MARATHON de PARIS 2002

Steve Woo (Palo Alto Run Club Newsletter)

Day One:  Thursday, April 4th

For starters, whenever I fly, jetlag screws up my eating patterns and I end up gorging after my arrival.  During my flight to Paris, from LA with a layover in New York, I barely slept and passed on alot of the airline food.  Arriving in Paris on an empty stomach is like letting a bull loose in a china shop.  After checking into my hotel in Paris' Montparnasse district, I was starving and immediately headed out to a boulangerie for any kind of sustenance.  My first taste of Paris was a salmon sandwich--not exactly the haute cuisine for which the French are known, but this was probably the best sandwich, salmon or otherwise, that I’ve ever had.  Mighta been the delicate crust on the fresh baguette, the generous mounds of butter, or maybe it was the way they cut the cheese, no pun intended.  In addition, my eyes undecidedly gazed across the rows of pastries.   But it was a particular vennoise that caught my attention--neither bread, nor pastry, vennoise is somewhere in between and claims the croissant as part of its family.   Anyway, this vennoise was a "pepites de chocolat"--it looked like a mini baguette, about a foot in length and packed with chocolate chips.  Again, this was a relatively simple piece of bread (or pastry), but given the amount of deprivation I go through during my marathon training, abstaining from anything remotely unhealthy, this pepites de chocolat was a culinary work of art, and marked the start of my marathon food frenzy in Paris.  There were so many chocolate chips that had melted together, they essentially formed a bar, so it was like eating a chocolate bar sandwich, hold the mayo please.

Next I headed down to the marathon expo to pick up my bib number.  No big hoopla there--lotsa French vendors, but absolutely no free samples.  PowerBar was there, but charging for its bars, and the gels were conspicuously absent.  Didn’t spend much time there, and then walked around the neighborhood.  I’ve got some friends in Paris, but I wasn’t planning to see them for a couple of days, so I was on my own in Paris for a couple of days.

That evening, I checked out the Latin Quarter, home to Parisian intellectuals, the Sorbonne, and university students--and that's Latin as in the ancient language, not as in J-Lo or Ricky Martin.  There were alot of outdoor street vendors--went to one and had a huge jambon (ham) and mozzarella panini, then moved on down the street to another vendor where, already stuffed from the panini, I devoured a poulet & frommage crepe (chicken & cheese).  By this time, I had already consumed unusually large doses of cheese and other fats for the day and, adding insult to injury, when I got back to my hotel I devoured a couple of Kashi and ProMax Bars that I brought from home, as well as leftovers from a loaf of Trader Joe's bread.  Thus marked the end of an exhausting, jet-lagged day.

Day Two:  Friday, April 5th

Friday, I was beginning to feel myself sweating cheese from my frommage glands.  I forgot to pack my anti-cheese-perspirant, so I vowed to abstain from any cheese for the day.  I started off the morning with a 60 minute run.  It was good to get back my land and running legs, but I could definitely feel the jet lag during my run.  When I got back from my run, I had to finish up some work for school.  Here I was, my first morning in Paris, stuck in my hotel musing on the United Steelworker's efforts to help collegiate athletes unionize against the NCAA.  After two hours, I didn’t intend on spending any more time on this.  With my Lonely Planet (never leave home without it), I headed out to explore Paris, altogether spending over six hours on my feet, only two days before the marathon.

The Bastille:   My first instinct was to go straight to the Eiffel Tower--I was in Paris afterall, right?  But given my time constraints, I had to be efficient with my schedule.   Since I was gonna be near the Eiffel Tower and Champs Elysees for the marathon and the breakfast run the day before, I should probably check out some other sights first.  So I headed down to the Bastille, which has been described as one of the world's most famous monuments that doesn’t exist.  The Bastille that was stormed way back when no longer stands--it's now a traffic circle, with a monument in the center, honoring those who died in the attack (they're also buried beneath the site).   In addition to being a historical site, the Bastille district is a popular commercial district--lotsa old architecture, churches, and narrow alleys mixed in with cafes, bars, restaurants, boutiques, bookstores.......and an Internet cafe.   Perfect, I brought a floppy disk with me, because I had to email an assignment back to a classmate, so I was able to get that outta the way and check some personal mail.   Then I headed down to the Hotel de Ville department store, where I had to buy an American adapter so I could plug in my laptop back at the hotel.

