IV Bieg Krzyska Kuczyńskiego

I wrote about this race last year so I'm not going to say much. Just a promise that I will start the next year too. And Wojtek made his appearance in running too!

RAZ love

Do you know that we're celebrating 10th wedding anniversary this July? Let the celebrations begin. Although it's only February, we're feeling like this is a special year for us. We typically don't celebrate the Valentine's Day but we found this race to be just perfect to spend some time together. The idea is that it's a couple race and the couple is tighed together with a string and the string cannot be torn during the race. It's only 5 km, so nothing too long. And lots of people put on costumes. We did too :)

Photo Credit: Dulny Photo and Borek

18. Poznań Marathon

When I'm writing the memory of this race, it's already 1.5 half year later but the emotions are still vivid. By no means this was the most extreme thing we both did in our life. But let me write the whole story.
When we came back to Poland in 2015 we were pretty fit after weekly excursions to the mountains. And we also made a plan to climb Mont Blanc the next summer. We had never run before but we both decided it would be the best way to keep our fitness level and prepare to the climb which would be very dificult in terms of needed stamina. And so we started running. I kind of immediately knew I needed the aim and kind of immediately knew this aim would be the marathon. And we both kind of immediately started to like running. But the story ended very quickly as I got pregnant with Kamila. I guess Radek didn't have the motivation to train on his own and we both stopped our preparation. 3 months after giving birth to Kamila I did my first 4 km. My legs felt like concrete but I felt exhilirated like never. I was very happy to be able to train again. And so the training began. I think it was around march that we decided we would like to enroll for Szczecin Marathon which would take place 4 months later. I reached out to Ewa Huryń who is an acknowledged runner and writes running plans and I was very serious about the preparation. Of course, from the time perspective I know I wanted it too much and pushed it too hard but sometimes heart takes over the reason. Anyway, we didn't start in Szczecin Marathon. I got an injury after the halfmarathon I did in May and had to take a break from running. So we set up the new goal - Poznań Marathon.

That's us before the start.

My preparation to this race was very poor. Radek's not perfect either but still better. It was a difficult venture for us as Kamila was still too young to leave her in Szczecin, so we took her, my mum and my sister with us. I am very grateful for the support I got from both of them along the preparation and the run itself. 
An so, we found ourselves on the starting line. Very insecure but also pretty excited. Radek was aiming for 4:00 and me for 4:30. And oh boy, how we missed those estimations :)  Together with us was our friend Marcin, who is a very experienced runner and did countless marathons already.

Long story short - we both started way too fast for our possibilities and for both of us it was not a good day for running. I'll tell the story from my perspective but I know Radek's is very similar. I guess after 7 km I already knew this wouldn't be a walk in the park and that something was not OK with me. On 10th km I had my first crisis... Halfway through, after running for 2h 15 min and having 21 km behind I simply couldn't imagine continue running... I remember that moment very clearly. I stepped over the halfway point line and I was totally devastated and wanted to end my misery. Somewhere around ~30th km I encountered my friend Karot. This was the joliest moment of the whole run! Afterwards he told me I looked like in very bad shape... Somewhere around ~33rd km I started crying. The whole time I was thinking: I can't do it anymore and it's still so bloody far to the finish line. Yet again, I got a stomach upset which only made things worse. Radek told me he was thinking to withdraw during the course... The feelings and the misery was very intense. But we both made it finally. And on the finish line our first words were: never again!

Radek's time was 4h 15min 03s and mine was 4h 45min 31s. I don't exaggerate when I say I still have thrills when I recall that race. But who cares, I could cross out "marathon" from my life bucket list.

K2 race

The K2 race is a mountain race in Szczecin. Sounds strange? Well, let me explain. It takes place on the hills of Bukowa forest. The finish line is on the top of Gubałówka hill which is also our "ski resort" (see more here). The funny thing about this race is that you need to beat the hill twice, as the starting point is down the hill, and the finish line is on the hill. The name of the race derives from a fact that the distance is ~8611m (like K2 mountain) and that it's a hill race. Lots of fun. And seriously, I have no idea how it is possible that I'm smiling on those final metres. The uphill is devastating!

Photo credit: Dulny Photo and Radek

Radków 2017 Day 3

Third day was the day of the run. So after cheering me on start, Bartek and Wojtek went to Czech to see another rock labirynth often compared to some Lord Of The Rings locations. 

Meanwhile I was running through mountains. 24km with 750m vertical change. I must said that it was much more fun than running on flat. Beautiful views, changes in tempo and style, constant focus on difficult track and less pression for time. I really enjoyed it. Final time 2:49

38. Halfmarathon Szczecin

I will have a lot to write about this race, so ready for a story?
Although we are preparing for our fist marathon, I have to admit, I was a bit neglectful of my training. I haven't been feeling well lately and I sometimes skip my trainings. I had even considered dropping out of marathon at some point. Anyway... Since my running performance is rather bad, I decided I would take this halfmarathon calmly. I was aiming for 2h 15 min, so more like a long run training instead of a tempo training. But I changed my mind one week before the start. I'll keep this to myself where I found motivation - or ask me some day face to face :) But the motivation was big enough for me to try to go under 2h in this marathon - this was the goal I set for myself.

What adds flavour to this story is a fact that a day earlier Radek had ordered a pizza and I was unable to refrain myself (who wouldn't?) :) It ended badly for me, I got stomach upset and it began even before the starting line. Another setback... Like 20m after the start my headphones died and I was left without any music. I'm the kind of a runner who can't imagine running without music but I had no choice. So... weak from food poisoning, with no beat in my head that would speed up my pace, I endevoured to beat my life record in half marathon. Radek had not believed I would make it and to be honest, neither had I. But I tried anyway.

The two photos above are from the finish line. Radek made it in 1:48:08 and I... wait for it... 1:58:17. I honestly don't know how it is possible. The very race was not an ordeal for me surprisingly. Problems began after the finish line but that's another story. We were both super proud from these results (although it's not Radek's personal best). And I guess, running is 50% muscles and 50% head.

Running: 3 Dzikobieg

What was I thinking when registering us for Dzikobieg? Easy answer: I thought it could be fun. And it was :) What is Dzikobieg? Well, the name is not that easily translatable as it's kind of a word play. Dzik is a 'wild boar' and dziki is 'wild'. So I'd say the name is sometging like "The wild run of a wild boar" :) I guess everyone knows Runmaggeddons. It's something like that but better because many of the obstacles are natural (like in the photo above) and there's a very nice atmosphere. You can push forward, race and do every obstacle as it should be done but you can also cheat and help each other etc. It's up to you :)

In the above photos you can see only a couple of obstacles but there were plenty... Mud, river stream, trees - these were the natural ones. But there was a variety of artificial obstacles that I even don't know names of. For example crawling under a tank, diving in a freezing water, wading in foam, lots of pulling up etc. It was great fun. Of course, it's a dangerous race but we were careful and didn't take it too seriously and we made it in one piece with smiles on our faces. See you next year!

Photo credit: Dulny Photo and Foto Art.

RAZ Mam Marzenie - 25h run

If after reading the title of this post you think I took part in a 25-hour run - you're wrong :) not this level... yet :) The run was called a 25h run because there was a 25 h span of time you could go and run on the track. It was a charity run, so the more kilometres you did, the better. I did 10,2 but to be precise I did 16 that day (it took me 3 km to get to the starting point and another 3 to get back to home).

Photo credit - amazing Dulny Photo