluun.
Kesämaratonien riski on hellekelit. Syksylläkin voi helteitä olla jossain, kuten oli esim. Chigagossa viikko sitten. Olympiavoittaja (1972) ja olympiahopeamitalistin (1976) Frank Shorterin kirjoitus siitä, mitä voi yrittää tehdä hellemaratonilla. Shorteristahan Amerikassa oikein maraton- ja juoksuinnostus aikanaan alkoi.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/12/opinion/12shorter.html?ex=1192852800&en=67c13ffff67dbc79&ei=5070&emc=eta1
Lohtusignaali löytyy nyt "loka"kuiseen vallankumousuhkaan! Jos parlamenttiedustuksemme ensi vuosikymmenellä typistyy, niin tiivistyköön siihen enemmän Stubbstanssia, ehkä vähemmän esanssia! Valtakunnassa kaikki hyvin, kun yksikin kirkas valon suurlähettiläs piirtyy euroheimokartalle. Paljon poweria ja kepeää rullausta niin puru- kuin kiitoradoillekin maratonmailinavigoijalle, sporttiperheenisälle! Kunnioittavasti manifestoi yksi demokraattinen, unioniuskovainen kenttä-ääni
H.L ja Annukka - suurkiitos palautteesta! Tässähän palautuu maratonista kummasti noin kaunista tekstiä lukiessa.
Dear Alex, Congratulations for your great "sprint"! While I'm stupified by your fantastic learning-curve (regarding Brussels Marathon compared to Helsinki City Marathon), I am absolulety pleased with your phase of running. As I've followed your blog for a while, I might guess that it's not the easiest of the orders to follow for your part to start slowly. However, you managed to do that, and my belief is that you will tackle the political obstacles in the same manner in the future, as well as you are doing at present.
You mentioned something about being a boss of a team. I've had a possibility to work in several different teams: Dominican, Swedish, Finnnish, Spanish, US and European teams. In order to give you some points concerning your teamwork, I'd like to shortly tell about my experiencies:
A Swedish team is worst of all, if you need to rely on its results in a short period of time, since a Swedish team is based on discussing and discussing until people get tired and the conclusion is to discuss even more (a possibility to people who have not participated in war for a while).
A US team works for a while and extremely well depending on the capabilities of its boss, as it works on "information-only-if-needed-basis". However, this kind of teamwork tends up to disintegrate, since the best reason to participate in a teamwork is to get a better position and not necessarily in the same organisation.
A Spanish team is largely dependent on its boss, since if a boss shows the smallest point of weakness, the group will get wild and it will not work properly after that. However, a Spanish team is a very human one.
A Dominican team is run by its boss, and it functions well as long as people get paid and as long as the members of the team have a social standing outside the team, due to their membership in the team.
A Finnish team is on of the best as long as the boss understands that all the players are needed. The Finnish team is best in a highly stressful situation (= sisu), in other situations the membership in a team might turn out to be a position of influence without any further OWN ideas.
A European team is just emerging. My experience is that as a multilingual and multicultural working-group a European team is one of the most successful or one of the worst ones, mainly depending on the boss and on the capabilities and visions of its members.
So, Dear Alex, everything depends on the boss in the end. as well as on the skills, visions and wellbeing of your team.
I'm no judge to decide or even propose whether you are a good boss (to whom?) or whether you have a good team, but my hint is that your website would have long ago been down unless you had not taken care of your backyard. How is your garden by the way?
Thinking about football, I'd like to state that justice exists even in football but it is not evenly delivered.
To be short. What I have heard and seen from Finland in the past 30 years on culture and foreign policy + defence can be divided in two categories : extreme left views and left views. Until 1991 I thought it had to do with YYA and being cautious but 16 years later Finland still behaves in the same way. It is good for Finland to get some counterweight for Soviet brainwashing (finlandization) during YYA-times.
Hei Alex,
I came to your website to check your views on the approval of the Lisbon treaty... and I find out that you've been training secretly and running the Brussels marathon! ;-)
Well, congratulations are in order, it is indeed a great time and an impressive improvement in such a short time, and it certainly gives me ideas for next year in order to improve my own mark set in Helsinki!
I am looking forward to reading more of your views on Europe, keep up the good work!
Alex,
Just a note about your work - I work in British politics, and there are so very few inspirational figures available - indeed, I struggle to find any in my country. We're in the process of ordering the Party regional lists for 2009, and the choice available is not what I would like. The European Parliament isn't a natural place to look for the young, the energetic, the intelligent, and - dare I say it? - the drop dead gorgeous.
In spite of that, there you are. I find the party groupings interesting - you're EPP-ED, I'm a Lib Dem (ALDE), but after trying for 18 months, the only policy position I can find to disagree on is my fervent desire for the EU to one day be a fully formed federal state (ref: Blue Wings may 2007). Much as I'm contractually obliged to hate Conservatives, there apparently is some overlap. Please keep arguing your case, communicating with the people in ever more innovative ways, and please don't let your idea of punishing M(E)P's assistants by making them run marathons catch on...
Finland needs several miracles to advance to Euro 2008. I think Finland will sooner become member of NATO (which won't happen because of the effects of finlandization) than qualify for a football tournament. Well, I hope Poland and Portugal qualify now.