This translates into the ‘Death March’ and is a 100KM (~63 miles) walk that has to be done in a 24 hour period, starting on Friday night at 9PM. I had been planning to participate in this event for a couple months but mostly was planning on doing this with friends and stopping at the Duvel brewery, which is the 40 KM mark, to enjoy some freshly brewed Duvels! Therefore, I did absolutely zero training. However, everyone kept asking me if I was training and was telling me how hard it was going to be blah blah blah and my competitive side got the best of me and all I wanted to do was finish. I was rather excited but so tired because one of my closest friend's last day with the company was the day before, so of course we went out in Gent a little later than I should have (Tequila was a bad idea) on Thursday night for needing to walk 100KM the next evening -- keep in mind I worked all day Friday too. I walked with a friend (who actually trained quite a bit, walking up to 32KM in training at one time AND took Friday off of work to relax and prepare) and he wanted to make it to the Palm brewery, which is the halfway point, by 6 AM. We were hauling too fast at the start of the race but the adrenaline took over and we were just walking so didn’t ever feel tired. Everything was going great until around the 32 KM mark and then the temperatures started to go down and the pains started to begin. We reached the Duvel Brewery just after 4 AM and started to slow down a bit then but we said we wanted to keep pushing to Palm, and then relax as we still had 13+ hours to finish the race. However, on the way to Palm I could feel blisters popping and then created again and popped again in the same spot and my legs were so sore – I never knew I could be that sore from walking! We made it to the Palm at 5:56 AM and after sitting down and taking a power nap my body couldn’t move anymore so we both decided to call it quits and take the shuttle bus back to the start. (Note: please read that previous sentence again. "we BOTH decided to call it quits," that is exactly why I did not train or take time off of work because I was able to make it the same distance as my friend who trained!) I could barely walk and I had an intense pain in my calves just below my knees and couldn’t wait to get home and take a shower and go to bed. I could have maybe made it one or two more checkpoints but I knew there was no way I would be able to continue to make the 100KM mark. Unfortunately, I didn’t even enjoy a Palm because I knew that one beer would put me to sleep and I still had to drive home which surprisingly didn’t hurt at all but I had my doubts with the manual car!
Captions: Top - Waiting for the gun
Top Middle - Happy and pain-free
Middle - Standing on the left, at the scanning checkpoint at the Duvel Brewery (40KM)
Bottom Middle - Mmm. So much Duvel...empty crates though..
Bottom - Proof I made it to the Palm Brewery (50KM)
I woke up around 2 PM and checked the weather for the weekend and it forecasted rain for Sunday so I knew if I was going to make it down to Brussels to see the 2010 Flower Carpet that it would have to today! I was a bit skeptical because I could barely walk but I knew the Grand Place was not very far from the train station and it was my only planned stop for the day. But, I had to make it down to see the Carpet for Nells because she asked me about it in the spring!! My bigger concern was dealing with the hordes of tourists and if someone stepped on my foot and touched or popped a blister I would scream! Overall, this year’s design was a bit lame because there was a lot of green in the carpet which meant more grass. Enjoy the pics Nells!
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