Staffan Malmgrens blogg

So, finally after training for this since new year’s, I was standing in the starting pen for this year’s Stockholm Marathon. I did not feel well. For the last couple of days, the right side of my neck had felt inflamed, and I felt like I was coming down with a cold of some sort. To make matters worse, the sun and the general nervousness had given me a headache. I took some pain relievers and hoped it would pass somehow.

The starting pen was packed. 16000 runners had entered this year, I don’t know how many of them showed up, but definitely most of them (however, only 9957 finished) After a lot of waiting, the start was announced and — absolutely nothing happened. I was in the last starting pen, and it took at least a minute before people even could start moving. It took us a little over five minutes to reach the starting line, at which time the pace had picked up to a slow jog.

1. Lidingövägen-Valhallavägen

During the first kilometer, the street was packed with runners. It was possible to advance a few positions if you really wanted to, but as I liked the pace, I just went with the flow. I saw one runner in full military camouflage, including thick helmet and backpack, one in a chicken costume, and one runner with black metal-style corpsepaint. I hope he had waterproof makeup.

2. Vallhallavägen-Filmhuset

At this point, I started to look for the paceholders in the race. They were supposed to have flags so that you could spot them in the crowd, but it was hard to find anyone. I spotted a few people with finishing times posted on their backs, but it turns out these people were ordinary runners with an intention to make those times. Later in the race, it became appearent that their intentions were not always matched by their abilities (after about half the marathon, I saw a couple of 5:00 runners ahead of a 4:15 runner). A few spectators were present, which was fun, but they were very quiet. After reading reports on Stockholm marathon by runners that have run in other countries, the consensus seem to be that the swedish crowds are numerous, but a silent.

3. Lindarängsvägen

This kilometre saw us leaving the city and enter the greener surroundings of Gärdet. Just at the exit of Vallhallavägen, there was a heavy rock band playing from a lorry. They were no Entombed, but it was good to hear some heavy music all the same. The running still felt really easy, but I continually reminded myself that I should take it easy and keep my own pace. At this point, my headache had dissappeared, but my right foot started to hurt real bad.

4. Lindarängsvägen-Kaknäsvägen

At this point, the road got a lot narrower, and so it got a little more crowded again. I saw Ian, who was arranging a refreshment station with punsch (a swedish liquour), but I didn’t manage to say hi due to the crowd.

5. Kaknäsvägen-Djurgårdsbrunnsvägen

This kilometre saw the first real refreshment station, where wet sponges was also passed out. Ever since the start, the sun had been shining, and it felt really good to cool down a little. I ended up keeping the sponge during the whole race, like a little mascot. I had another Ipren (pain reliver) with some water at this station, which seemed to kill off the pain in the foot for good. There were new pains to come, though. At this point, we also saw our first official race clock. I didn’t have my own clock, so it was good to see how I was doing. Fairly well, my first 5 km took around 31 minutes.

6. Djurgårdsbrunnsvägen-Dag Hammarskjölds Väg

This kilometer was run in the blistering sun, with no shadows of any kind. Spectators began to appear again, cheering a little more this time around.

7. Engelska Kyrkan-Strandvägen

At this stage, we began to get back into the city again. I think this was where I first encountered the run-through showers. Those were really great, as it was still pretty hot.

8. Strandvägen-Kungsträdgården

The second refreshment station was near the end of Strandvägen. At this stage, I still felt pretty good and was eager to push on, so i tried to drink while running. Not a good idea, most of the water ended up on my clothes. Apparently, both Marika and my aunt was standing at Kungsträdgården, wanting to cheer for me, but I missed them both. At this stage, there was a lot of spectators, and a fair amount of cheering. It did help, as I was beginning to feel a little tired at this stage (did I mention that it was hot?)

9. Kungsträdgården-Slussen

This kilometre went through the middle of Stockholm, over bridges and with plenty of sights to see on all sides. Since I’ve lived here for quite some years, I wasn’t that impressed and enjoyed the second run-through shower much more.

