Athens Marathon 99
Steve Woo (Palo Alto Run Club Newsletter)
It seems that every international city worth it's exchange rate to the dollar has it's own marathon these days. Given that running is one of the few sports that allows recreational athletes to travel around the globe to organized sporting events, I recently took advantage of the opportunity to go back to our marathon roots (as well as the roots of one of my college majors, Rhetoric) to run the Athens Marathon on October 17, 1999. Consider taking your next marathon excursion to the Colosseum, Tiananmen Square, Ipanema, or the Pyramids. Sorry.....LA does not count as a foreign marathon, confusing as this may be. Among all the international marathons, however, Athens is in a class of it's own.
Backpacking in Greece is stressful enough, but throw in a marathon and you've got a recipe for some bad mousakka. Along with about 40 other marathoners from the US, I signed up with Apostolos Greek Tours, which arranged much of the marathon nitty gritty, including race registration, number delivery, meals & carbo loading, race day transportation, course support, etc. The alternative would have been to deal with this in-country and in Greek! Apostolos also took care of accommodation and the obvious tours around Athens and other spots around Greece. Paul Samaras is the director of Apostolos, which is based in Denver, and works directly with the Greek government and race organization. In addition to Paul, Jeff Galloway (72 Olympian, for the uninformed) accompanies the tour as your "coach", and "Maria" was our real-live Greek tour guide.
With Apostolos, you've got one big summer camp for marathoners. Most of our group's runners were from around the States, with a good contingent from the Bay Area. We also had some American expats from Israel and Germany, as well as a runner from Brazil. The group included a good mix of longtime & die-hard marathoners, a four-time "Ironwoman", first-timers, walkers, 20, 30, 40, and 50-somethings. This was no place to be for half-marathoners. All the talk revolved around "marathon this" and "marathon that"--enough to make Pheidipiddes cry.
Despite my 22 hours worth of transit, from SFO, to Milan (where I was delayed for 7 excruciating lung-cancer-inducing-hours at the smoke-filled airport), to my hotel in Vouliagmeni (a resort town outside of Athens) at 0100 hours, I managed to wake up on the Friday morning before the marathon to go on an easy jog led by Jeff Galloway, along the very trails that Pheidipiddes may (or may not) have covered--hey, use your imagination. After that, we all got on a bus and headed to the town of Marathon to check out the battlefield which started this whole marathon nonsense.
I'm sure we're all already oh-too familiar with the story, but for the comatose, it runs like this.....in 490 BC, 6000 Greeks were faced with 25,000 Persians trampling across the fertile plains of Marathon. Because of some new innovative military strategy, the Greeks were able to defeat the Persians. Meanwhile, back in Athens, the Greeks were preparing for a dismal loss, so they planned to burn the city to piss off the Persians. Then, Pheidipiddes, our heroic Greek messenger, was dispatched on his not-quite 26.2 mile run to bring word to Athens of the "Nikki!", or "Victory". Yes, Virginia, Nike and Nikki are synonymous, or so said Maria, our tour guide.
So, we visited the huge mound of earth that marks the final resting place of the 192 Greeks who lost their lives in the battle, as well as the tomb of the Plateeans, who fought alongside the Greeks. Marathon is a sleepy little town, and unassuming as the birthplace of the phenomenon that has become the marathon. Rising above the plains is Mount Penteli, which provided ancient Greece with the marble used to construct the Parthenon, the Olympic Stadium, and other historical monuments throughout Athens. Aside from Mount Penteli, there's nothing too scenic about Marathon. So we left in a flash.
After our brief tour of Marathon, our bus drove back towards Athens, covering the entire route that we'd be running two days later. Seeing the course before actually running it was not what I wanted to do--it would make the actual race seem anti-climactic--kind of like opening all your presents the week before Christmas, then re-wrapping them and feigning interest on Christmas morning. So I made fists with both hands and squeezed my eyes shut tight the entire way to keep myself in suspense until Sunday, but the woman sitting next to me thought I was having bowel problems.
So after we arrived in Athens, we had lunch in Plakka, the tourist area of Athens with all the tavernas and souvenir hawkers. This was my first in-country taste of Greek food, and given that I had a marathon to run in 2 days, I must say I was none-too-pleased with the selection of food that was placed in front of me. Tzatsiki, Fish Roe Dip, Dolmas, two big chunks of beef, and a plate of french fries. Not exactly a runner's dream meal before a marathon....but it got worse later in the evening.
After lunch, we made the obligatory trek up to the Acropolis. Plenty of obligatory oohs and aahs were sounded, we made the obligatory trek around the Parthenon, snapped the obligatory standing-in-front-of-the-Parthenon photos while screaming the obligatory "Get outta the way! I'm trying to take a photo!", then got back on the bus back to the hotel where I was DOA and crashed until my next pre-marathon fat-loading meal--dinner.
Not so fast. We had to hit some pub first, where the Sao Paolan chick in our group opted for Coke and I for water. Couldnt believe one woman was smoking and having a beer! THAT was uncalled for, and totally un-PC.
So then we moved on to the taverna down the street for dinner. Trying to be adventurous, I ordered two items written in Greek--"keseri something", and "patsumoura pie (sp?)". The former turned out to be fried cheese balls, and the latter, fried filo dough, cheese, and bacon or something pig-related. Well-aware that I was running in two days, I still had to eat, however. So much for carbo-loading.
