Z Valdir's races

I got my "personal worst", I ran the 42.2 km in 5h41m51s. Horrible! The first half was ok, I was going at my marathon pace (seven minutes per kilometer) but in the second half I had to walk long stretches, I was feeling sick and my pace slowed down to nine minutes per kilometer. My daughter met me around km 34 and stayed with me for a kilometer or so. The idea was that she would jog with me to the end, but that was only if I had a shot at sub-5. As I had already blown out that possibility, I told her to go back home. The last few kilometers were murderous, I couldn't run anymore, the best I could manage was a semblance of rapid walking. At the end I got my medal, my jacket, I drank a beer and ate corn on the cob. I was mad at myself for my result. I had trained so much, I deserved a better time.

3K rapid walk On September 14th, 2016, a Wednesday, I took the day off from work to take part in the provincial finals of the Jeux FADOQ in Lévis, QC . Unfortunately my wife could not be there with me due to her work, so I did the trip all by myself. It rained on and off all day long, it was a bad day to be outside walking and running. A little after 11 am we finally did the 3K rapid walking. We were eight competitors at the start line, six men and two women. When we started the race, one of the participants started jogging and, of course, got a huge advantage over us who were doing the rapid walking. He was disqualified by the organizers after his first lap. With him out of the way, I was in second place, right behind the leader. My goal was to keep with him as long as possible and if I still had some gas left at the end I would try to overcome him. But unfortunately he started jogging when we were far from the organizers. He got a good advantage over me, there was no...

Lachine Half Marathon My wife took  me  and  my daughter to Lachine, a suburb of Montreal, for our half marathon today. After she left us very close to the beginning of the race we went on to see the departure of the 10K event. Later in the day there would also be a 5K and even children's races (1K and 2K). After the 10K runners were out, we walked around a little bit. The area at the end of the Lachine canal is a nice place for such an event. Close to 8h30 we were ligning up at corral 2. Corral 1 was sent off, we waited a minute and then it was our time. There was a lot of "traffic" in front of us at the beginning, so we had to go with the flow. After two or three kilometers my daughter left me behind and went on for her own pace. By km 4 I left the two-hour bunny behind and started putting some distance on him. But at km 12 the inevitable happened: he caught up with me again. I tried to stay with him for some time but after just a kilomete...

Back to the index The day before This year was my third Ottawa marathon and ninth overall. Due to the heat in the preceding days, there were even talks of cancelling the event. Fortunately, that did not happen. On the day before the race we left Montreal early, right after 8h. We were five in the car: my wife and myself in front and our daughter in the back seat with two friends visiting from Brazil. We parked our car near the Shaw Centre and went to visit the expo and get our bibs. "Our" because my daughter was also going to run. In the 10K. She wanted to do the half marathon, but she decided too late and the event had sold out, so she had to settle for the 10K, which happens the day before the marathon. We spent the Saturday walking around downtown Ottawa, we visited the Parliament Hill, Byward Market, the Rideau Canal. We even visited the museum of fine arts in the afternoon. At the beginning of the evening we all went to the starting line of th...

Back to the index Jeux FADOQ Montreal The day was cold. I finished the 5K run in 23'48'', one of my best times, but still not good enough to win. I finished third again, the winners did it in 23'26''. For the 1K rapid walk, my knee bothered me all the time, but I still finished first with a time of 7'10''. For the provincials, I'll have to improve a little bit.

Back to the index On April 24th I participated in the Scotia Bank Montreal Half Marathon . The day was a bit too cold to be running outside... I walked the seven kilometers from my house near the Olympic Stadium to the Parc des Îles, where the race would happen. It took me a bit more than one hour to get there. This half marathon happens completely inside the Parc des Îles, we pass by some places twice, some other places even three times. I don't particularly like this. After the first kilometer we had already seen the kilometer markers for 6K and 20K. A bit discouraging... There was a good crowd there. The half marathon didn't sell out, but there was a large number of people anyway lined up for the start. The course is not so great, too many places with gravel and dirty. Fortunately it was not raining... I reached the half way point around 58'30'', so I had high hopes of reaching my first ever sub-2 in a half marathon. But the second half was ha...

Back to the index My marathon number eight happened in beautiful Seville : The course of the marathon goes through most of the important parts of the city: According to the organizers, it's the flattest marathon in Europe. But before we went to Seville, my wife and I stayed for a few days in Malaga: We also did daytrips to Cordoba and Granada. We visited many places, like fortific ations... museums... Roman ruins... art centres... churches... mosques... more Roman ruins... the Alhambra... culture centres... museums on top of Roman ruins: and architectural marvels... Wow! -------------------------------------------------------- On Saturday afternoon it was time to go to the FIBES... ... to get my bib and other goodies: I find it impressive that every participant received this beautiful blue wind-breaker... ---------------------------...