10. Slussen-Söder Mälarstrand

A lot of cheering people at Slussen, as well as the first photo opportunity. A company called Photomotion had their photographers stationed around the course, the idea being that they take your picture, identify you by the number bib, and offer to sell the picture to you later. I’ll have to see how they turned out.

11. Söder Mälarstrand

Söder Mälarstrand is a fairly long, straight stretch, with not much variation, but here I encountered the 10-km timing mat, which you run over and, through the magic of the timing chip fastened to your shoe, your time is recorded. I did the first 10-km in 1.06.06, which I’m pretty happy with, since I was trying to conserve energy. At the refreshment station, I took my first shot of energy gel (I had six shots in total), which really worked. At this stage, I hardly felt tired at all, but my feet and knees had started to hurt a little.

12. Söder Mälarstrand-Västerbron

Yet more running on flat ground, leading up to the feared Västerbron (”West bridge”) At the base of the bridge Erik, Helene and Filippa was standing, cheering for me. I went over and exchanged a few words. Cheered up, I went on for Västerbron. This is a bridge that’s also the highest part of the course, going from 5 m above ground to around 30 in only a few hundred meters. I did manage to run the entire climb, and was fairly satisfied with myself.

13. Västerbron-Rålambhovsparken

At the crest of the bridge, I exchanged a couple of brief words with a danish runner in his 50’s, saying that “Now the worst is over”. Little did I know… The slope down was nice after the hill climb, but it was almost too steep. At the end of the bridge, there was another run-through shower, again made full use of. Rålambshovsparken is one of the nicest and biggest parks in Stockholm, and normally on a Saturday there are lots of people there, but I can’t really recall how many spectators there were. I think I was just longing for the next refreshment station, which appeared at the end of Rålambshovsparken. At this stage I started to take longer walks while making sure I drank at least two cups of energy drink.

14. Norr Mälarstrand

My standard 9 km course goes by Norr Mälarstrand, so this was familiar ground. Although, when I run it, i run on the small path near the water, but of course that wasn’t an option this time.

15. Stadshuset

Close to Stadshuset, a calypso band was playing, and a lot of pretty smiling girls were samba dancing. If I recall correctly, clouds began to appear around this point.

16. Stadshuset-Fleminggatan

Fleminggatan slopes slightly upward, so I took my time at the refreshment station here. When I had run my practice runs, I’ve missed the exit to this street, due to me running at small path close to the water. You have to run on the alsphalt street to get to Fleminggatan. At the refreshment station, I had my second energy gel shot, and continued to do one every other station. The energy gel didn’t taste that good, though, sort of a syrupy kind of fluid with a slight citrus taste.

17. Fleminggatan-S:t Eriksbron

Now we were starting to get close to where I live. I often walk over S:t Eriksbron to Fridhemsplan (close to where S:t Eriksgatan and Fleminggatan cross). Again, a lot of people were cheering at this stage.

18. S:t Eriksbron-Odengatan

At the end of S:t Eriksbron, a sign saying that grape sugar was dispensed 100 m ahead appeared. Great! At this point, my knees started to get really tired, and I could use a energy boost.

19. Odengatan-Karlavägen

At this point, cars with the current race time started to pass us, so I got the feeling that the leaders of the race, now on their second lap, was close to us. And sure enough, two racers soon sped past us in the left lane. It’s one thing to see how these people run on TV, but a whole different thing when you’re running beside them, having almost half a half marathon behind you. Truly impressive. Most of us runners still on the first lap applauded as they went by.

20. Karlavägen-Sturegatan

Now we were starting to get really close to the end of the first lap. On my practice runs, I had usually been a lot more tired at this stage, but now my worst problem was the increasing pain in my knees and legs.

21. Sturegatan-Fältöversten

At Sturegatan, people were passing out pickles, of all things. I took one, thinking that it would be good to replenish some salt, but it tasted really really bad, so I quickly spit it out. Speaking of which, the amount of junk (cups, sponges, pickles, grape sugar tablets) beeing thrown on the street was absolutely staggering. People were showeling junk away all the time.