The Louvre:   After the Bastille, I heard a woman's voice in Italian calling from the Louvre--it sounded like Mona Lisa.  I made my way to the glass pyramid entrance of the famed museum, and waited only five minutes to get through the security check, then another five to buy my ticket.  Let's make it very clear that I don’t claim to know anything about art--this guy cant tell the Venus di Milo from a French child's playdough sculpture of a poodle, though I did impress myself by recognizing the simplistic Cycladic art as I passed through the Greek sculptures, probably a reflection of my own artistic ignorance.  So, naturally, I thought, "Show me the Mona!" and went straight for the popular painting, expecting a reverent, introspective mood when I got there.  Au contraire. It was a mob scene, with kids screaming and Americans posing to take their mug with Mona.  The only thing that was missing from the ambience was Nat King Cole crooning his rendition of "Mona Lisa" over the soundspeakers.  Not to be left out, I also posed for a mug shot--just me and Mona.  Then I went for another main attraction, the Venus di Milo.  OK, again, same scene, same mug shot.  Ended up walking through some more exhibits, getting lost at the same time, and adding to the amount of time on my feet.  Next, I walked around the posh district around the Louvre for a while, with feet aching and stomach growling--a viennoise-pepites de chocolat with my name on it could not be far away.  None of this made any marathon-sense.  Here I was exhausting myself before the marathon, and I still had so much to see, yet so little time.   But I figured I didn’t fly out to Paris to rest, marathon or not, so I made my way out to Chinatown, just to check out the scene and see what my French Chinese counterparts are like. 

Chinatown:   Has anyone figured out yet why it seems Chinatowns and Little Italies around the world are always located next to each other?  On my way to Chinatown, I got off at Place de Italia and walked through the Italian district.  I got weak and bought another viennoise-pepites de chocolat.  Then as I approached Chinatown, I could feel the decibels in the air rise a notch and the streets started getting a little less sanitary.  Yep, I reached my destination, this was Chinatown.  Still, compared to Chinatowns in SF, LA, and NY, Paris' Chinatown is extremely tame, relatively clean, and quiet in comparison.  Most of the Chinatowns in US cities are heavily influenced by the Cantonese of Hong Kong and Southern China, but here in Paris, there was more of an Eastern/Northern Chinese feel.  I felt like I was in Shanghai, which has been dubbed the "Paris of the East."  But this Chinatown also takes on a strong Vietnamese and SouthEast Asian flavor, especially with all the Pho restaurants, probably because of the French influence on IndoChina and the immigrants that fled to Paris during the war.  Incidentally, speaking of the French connection with Vietnam, I was reminded of how I could have ended up being Chinese-French, instead of Chinese-American.  Way back when, my father and his friends lived in Vietnam before immigrating to the US and France to study--he wisely chose California, but had he gone to France with other friends instead, I might have turned out to be another random Francois or Antoine growing up running laps around the Eiffel Tower, instead of a random Woo running back and forth on the GG Bridge.

Anyway, meandering through Chinatown, I got weak again and bought a Chinese spring roll and then, passing by another Chinese deli, I bought a cha-siu-bao (pork bun).  I don’t understand why I was so fascinated with Chinese food all of a sudden.  I mean, I had recently spent half a year living in Hong Kong, and here I was in Paris searching for Chinese food that is arguably better back home in SF and LA anyway.  If you've had one cha-siu-bao, you've had them all, right?   Au contraire, not exactly.  Maybe it's the French water or something, but this was a funky French cha-siu-bao that seemed to pack everything but the kitchen sink into the pork bun--eggs, sausage, pork, and other unidentifiable items.  It wasn’t bad, but given the 5000 years of Chinese history and culinary traditions, I think it best to leave Chinese food to the Chinese from either the mainland or San Francisco.

