Marathon Me

Balazs Koranyi just ran 246km in the Athens to Sparta Spartathlon. His secret weapon? Pulverize fattened geese - or if you want to get fancy, Foie Gras.

To do this race his body would consume over 24,000 calories. Yes, that’s basically breakfast for Michael Phelps, or 10 times what you and I would eat in a given day.

It was time for my secret weapons: goose-liver pate, cheese, yoghurt with honey, peaches, Coca-Cola and a cup of coffee.

I don’t know why these foods work, but they do: ultramarathon running’s rule of thumb is keep eating and keep moving.

I’m sorry, Balazs, but goose-liver pate is disgusting. The only thing this would do for me is increase the speed at which I rushed off the trail to vomit. Call me uncultured. But why is he surprised that this is a hard race?

I sat down, or more accurately fell down, and buried my head in my hands. Cold winds blew through my shirt. Would my body survive the punishment I was dealing it? Why was I doing this?

Just over halfway through the 246-km Spartathlon, a 36-hour non-stop footrace from Athens to Sparta that traces the route of an ancient messenger, my body was already hurting beyond belief.

Yes… your body is hurting, because 123 km is freaking far! And Athens isn’t a flat place to run.

It was around 3 am on a Saturday in September. A relentless climb toward a 1,200-meter-high mountain pass had left me dizzy. I ached. I had been running for 20 hours, my only sleep was to be occasionally wandering off the road when I dozed off.

A 1200 meter climb, in and of itself, isn’t that bad, but somehow I think when it’s placed at 60-70 miles into a run, and you still have another 60-70 to go, the difficulty increases.

With the food consumed, I felt the energy slowly return and began the last leg of the climb.

Yes, that’s why it is called food. You eat it, you have energy. You don’t eat it, you don’t have energy. This is a fairly well documented concept.

But I come to talk about Balazs, not to mock him; the craziness that runners do lives after them; the good is oft interred with their bones, so let it be with Balazs.

Sorry about that, flashback to English class.

My right Achilles tendon was swollen, both my feet were blistered, my thighs were bloody from rubbing against each other, my knees were swollen and the sun burned my lips.

By the standards of the race, I was perfectly fine.

When that the poor have cried, Balazs hath wept:
Ambition should be made of sterner stuff:
Yet Brutus says he was ambitious;
And Brutus is an honourable man.

Dammit, there I go again.

Concentration was getting harder as the morning dawned. My body was crashing again and I began to hallucinate. Scenes from old Leslie Nielsen movies kept playing before my eyes. I mistook a discarded cardboard box for a kneeling elf. I kept seeing wild animals running down the hill to attack me.

A joke: this has to be the cheapest legal high.

I bet you would, Panama Red [Go to 1:28 on this video].

As I entered the last stretch — the length of a marathon — my will had faded. I could no longer run and the blood blisters made every step painful. I kept dreaming about collapsing at the finish and waking up in a hospital bed.

Okay, all mocking aside, this guy is pretty damn tough, and could surely kick my ass at running. Any event where when you get to having only a “marathon *LEFT*”, is a crazy race.

So did he make it? Yes, he did. Not as quite as fast a Scott Jurek, but Scott isn’t human.

But I kept moving and slowly descended into Sparta more than 35 hours after leaving Athens.

In the town, families stood on balconies to welcome runners, men at cafes stood at attention to cheer. Here, first and hundredth are equal, as were all Sparta’s heroes for a day.

This year 50 percent of the runners made it. Scott Jurek of the United States needed just 22 hours and 20 minutes to reach Sparta, but most runners arrive between 34 and 36 hours.

I can’t imagine running for 35 hours. The longest I’ve ever run was a little over 8 hours in a 50 mile race, and I’ve taken around 12 hours in an Ironman, so tripling my longest time spent exercising is a bit much for me right now. But good on ya mate, way to run.

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