22. Fältöversten-Gärdet

Soon after Fältöversten, the 21.1 km timing station was set up. I clocked at 2.20.32, which was ok, but I had really hoped that I would do better, to around 2.10. I had, however, advanced from place 9045 to 8967 (which I didn’t know at the time)!

23. Greve von Essens Väg

I had told myself that I would allow myself to start walking after 21.1 km, but for some reason I kept on running. At this point, the sky was more or less completely cloud-covered, which probably was a good thing, but it would have been nice to run this part, leading away from the city into green surroundings, in some sunshine. I think it was somewhere around here that bananas were handed out. Unfortunately, they were pre-peeled and stored in big jars, so they were slightly… icky.

24. Greve von Essens Väg-Djurgårdsbrunnsbron

At this stage, my legs finally gave in, and I started walking. I had passed plenty of people that were walking up to this point, so I felt it was only fair. However, I got a little stressed by all the people passing me, so I started running soon again.

25. Manillavägen-Djurgårdsvägen

This part had some hills, which was fun, but I started to walk up the hills, to save my knees. Normally, these are really nice surroundings, with beautiful nature, but I was a little past being able to admire that now, particularly as the sun wasn’t shining anymore.

26. Djurgårdsvägen

Ah this point, my mood started to change. There were no spectators, no sun, my knees and feet hurt, and the pace was really slow, so there were no things to pick me up. I considered getting my mp3 player from my pocket and use some music to cheer me up, but decided against it, as music mostly seem to help me in the beginning of a run. A few days before the race, I decided that I would mostly run without music, so as to not shield myself from the other runners, the crowd, and the general vibe.

27. Djurgårdsvägen

…and this part was just more of the same.

28. Djurgårdsvägen-Strandvägen

At this stage, leading in to the city, we passed a house where 7-8 kids where standing, hands outstretched, and whenever a runner high-fived them they would cheer. So I did that, and it really cheered me up, as well. Thanks, kids!

29. Strandvägen-Kungsträdgården

Although the sun was not shining anymore, it was still kind of hot, so I took one water cup at the refreshment station and poured it over my head. I quickly found out that there was more in the cup that I had thought, as the front of my shirt got troughly soaked. Now I started to really miss the sun, since it got cold. I realized the only way to get the water out was to keep running to evaporate it. So that’s what I did.

30. Kungsträdgården-Slussen

At the bridge over to Gamla stan, on the way to Slussen, my knees gave out again, and I started walking again. Of course, that’s when a photomotion photographer appeared and took my picture. I wish I had faked a couple of running steps.

31. Slussen-Söder Mälarstrand

Here was the 30-km timing mat. I clocked at 3.26.41, and advanced my position from 8967 to 8965. Not much, but still! Of course, at the time I did not know this, and so I plodded on.

32. Söder Mälarstrand

Veteran runners say that the last 10 km are much harder than all the kilometres leading up to them, and I can see what they mean. At this point, I was hurting all over, the energy gel was not of much use (it wasn’t that I hadn’t the energy, it was my feet and knees being worn out), spectators had begun to go home, and even the arrangers was less entusiastic than on the previous lap.

33. Söder Mälarstrand-Västerbron

Here, Erik, Rickard and Niklas was standing and cheering for me. I paused for a while, talking, and they convinced me that even though 4.30 was out of the question, I might still make 5.00. With renewed self-confidence, I started running again, but had to walk the “hard” part of västerbron (the bridge has a fairly flat part with just a little ascent, but following that, there’s a much steeper part). Some traffic passed us on the left side of the bridge, and when a pickup truck passed, I briefly thought of jumping abord it.

34. Västerbron-Rålambhovsparken

The slope down from västerbron went fairly well, and I managed to keep running all the way to the refreshment station. At this point, my spirit wasn’t that high. I kept telling myself “only 8 more kilometres to go, that’s nothing, I can do this!”, but I didn’t really convince myself.

