44km Memorrial run from Würzburg to Gemünden, Germany

Since 21 years the Gedächnislauf was organised to remember the bombing of Würzburg 03/16/1945. At that time Würzburg was almost completely destroyed and people migrated upstream to Gemünden. Today, about 500 runners started at the city hall to run to Gemünden. People can not run so far have the chance to finish already after 10k in Magetshöchheim, after 21k in Himmelstadt or after 28k in Karlstadt. Since three years my running club LG Würzburg organises the event. Therefore we runners had to help. Luckly also some of us are able to run the course.

My wife and I arrived at 9am. While she was helping, I was going to have an interview with Lukas Miller and run after. He was doing his bachelor thesis at the TH Georg-Simon-Ohm in Nuremberg, where I am working. In a video documentation he is analysing extreme sports on the topic “Above the limits”. Therefore he interviews the athletes, accompanies them at their activities and cuts a video about their experiences. After the free diver Jens Stoetzner I was the second candidate. We recorded the interview before the start. It was split in six main parts. First a few words about myself, after my accomplishments, my experiences with limits in my sport - running, reasons why I do the sport, prejudges and finally the acceptance in the society.

During the race Lukas and his friend Max split the work up. Max accompanied me by bike, to get some video material on the road. Lukas and Lara drove to some points to record there with the big camera. It was a shame that the weather was not very good. A cold wind blew and some rain drops came down, while we did the interview. Luckily it was better during the race.

There were some minor problems, the start delayed to a few minutes past 11am. Usually all the runners are ready to start, but today it seemed that nobody was paying attention to the start shot. Therefore, it took some seconds until the mass started to move. Up to the parking lot at the Talavera, which was after two kilometres, all runners stayed together. This time should be used to remember the happenings 70 years ago. After that all the runners started their race. On the top was Adam Zahoran. He won the race last year and was going for the course record today. Just two runners from the short distance were in front of him. But it did not take long, until he also passed them. I was going for a a goal of less than three hours. Even I had to speed from beginning on, I let Adam run away. I knew, that I would run into problems, if I try to stay with him. After a few miles it was getting quiet. In front of me were just Adam and some of the short distance runners. After 15k I caught two of them. Gunter and Stefan, also from Würzburg, and we ran together until Karlstadt. Running was just a “side hobby” for both of them. They prefer Triathlon and Biking. Not far away from Karlstadt I left them behind and continued running alone. Max was still with me, he always biked a short distance in front, stopped now and then to take some video. In the end the weather was getting worse, but it remained dry, until I reached the finish. It was one of the reasons, why I did not stay a long time at the finish area.

Unfortunately there was also no way to get the desired hot shower. My wife and Hilke, the wife of our club president, drove together to Gemünden and forgot to take my shower bag. So I had to wait to get my hot warm shower when I arrived at home. While waiting for the award ceremony, which was scheduled for 4pm, I enjoyed some coffee and a few pieces of cake.