Ali Baba:   Throughout much of my training, I've been eating alot of couscous, ala Trader Joes, and since I was in Paris, where there's a heavy population of North Africans, this was as close as I would get to the way couscous is meant to be eaten, in contrast to the instant-add-water-and-mix version to which I’m so accustomed.  So for dinner, I went to a couscous restaurant thinking I'd be eating relatively healthy.  Ordered the "Couscous Ali Baba" not really knowing what was in it because the menu was in French and I couldn’t make out any other text, and I was distracted as I recalled the lyrics to Beastie Boys' "Ali Baba and the 40 thieves.”  Initially, it was great, they brought out a big bowl of plain couscous and a vegetable stew.   Aaaah, relief, no fat.....But then a minute later, the waiter came out with a plate of 3 greasy sausages.  A little frightened at the impact these sausages might have on my marathon in two days, I stared at them for a few seconds, then mashed my fork over the top of one of the links, watching the grease ooze all over the plate to create a little pool of fat in which the sausages could swim--too cool.  This litmus test indicated they were gonna be goooooood.  And the sausages did not disappoint.  However, the couscous, while good, did not live up to my expectations.  It was a simple dish, the stew was maybe a little bland, and I was expecting something more elaborate, though I guess you cant get too elaborate with such a simple grain?  Next, I had to have dessert--didn’t know what the thing was, but it was a cone-shaped cake with a pistacio topping that tasted a little like baklava.  Then walking back to my hotel, I walked by the boulangerie again.  ARGGGGH, don’t do it, don’t do it.............Ended up buying a slice of Tarte Normandy.  After polishing that off in my hotel room, I started getting groggy......I'd like to think that my jet lag was hitting me, but I think that the amount of food I had been eating all day, and topped off by this huge dinner was sending me into a coma.  Not even after an hour after I returned, I was out like a light, while visions of viennoise-pepites de chocolat danced in my head.

"Just Say No PR"

It's times like this when you hear Nancy Regan heeding you to "Just say no" to these temptations, but after only two days in Paris, I knew it was impossible to try to restrain myself any longer, so with all due respect to the former First Lady, I began thinking to myself, "Just say no PR."  Without any pressure to run a marathon PR, it really didn’t matter anymore what I ate or how much I ate.  I'd already deprived myself too long during training, and I was pleased with my 2:54 at the DC Marathon two weeks earlier, and having already qualified for next year's Boston left me alot less stressed.  I could kick back now and enjoy the marathon on Sunday........But then again, I was still going to be running the Boston Marathon only eight days after Paris, and was hoping to run a decent time there.  However, there was fat chance I could expect to recover from Paris and jet lag soon enough to run well at Boston.  So with this logic, I should just expect to "Just say no PR" at Boston too.  With that, my eating frenzy could continue.

Day Three:  Saturday, April 6th

"Pancake" Breakfast Run

I was quite excited about running the 5.2K Pancake Breakfast Run and the opportunity to get myself into another French feeding frenzy.  Woke up at 6:30AM to get down to the start, in front of the UNESCO (United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization) building.  Paris' metro system is excellent, so I ended up getting there 45 minutes earlier than expected, leaving me to stand around and freeze in the cool breeze.  I met two Americans who were on an exchange program at Cambridge and had come down to run the marathon.  Neither had done much training and for one, it was his first marathon.  At the start, there were 30 runners bearing flags of the countries that were most represented among the marathoners.  Of course someone felt compelled to have the Americans doubly represented with TWO Old Glories--one of these flags was twice as large as the others and was being waved unmistakably higher and with more vigor than the rest.  Passing time in the middle of the pack, we were trying to identify each country's flag.  There was Mexico's flag and someone wearing a mariachi hat, making me feel like I was back in LA.  Canada, Brazil, Japan.   And then there was the Israeli flag, but, um........no Palestinian flag?  Uh oh, given the tensions in the Middle East in the past week, let's hope all politics are left outta the marathon. 

The run started at 8:30AM, and the short course led us through the Left Bank by the Seine River, around the Eiffel Tower, and then to the final stretch of the marathon course in front by the Arc de Triomphe.  Running right at the base of the Eiffel Tower was nothing short of S-P-E-C-T-A-C-U-L-A-R, and I was reminded of that scene in Superman II where Lois Lane is trapped beneath the elevator and Clark Kent (aka Superman) rescues her.  It was a bit chilly, but the morning sun reflecting off the tower gave it a glow that made you feel all warm and fuzzy staring in awe at the enormous structure.  It was one of those times in life when you wish you could just stop the world and make the moment last.......but, shoot, I didn’t have my camera on me and there were just too many runners stampeding behind us to get all emotional and reflective, so on with the run we went.  As the run continued, my legs were feeling quite tired, and I could REALLY feel the combined effects of jet-lag, the past two days' feeding frenzies, and yesterday's 8 hours of being on my feet walking around Paris.   Oh well, ke sera sera, whatever will be, will be.....or whatever wont be, wont be, especially since I figured a decent finishing time for the marathon would not be.  I had already eaten 5 too many viennoise-pepites de chocolats in the past couple of days to even hope for a decent marathon.  However, my culinary marathon was coming along perfectly, and I think I was on pace to break my PR at the pace I was eating everything in sight.