35. Norr Mälarstrand

Some percussionists were playing along the way, and the Swiss fanclub had a couple of lawn chairs up, drinking beer and cheering on. Were there a lot of Swiss people running this year?

36. Stadshuset

The samba girls were still present, but they weren’t smiling much, and mostly seemed to want to go home. At this point, I wanted to, too. Kept telling myself how short of a distance it was left, and that I knew every step of the way.

37. Stadshuset-Fleminggatan

There were a lot of Finnish people cheering around here. And a lot of Finnish people in the race. I even heard something about there being more finns in Stockholm marathon than in Helsinki marathon, can this be true?

38. Fleminggatan-S:t Eriksbron

While most of the streets where the marathon ran was totally closed of for car traffic, S:t eriksgatan was only half closed off, so there was a bit of traffic beside us. Still, I think this wasn’t the best day to be driving in Stockholm.

39. S:t Eriksbron-Odengatan

Passing S:t Eriksplan, I briefly thought about taking a detour to my apartment to get my knee support thingy (I tried running with one during practice, but decided against it for the race, since it made actual leg bending movement harder). But that would have meant running an extra 500 meters, so that was out ouf the question. Again, they passed out grape sugar tablets. The ground was white for the next 100 meters, of all the dropped tablets that had been crushed under runner’s feet.

40. Odengatan-Karlavägen

At this point, I passed a car with a race timer, which said that I had to run the last two kilometres in six minutes in order to achieve my 5:00 goal. Needlessly, this didn’t feel at all achievable, and so, I started walking again. But there’s something about beeing passed by the other runners that bring out the competitivness in me, and so I started running again soon after.

41. Karlavägen-Sturegatan

Now I felt that the goal was within reach, which lifted my spirits, and so I decided to try and run the last part. I think I gained more than a few positions during this stretch. No pickles was passed out this time around, which was just as well.

42.2 Sturegatan-Stadion

It was great to see the sight of Stadion. I didn’t really know how the last part of the course was laid out, so I got a little frustrated when it dawned on me that we had to run outside the entire lenght of the stadium, and enter through a back entrance. But entering the stadium was great. The first thing I saw was this giant “Välkommen i mål” (Welcome to the goal) message on the light screen, then I saw the crowd, who was still numerous, even though the race had been going on for five hours. The last 200 meters took place on the running track, which felt so much better to my feet than the asphalt. I even increased the pace slightly. Looking at the race clock at the goal, I saw that I came in at around 5.04, but since I crossed the starting line about five minutes after race start, my effective time was 4:59:09, and my place was 8743, meaning that I overtook over 200 runners in the last 12 km! That’s not so bad.

Here’s the result page for me

Afterwards, I was of course exhausted. I got my medal and stretched for a while, but since most of the pain was in my knees and feet, I had no idea of how to tend to them. There was a tent set up from a massage school where I probably could have gotten some help, but it had an insanely long line. Instead, I got some bread, chocolate and soft drinks to start the recovery process, after which I went home.

So, was it worth it? The five months of intense training, all focused on this race, and the five hours of running, the pain in the knees, the loniness of the second lap, the nausea later at night? Of course it was. Immediately after finishing, I was dissappointed with my finishing time, as I had aimed for 4:30 (actually, I originally trained for 4:00), but with a few hours of perspective, I’m really happy that I finished at all. I think that most people have the ability to get in the shape needed to finish a marathon, but very few ever do. I’m glad I managed to, and I’m happy I managed to reach the goal that I set for myself over five months ago. I’m now looking forward to resting for quite some time without feeling bad about it. Some say that the recovery period should be the same as the number of miles in the race (26 in this case). Sounds about right.

Would I do it again? I don’t know. I sort of proved that I could do it, running it again wouldn’t prove anything. But it would be great to be able to run the race through, and to get my time closer to 4 hours. And in particular, running the New York Marathon would be really cool…

Tags: marathon, racerapport

This entry was posted on söndag, juni 6th, 2004 at 21:12 and is filed under running. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.