Saturday. In the morning, we all met in the hotel where individual "goody" bags were distributed. I, of course would never voluntarily use this word, "goody", but since it's quite common, I defer to the rest of you. Cool stuff! We got t-shirts, keychains, tacky lapel pins, and the official marathon guide. We were also given our race bibs--gargantuan, these things. They were made of cloth and were like twice the size of bibs in the US.....Then, for the rest of the day, most of us just hung out around the hotel and went across the street to the beach.
Later in the evening, we had the traditional carbo-load dinner, comprised of spaghetti and some other squiggly-shaped pasta. But, clearly the chef was no marathoner. For dessert, we had something along the lines of chocolate mousse, a caramel-flan-type custard, and some strawberry-thingee. Never one to turn down food at a free all-you-can-eat buffet, I humored the chef and sampled them. By this time, after already having had three big meals laden with fat, I was testing the hypothesis that pre-marathon fat-loading actually provides more benefit than carbo-loading.
"And the scientific results of my research?" you ask. Let's see............
Saturday evening, I turned in early, and slept quite soundly, given that I was still jet-lagging. Buses shuttled us all out to the start line in Marathon at 0630 hours for the 0830 hours start time. Go figure how the Greeks came up with that. Race morning weather conditions could not have been more pleasant. It was overcast and misty. This, however, did manage to screw up some of my early morning race photos b/c of the poor lighting. About 1500 runners ran the marathon--most of them Europeans, I assume, based on the blue, black, and red colored socks many of them were wearing. There were also a handful of runners from Japan, but no notable Africans. The marathon does not attract the world's elite runners, primarily because there's no loot involved.
The race course. What's there to say? It was none too scenic, and quite similar to running 26 miles down El Camino Real on a Sunday morning, past car lots, appliance shops, small markets, mini factories. The first half of the marathon was relatively flat, then the course turned into quite the Willard's Wizard from miles 13 -20, and finally, the final 10K was all downhill. This was, by far, the hilliest marathon I've run, as well as the sleepiest, considering I had only flown into Athens two days earlier. My active nap, running between miles 8-9, provided the pick-me-up I needed.
What I didnt need to do was carry my disposable camera and a pack of PowerGel for the entire first half of the marathon. The pics I took along the course turned out dark & grainy, and I brought the wrong flavor PowerGel--I wanted Chocolate, not Tangerine--this totally threw my concentration off. Finally, at the halfway mark, where Apostolos had a water stop for our group, I dumped my load--my camera, not "that".
Organization along the course was exceptional, especially when you consider the bad wrap that marathon organizers have taken in the past. Every kilometer was marked, and water stops were set up about every 2 kilometers. This, perhaps, was the most difficult thing about the Athens Marathon--trying to convert kilometers to miles, and being given only the short span of one kilometer to figure out where you were, before you reached the next kilometer and had to start calculating all over again. It was total chaos on the course for the Americans and Brit-ish.
Roads along the course were blocked, so there was little or no traffic. But my lungs nearly did a triple flip, forward pike, and double twist when I came into Athens, where I was greeted by thick, delicious clouds of smog. At that point, I could see the Acropolis in the distance but, confused by all the smog, I thought it was the Matterhorn at Disneyland. I realized it wasnt LA at all, as soon as I heard the sounds of spectators applauding and chanting, "Bravo! Bravo!" Passing the American Embassy, though, I did hear one American telling me to lift my knees high and keep up my form, to which I responded, after coming to a complete stop in front of him, "I beg your pardon? Would you like to do this?" Bet he wasnt expecting that.
Having run Portland two weeks earlier, and this being my third marathon for the year and since knee surgery, I was only too happy that this would be my last marathon of the millennium and until Boston next year. So, with this in mind, I quickly hauled my butt to the finish at the Panantheanic Stadium (aka Olympic Stadium) where the first modern Olympics were held in 1896. The stadium is made entirely of Pentilic marble, so, coming into the stadium, it was quite a blinding sight to see it gleaming under the beating sun with spectators offering what I believe were congratulatory chants. You can never be too sure in a foreign land. With glee, I finished the marathon in my fastest post-op time.
Medals, without ribbons strung to them, and certificates were given to the finishers. Post race refreshments were all but non-existent. You got a bottle of water and then sent on to, well, into traffic. Fortunately, Apostolos provided our group with Powerbars, bananas, and water, but the race organization only provided water. For this, the organizers get a big thumbs down. Luckily, I had also brought my own Promax and Cliff Bars.
That evening, my post-race recovery commenced. Recovery, that is, of the vast amounts of FAT I deprived myself of all year during my training. After the marathon, I spent a few days on Crete and Athens, and committed myself to getting FAT on gyros**, souvlaki, baklava, feta cheese, pastisio, filo, filo, and more filo, and a long list of other stuff I cant spell. In the twisted words of Gordon Gekko, "FAT IS GOOD."
The Athens Marathon has potential to become one of the world's great marathon destinations. The same course was used for the 1997 World Championships, and as the 2004 Athens Olympics approaches, the marathon should attract a greater number of both elite and recreational runners. Greece alone should be attraction enough to put the Athens Marathon at the top of your "to run" list.
OK, so I ran in the footsteps of Pheidipiddes. Been there. Done that. What next? Can I ever bring myself to run a domestic marathon again? Vienna! Beijing! Santiago! Sydney!.....Close your eyes and point your finger anywhere on the map. Oooh...look where you're running!
**Greece can get pretty expensive if you're on a backpacker's budget. Consider dining at some of the finer gyros stalls around Athens. At 400 drachmas (~$1.33) a pop, gyros are the Greek equivalent of the 59 cent taco. Yo quiero gyros stalls.
