28km

Clear skies, not a cloud, sun shining bright and warm, not a breath of wind, 20℃. Ideal conditions for a run? Nope, not if you've always trained in much cooler conditions and you have to run for 28km. 
Add also the fact that yesterday I spent pretty much the whole day walking up and down the Floriade (world's biggest horticultural expo, held in the Netherlands once every decade) and you get the picture of how hard this run was. 
The alarm went off at 7:01am, when I was deeeeeeep asleep, I almost immediately put my feet on the floor but it took a while before I could actually stand and leave the bed. About one hour later I was ready to go with my capri's and one of my new bright orange shirts, a must considering that today we celebrate Her Majesty's birthday here. Everybody wears orange, goes out in the streets and gets drunk... I followed two thirds of the tradition so that's ok. Belt on: two bottles of electrolyte, 4 gels, cell phone, tissues, house keys... was I missing something? Oh yes, the iPod! Anything else? Hmmm... ooops! The Garmin! I went to get it and immediately upon switching it on I found out it had low batteries, so I had to plug it in and wait. Umpf.
In the meantime the sun came out in all its glory and I changed to my shorts, which was the only good thing that resulted from this delay. Oh and I was able to say good morning to the whole family :-)


I eventually left the house at 9am, and immediately realized how hard it was going to be. I could already feel my knees from the beginning and started to doubt: if I feel like this now, how am I going to run a whole marathon? It was a good lesson though, because I realized we can't go walking around doing the tourists in Stockholm on the day before the marathon, we need to find an alternative. 
The heat wasn't helping either, I called my husband to ask him to hand me another bottle of electrolyte at the end of my first lap (10km) and so we had a cute aid station simulation with the whole family. But it was hard, boy was it hard. At 14km I felt discouraged at the thought of being only half way, but still I kept on running. 
I was even attacked multiple times by flocks of black insects about half an inch big, I went through them with my mouth sealed shut and waving my arms like mad... and I was not the only one having that problem. 
My husband and kids found me once more around the 20K mark, and I asked to go fetch some more fluids so they didn't stay with me. There was also a dramatic moment when the last (and much looked forward to) gel didn't open properly and wouldn't let a single drop out... but I somehow managed to squeeze it open. Shortly after that the Garmin beeped to signal again low batteries, but at that point I was in a well known area so I more or less knew how much longer I had to run and it didn't bother me that much. The Garmin though, like me, kept on going hanging by a thread until the end. 
I drank two full bottles in the last 4km, I was dragging myself one step at a time and my pace went down to a ridiculous 8:51min/km in the last kilometer, but I did it.  


Lessons learnt:

1. The Nike new t-shirt is too tight, I prefer the Saucony (the one in the picture here).
2. Do not walk all day before a long run, or even worse before the marathon.
3. Bring as many gels as my belt allows.
4. These Maxim gels bounce in the belt compartments, but the bouncing is the least annoying solution (as compared to carrying them in my hands or stuffing them under the belt instead of in the compartments, I tried all that today).
5. Two bottles are not enough even with the drink gels, must organize family aid stations for my last long run. During the marathon I will take a cup at every station.

33 days to go and I finished today's run in 3:33:21, I'll take that as a good sign.