We reached the finish and I had anticipated this being a sit down pancake breakfast.  But everyone was standing around--what was up with that?  I stood in line with several other Americans and we asked the French volunteer where the pancakes were.  He held up a big cardboard box filled with packages of round biscuits.  Say what?   These were supposed to be "pancakes?"  Indeed, they were "pancakes"--French pancakes.  7000 miles back in California, these same "pancakes "would be called "butter cookies."  Aargh, after two days of riding a wave, no, a tsunami, of French culinary cuisine, I crashed, both emotionally and physically.  It was a big let down, not only because my culinary fantasy turned into this nightmare, but also because I had limited myself to a piece of bread before the run to save my appetite for the "pancakes."  Well, perhaps it was better this way, since I would’ve eaten myself into another coma had this been a real pancake feast.  Still, when it comes to pancakes, Julia Child has NOTHING up on Aunt Jemima, unless we're talking crepes, which one might argue is technically a pancake, only much thinner, in which case I would have preferred this "Pancake Breakfast Run" to be a "Crepe Breakfast Run" instead.  Feeling the effects of my post partum "pancake" depression, I walked past the boulangerie on my way back to the my hotel and felt the need to be vindicated, so I bought another viennoise-pepites de chocolat and scarfed it down in 10 minutes--sweet victory was mine.

Unfortunately, I had some more work to do for school, so I went and got a salmon sandwich on a baguette smothered with butter, and brought it back to my hotel room and studied.

"If there's a protest, this must be Paris"

After a couple of hours, I had to get out of my room.  I headed down to the metro station, buying an almond croissant along the way, then noticed they had blocked off the road to traffic.  Way down at the other end there was a big crowd.  It was probably half a mile down the street and I didn’t want to unnecessarily wear my legs out the day before the marathon, but I had to find out what it was.  I was just hoping it wasn’t some silly protest about economics or politics, otherwise I'd be really irked for having walked so far.  I was hoping for something more along the lines of a food festival with lotsa free samples so I could continue to fuel my marathon feeding frenzy, even though the marathon was only half a day away. 

But as I suspected, it turned out to be a big anti-Israeli protest, with pro-Palestinians chanting not so positive things about George Dubya and Ariel Sharon.  There were also many protestors waving Iraqi flags and bright yellow flags with Sadaam Hussein's face.   I exchanged a few words with some Americans on the street who thought it probably wasn’t the best place for us to be.  I wasn’t too worried--my black hair and light complexion screamed Chinese more than American, so I was able to work my way into the crowd to get a better look at the whole scene.  However, I was wearing Levi's and a sweatshirt that read "LA Marathon 2001," so I tried to cover that up with my Lonely Planet Paris guide, only realizing that it just made me look like more like a Western tourist.  Shoving my way back out of the crowd, I excused myself, mustering my best French accent, "Pardon! Pardon! Pardon!".........Phew, made it out safe and sound.  This called for a reward of some sort, so as I was walking around the area in and out of side streets, I passed by a Greek shop and bought a thick, crisp, juicy slab of baklava--the finger-lickin-good type that leaves your fingers drenched in butter, with nowhere to clean them off except in your mouth.  Unfortunately, by this time, the marginal returns of all my food consumption were beginning to decline.  Don’t get me wrong, the baklava was great, but the same pleasures I experienced from eating other patisseries up until this point didn’t seem as intense now.   Perhaps I needed a break to revitalize my taste buds that were maybe beginning to get numb?  Nah, no time for breaks--it was about time to head down to the pre-race pasta dinner.

