It was only the second time we entered the lottery to participate in Berlin marathon and we were lucky. So, we took our training seriously; we started in early 2018 when there were more than 30 weeks to go, though because of traveling we took some weeks off or did not quite follow the program (Runner’s World’s training plan for 4:15 finishing time). In the end we were quite happy how the training went and felt very strong coming to Berlin. The expo where we picked up our race packets was overwhelming; we had to walk through all the merchandise vendors before reaching the place to get our bibs printed. A plus was the inexpensive Erdinger beer and probably the best hot dogs we have had anywhere, anytime.
So the training culminated in the race this past weekend (16.9.). The race itself was not so good; the running went well and we finished strong, but we could not keep up the pace we had planned because of the crowd. Neither of us made the PB, but not the PW either. But we enjoyed our post-run Erdinger Alcoholfrei beers!
We stayed at an Airbnb apartment in Wedding district of Berlin — this time we rented a private room, since the whole apartment was not available and we tried to be on a budget.
Our last run before the race was a day before on Saturday morning. It was chilly +9 degrees of Celsius at 7am. The park Volkspark Rehberge, was quite big and we got a bit lost since there were no maps, no signs to be found (and no water points or toilets either).
After the run we headed out for breakfast, and then to Mitte for a walk — we know we should not have been on our feet so long before the race day, but it was such a beautiful day! I don’t think our feet or backs suffered from the walk, though. For a breakfast place we had already checked Divan Simitevi Frühstückshaus, a Turkish breakfast cafe. From there we walked South to Reinickendorfer Strasse and found Berliner Mauerweg, a walking path that follows the former wall. It seemed that Berlin is an eternal construction site: so much had changed since our last visit in 2013, but Unter den Linden was still a mess.
No photos from Sunday, the race day, but a funny incident happened on our way to the race. A man in his seventies (according to him) completely dressed in green came to talk to us, and the whole conversation was carried out in French, maybe because I automatically answered in French to his question if the marathon was that day. He was very interested in languages, which he knew several: his native language was Russian, but he was Polish living in Germany. He was also an advocate of Esperanto, and had attended a related conference in Finland, and was returning there in the near future.
Early Monday morning we returned to Volkspark Rehberge for a recovery walk. It was chilly but the golden rising sun made it look warm and us feel warm. Tomi also found an exercise equipment to practice his flossing skills.
On Monday we had a chance to be tourists. In our Airbnb host’s recommendation we headed to Ufer Strasse to have lunch at Café Pfoertner part of which is an old renovated Volskwagen bus. Tei had a feta and corn salad (pictured) and Tomi a spätzle salad. We continued South-West towards Kollvitzplatz. We walked through some interesting neighborhoods — ones with tanning saloons and sports betting shops to ones with trendy coffee shops and a lot of young mothers pushing baby strollers. We ended our walk at Rosa Luxemburg Platz and Kaschk beer bar.
On Tuesday it was the time to fly home. All that was left in Berlin was breakfast. We walked to Leopoldplatz to a coffee roastery, The Visit, we had seen earlier. We had bagels with avocado and smoked salmon with cappuccino and americano. Then we left for Tegel airport. Our return flight was via Munich. We had a layover of one and half hours, which was quite enough, so we decided to have lunch at Käfer Bistro: Tei had meatloaf with potato salad and Tomi pork belly with a potato dumpling. We don’t know what went wrong: the service was good and quick and we ate fast, but still we ended up missing our flight to Lyon by seconds. We had to pay extra 2 x 70 euros for rescheduling, and we had three more hours to spend on the peaceful Munich airport.