Gnocchi, Gnocchi

I wasn’t sure what to expect at the pasta feed.  What kind of twist do the French give to pasta?  It was still early, so there wasn’t a huge line to get in.  To my astonishment, the menu was quite limited.  There were only two pasta choices--spirals or gnocchi, with plain tomato or meat sauce.  And then bananas for dessert.  What was so French about this?  Still, the simplicity of it all didn’t keep me from shoveling down three bowls of gnocchi, topped with generous heaps of freshly grated parmesan cheese.  Rolling myself out of the exposition hall, I made my way back to the hotel, relieved that I could lock myself in my room for the evening, without access to any more food (other than the stash of ClifBars I brought from home) before the marathon.   But before I reached the hotel, I passed by the boulangerie again, and was compelled to have one last pre-race pastry.  This time I bought a pain aux raisin, more like a raisin snail or danish in American-speak.  Physically, there was little satisfaction in consuming it, but emotionally, I felt very Parisian scarfing it down.  This must be what eating disorders are all about.   So, THAT WAS IT for the carboloading?  No doubt my last three days before the marathon were spent carbo-loading, but I was also loading up on protein and fat too, with more of an emphasis on the latter.  I can’t really figure out how Parisian marathoners train, what with boulangeries, patisseries, and frommageries serving up the fat everywhere you go in the city.

Day Four:  Sunday, April 7th

Marathon de Paris

Went to bed at 10PM, fell right to sleep, then woke up throughout the night in jet-lagged intervals:  1AM, 3AM, 5AM, then finally got up at 6AM.  Given all that I had eaten and all the sightseeing I had done in the past few days, there was part of me that wasn’t looking forward to the marathon.  I didn’t want to see how big of an impact it would all have on my run.  But as I started to change and digest my Clifbar, my mood started to change and I was just looking at the marathon as a good way to run off alot of what I'd been devouring.

Just to refresh my memory, this was April in Paris, like the best time of the year to be in the city.  The weather cooperated, and it turned out to be a clear sunny morning, though maybe a little on the cool and slightly breezy side.  Took the metro down to the Champs Elysee where the race started and huddled in a tent with other runners to stay warm.  Making my way to the start, I walked through the Arc de Triomphe and tried to make any sense of all the inscriptions carved in the monument--no luck, the French was all Greek to me.  My bib number was #3992, which was assigned based on my predicted finishing time of 3:15.  There were supposed to be corrals for corresponding bib numbers, but they weren’t clearly marked.  Things were barricaded and I saw runners hopping fences to line up in the pack.  With 29,000 runners trying to line up, it was a nightmare trying to move around and find my corral, so I just ended up hopping the fence at a random spot, which ended up being the position for runners looking to run 3:45.  I was maybe about 75 meters from the actual start line and thought it would just take a minute to cross the line.  But after the gun went off, it took about 4 minutes to finally get there, and even after we started, the gridlock and bottleneck of runners NEVER really let up throughout the entire 42 kilometer course.  Aside from the marathon itself, I must’ve run a vertical mile and a lateral mile, hopping on and off curbs, running on sidewalks and paths, and dodging in and out of people traffic.  This was by far the largest marathon I’ve run. 

This was also an extremely physically INTIMATE marathon, but given the Frenchness of it all, I guess that's normal?  The NARROW streets made running a steady pace all but impossible.  Just as I tried to accelerate, someone would cut in front of me, and just as I would decelerate to avoid running into people jumping in front of me, someone behind me was trying to accelerate and clipping my heels.  The early part of the marathon was nothing short of annoying and I was getting somewhat frustrated because I couldn’t really even look around me and take in all the sights because I was too busy concentrating on not falling down and getting run over by runners.  I thought that eventually everything would break up and we'd have plenty of room to run.  But still, the roads were so narrow, with a significant portion of the course not even the width of two highway lanes.  And if the roads were wide enough to accommodate more runners to relieve congestion, it didn’t happen because spectators would line up along the middle of the road, rather than on the sidewalks, so all the runners were squeezed onto only half of the road.  I was mentally measuring the width of the course at some points and at many areas, runners had to squeeze into widths of about 10 feet.  This was marathon gridlock that I’ve never experienced before and was WORSE than rush hour traffic on the 405 freeway in during LA's rush hour.  I tried to not make a big deal about it and enjoy the few hours I'd be running through the streets of Paris instead, but this was extremely difficult to do while running at such a stop and go pace.

This was probably the most unsanitary marathon I’ve experienced.  First off, the women were great--clean and polite.  But the men around me were creating a shower of bodily fluids that I could feel washing down the sides of my arms and legs throughout the entire run.  The cacophony of hacking, spitting, sneezing, coughing, and the most disgusting runner's crime, the "runner's one nostril nose blow," where you gently press down on one nostril and blow to let it all rip with the other nostril, had me squirming and trying to mute my vocal disgust as light sprinkles of mucus and saliva created an unnecessary layer of weight that I had to carry with me throughout the run.  It might not have been so bad had we not been running in such close proximity, but I just chalked it up the intimacy of the Europeans who probably aren’t as gung-ho on the concept of "personal space" like the Americans.

The course was marked in kilometers with mile markers showing up at random points.  I think I actually prefer to run by the kilometers.  Though it may seem like counting down from 42 kilometers to 1 is more tedious than from 26 miles to 1, with kilometers, you’ve got more milestones along the way, making it feel like you’re actually moving and getting somewhere, in contrast to miles, which seem to progress relatively more slowly than kilometers.  Rather than converting accumulated kilometers to miles during the run, I just broke up the course by 5KM portions.  For the first half of the marathon, I really had no clue what kind of pace I was running.  Clocks seemed to be located at random locations and I wasn’t wearing a watch.

The water situation was very European.  Just as with my experiences running the Athens and Torino marathons, water and fruit were available at every 5KM mark, with sponges available somewhere in between the water stations.  This really makes you appreciate how pampered runners are at American marathons, with water provided at every mile and sponsors like PowerBar handing out gel along the course.  Here in Paris, water was given out in small 8 ounce bottles (so if you were really dehydrated, 8 ounces would have to get you through until the next water station 5KM away), and the volunteers were standing behind tables handing them out, so you actually had to go up to the tables to get the water, as opposed to grabbing it from volunteers as you continued running.  This makes for an ugly scene as runners are climbing over each other at the tables to get at the water.  Each water station marked the start of a trail of slippery crushed water bottles, and a slick fruit salad of banana peels and orange wedges.

For the most part, I was feeling pretty good, even given my jetlag, and the gorging and sightseeing I'd been doing the past few days.  But with the narrow course and crowds, I just couldn’t expect to be run a decent time.   I reached the halfway point in 1:42, but I wasn’t sure what my chip deficit was at the time.  Kinda slow for me, but I knew I was in for a BIG negative split because of the earlier massive bottlenecks, which were subsiding but not by much.  More than anything else, I was relieved that I only had another 13 miles left--not because I was tired or hurting, but because I just wanted some breathing space for myself.  From the halfway point to the finish, I continued to pick up my pace and found it easier to dodge in and out of the crowds, though there was still alot of pushing and shoving and alot of, "Pardon! Pardon! Pardon!"   Had to get the phrase right and remember not to say, "Excuse me" or "Pardon me."  By the end of the marathon, I really had my French down--"Pardon!  Pardon!  Pardon!"  What was really unfortunate was when we were passing the Eiffel Tower--only 24 hours ago during the breakfast run, I was running in awe of the structure and having a great time, but during the marathon, I was feeling somewhat letdown from the stress of this big city marathon, and the tower seemed like just alot of twisted steel shaped in a funny pyramid.

Trying to remember what pace I was running is all a big blur right now--my memory got lost in the pack somewhere along the way.  But I recall reaching 35KM somewhere around 2:40, which was close to a 3:10 finishing pace.  That would be over 15 minutes slower than my time at the DC Marathon two weeks earlier, but it was a nice round number and I'd be happy anyway if I made it in at 3:10.  So with that in mind, I picked it up a little, feeling pretty comfortable in the legs and breathing easily--felt like another long training run.  Finally, I hit the 41KM mile and ran past a guy wearing a shirt that read "Boston Track Club" on the back.  "I'll be running Boston in eight more days," I thought.  Now there's a marathon that's got race organization down to a science.  Then making the turn onto the final stretch, there was a dust storm coming off the dirt trails on the sides of the road.   The dust ferociously swept across my contact lenses and had me whimpering in pain--whenever this happens, my eyes sting from the dust particles, I can barely open them, and my eyes start to tear.  As I approached the finish, tears were streaming down my face, my nose was running, and I was sniffing.  It must have appeared as if I was crying for joy or something.  So, yeah, I finished the Paris Marathon a little emotional and teary-eyed, but it was a fitting end to an extremely intimate and touchy-feely marathon.

The post run refreshments were rather skimpy.  There was water and lotsa fruit.  I just took a small bottle of water and made my way out as fast as I could because the finish area was small and getting congested quickly.  Fortunately, I had packed a Promax Bar in my sweat bag.   That gave me a good protein fix, but I was still hungry when I saw some crepe vendors in the area.  Ended up buying a Grand Marnier crepe--ooh lala, that was some strong postrace alcoholic replenishment.  Still sober, I made my way to the metro station and stopped by a brasserie for a poulet & frommage crepe and a huge piece of cheesecake, then went back to my hotel to do a little more studying, before going over to a friend's house for dinner.

Post Marathon Dinner:   Chowing down with the French

Domien, a friend from my exchange program in Hong Kong last semester, had invited me over to his parents' home to experience a typical home cooked French dinner.  Their home is in an especially nice neighborhood, right around the corner from the Eiffel Tower.   Both parents speak English, and his father is the spitting image and personality of the father from A Christmas Story.  There were snails all over the house--miniature metallic snails on the dinner table, an illuminating plastic snail on the mantle, and more around the living room.  Monsieur Duranton is originally from Burgundy, famous for its escargots and of course its wines.  Naturally, he proudly served up a Chablis from the region.  Madame Duranton served puffed cheese balls for appetizers, and for dinner prepared pork with mustard and potatoes au gratin, followed by salad, bread and a couple of cheeses, and strawberries and raspberries for dessert.  It was a very cool evening with a real live French family.  Afterwards, on my way back to my hotel, I decided to go to the top of the Eiffel Tower, which was all lit up for the night.  It was a clear evening so you could see all of Paris for miles.  No lines, no crowds, just lotsa lights in the City of Lights.

Day Five:  Monday, April 8th

The Day After

Woke up and was feeling pretty good, then went on an easy 65 minute run in and out of streets around the neighborhood.  I met Domien again for lunch in the Montmarte district--he was gonna play tour guide for the afternoon.  We did the French thing, getting sandwiches "emporter" and chowed down in front of the Sacre Coure Basillica.  Then we went into the Sacre Coure, walked around Montmartre, and passed by Paris' lone vineyard--a small patch of dirt not much bigger than a sandbox.  Then we headed to Notre Dame, toured the cathedral, walked around the island on which it's located, then chilled out at the Esmerelda Cafe along the Seine River where there was much people watching to be done, but no sign of Quasimodo around.  I ordered a Chocolat Vienoise--a mocha topped with almost a cup of HEAVY whipped cream--had to spoon it out like it was a pint of Ben and Jerry's.   Domien left for school, then I ended up walking around some more. I tried to find a cafe where I could sit down and do some studying--I had been lugging around my 8 pound laptop all afternoon and it was getting heavier by the minute.  But I knew I wouldn’t be able to concentrate in a cafe, so I headed back to my hotel instead.

Later in the evening, I met up with Laurent and Muriel, my other French friends who were also on my exchange program in Hong Kong.  We had a drink, then moved on to dinner at a Moroccan restaurant, directly across the street from the site of the old Bastille.  They asked me what I wanted to eat for my last meal in Paris--didn’t mean to snub them or anything, but I wanted to pass on French food because I wanted more authentic North African food.  Had couscous poulet, with lotsa hot sauce--it was excellent, as were the desserts.  Dunno what they were called, but we ordered 6 different pastries to sample among us--filo, honey, and pistacios never tasted this good.  After dinner, we ended up going on a joyride in Laurent's two week old Peugeot convertible for a tour of Paris by night.  It was freezing driving down the Champs Elysee with the top down, but I just imagined it must have been alot colder when they only had horses to ride down the Avenue, way back when.  AWESOME, it was a great way to top off my last night in Paris.

Day Six:  Tuesday, April 9th

The Million Euro Run

If I could place a monetary value on any of my runs, my last run through Paris would be worth about 6.56 million French francs, or roughly 1 million euros or dollars--I hit the lottery with this, the Mona Lisa of all runs.  Although the marathon itself offered a tour of all the prime attractions of Paris, it was hard to fully enjoy the course with 29,000 other runners pushing and shoving each other throughout the entire distance.  This was my last morning in the city before flying back to LA, so I had to run Paris one more time.  I headed out early enough in the morning, while it was still dark and the streets were free of traffic.  Paris was still asleep, so it was just me and my Nikes running through 2000 years of history.  This run had that sense of savoir faire that this marathon report cant possibly describe.  You just had to be there.

Started off at 6:50AM before dawn, headed through local residential, less touristed districts, down Rue d'Alesia and Rue Convention, westwards towards the Seine River.  Could smell the fresh bread being baked as the boulangeries, markets, and cafes were opening up for the day.  After reaching the Seine, I headed north alongside the river, as the sun was coming up in the distance behind the Eiffel Tower, about a mile up ahead.  I passed the Radio France building on my left, then reaching the Trocadero, I veered off to the right, hitting the Eiffel Tower.  I proceeded directly beneath the Eiffel Tower, gazing up as I continued running, while getting woozy and losing some balance from the wow-factor that the enormity of the structure commands.  Continued along the Champ de Mars, a grass field/park by the Eiffel Tower that used to be military parade grounds in the 18th century, and down about half a mile to the Ecolie Militaire (Military Academy).  Turned around and ran back down the length of the Champ de Mars to make one last pass beneath the Eiffel Tower, bringing me back along the edge of the Seine River.  As I continued eastward, the sun was coming up over the Seine, with the morning rays reflecting off the water and bouncing off the city's gold and bronzed monuments, bridges, cathedrals, and buildings, giving the city a blinding glow as if it were a pot of gold.   I was about to cross a bridge to the other side of the River, but then I noticed the Eglise du Dome on my right.  This is the golden dome that stands out in all the city skyline photos of Paris, and is where Napoleon rests; it also used to be a home for disabled veterans way, way back when.  I didn’t get a chance to check this out during the past few days, so I made a detour and ran down towards the Dome, then tried to get into the front courtyard to run around the multiple canons surrounding the manicured garden inside.  Unfortunately, there was a guard at the entrance, blocking my access to the vertically-challenged French emperor.  Next, I turned around and continued eastward along the Seine.   After passing the Assemblee Nationale, the French Parliament building, I crossed a bridge over the River, leading me directly into the courtyard of the Louvre.  Ran a quarter mile lap around the museum's glass pyramids, then headed westward, underneath the Arc de Triomphe Carousel and through the Tuileries Garden.  From there I proceeded to the Concorde, which led me directly onto the Champs Elysee, the final stretch of my run.  Going down the Champs Elysee, I began passing boulangerie after boulangerie.  This gave me incentive to pick up my pace because I was getting hungry, so I made one last sprint to reach my final destination, the Arc de Triomphe, then bolted to the closest boulangerie for one last Parisian gastronomic experience.  I felt great throughout the 90 minute run and, if not for the patisseries and pains that were screaming my name, I could have continued running all morning and through a few more centuries-worth of Paris. 

But alas I had to get to the airport to fly home.  After experiencing my newfound infatuation with French cuisine during my trip, the irony of ironies occurred when I arrived at my departure gate.  I was told that there would be a delay because there was a worker's STRIKE going on.  Turns out that the workers on strike were the airline CATERERS, leaving a bad French taste in my mouth.  But I tried to be positive and sympathetic in this case, believing that if any workers should be heard, it's those fine French masters of airline cuisine.   Afterall, Julia Child had to start somewhere, right?

Marathon de Paris:  4 Baguettes

And finally, this is just a word to the wise.   If you’re considering running a European marathon, you'll be hard-pressed to run a marathon where you'll get more bang, or more calories, for the buck, or Euro/Franc, if you decide to run Paris.  Of course there was more to my Paris Marathon experience than the marathon itself, so less emphasis should be placed on the pushing and shoving that was endured during the marathon.  If you’re looking into a smaller French marathon and want to get away from the big city races, they've got them all over France and over ten of them were represented at the marathon expo.  European marathons are just an excuse for me to travel, though I would’ve preferred to stay longer in Paris and leave my laptop at home.  Unless you're extremely claustrophobic or prone to anxiety, the Paris Marathon is highly recommended and gets my 4 baguettes rating.  I'd give this marathon a full 5 baguettes, but I scarfed one of them down--it was a vennoise pepites de chocolat.

Dunno when I'll be able to run another European marathon, but Italy is high on my list and I wouldn’t be honest if I didn’t say Mama Celeste, Chef Boyardee, and Gastronomics don’t have anything to do with it.  Until then, salud, abondanza, and prego!