Malta’s 14 Seconds

Fourteen seconds short of a sub-4 marathon time. How could this happen!? Well, I can think of a few reasons why: Malta was too much fun, and for a marathon in its 38^th edition a bit laisser-faire – and there are simply better things to do than chasing times.

It was my first time in Malta. I arrived Saturday morning at my apartment in Sliema, only five minutes away from the finish line and where the shuttle buses would depart to bring us to the start at Mdina, Malta’s former ancient capital. Valetta is a scenic backdrop to Sliema, and only a short ferry ride away. It all looks like stuff you are sure you have seen in movies and TV shows over the years. Games of Thrones had some sets here and you can see why. How would it feel running a marathon through all that stunning awesomeness? Well, it turned out that this is yet to be seen since the marathon route does not really capitalise on Malta’s ancient buildings, scenic seaside and glorious nature. Instead, there is quite a bit of sharing (and fighting over) roads with cars. And some car drivers did not like to share very much, and some faint-hearted marathoners might got a bit distracted by the hooting and being passed sometime a bit fast and close.

There were ancient buildings in far distance though, on the horizon, so you always had the feeling of being surrounded by history. It did not show well on my hasty shot pictures, but hey, not everything needs to. On the final stretch, coming closer to Valetta I did expect a bit more visual stimulation, but again, either I missed it or it just wasn’t there. However, exploring Mdina before the start was great. It would had been nice to run through these old small roads. The shuttle buses dropped us there early enough to have a wander before the start. The start was fun: a little bit of warm-up animation and eventually passing through the inflatable gate. I spotted the 4 hours pacer, with a yellow balloon and later surrounded by a group of sub-4 hopefuls.

After running Madeira last month, this was now my second marathon in minimal footwear. My ultra-thin leather sandals got a growing hole and not knowing the route’s street conditions, I did not want to risk it and ordered a new pair with a sturdier and slip-proof sole. New sandals, but not much testing them meant I was a bit nervous: the self-tied sandals strings felt a tad too loose, but redoing them is a bit of an effort (it’s science in itself). So I tried not to overthink it. On my first hundred metres, I noticed other minimalist runners: one completely barefoot, one in Vivos and one in FiveFingers. That made me feel slightly less alien. A guy who later became one of the sub-4 pack runners recognised my sandals for what they were. “Tarahumara”, he shouted, which explained everything and sounded much better than “crazy guy in flip-flops”.

I had pulled a little bit away from the sub-4 group, was overtaken by barefoot guy, and overtook him back, but at some point, the sub-4 runners caught up and it became this welcomed group running feeling, where you don’t have to think, but just try to stick to the others. Not sure what happened to the yellow sub-4 balloon, but it was gone. So was the confidence of the pacer; not in his running capabilities, but in getting the time right. When we reached the half-point, it felt we were slightly (a few seconds) too slow, but what did I know? I might have started my watch a bit earlier or later, so it did not really matter. This whole sub-4 thing was more a nice to have for me, something to aim for in the spirit of consistency. My own relaxed attitude fitted well the slightly laisser-faire style of the event: the distance markers were too often slightly off, and there was more than one situation where roads shared with the traffic caused some distraction.

5 km before the end, the pacer suddenly shot ahead. Had I really slowed down so much? Up to this point, my running had felt rather consistent. A portable loo break had cost me 40 valuable seconds though and it took me 20 minutes to catch up with my sub-4 buddies, who disappointingly weren’t forming a group anymore. The Tarahumara enthusiast was nowhere seen, the stoic Welsh lady was falling a bit behind and the pacer seemed to be happy that at least I was left. Discussions started between us, around the right pace to get the sub-4. Some runners we passed said we are even behind the 4:15 pacer (which was obviously not true but did irritate the pacer nevertheless). So when he eventually got faster I did think it was more about creating more buffer. The next beep of my watch did show I had slowed down, and it was time to dig a bit deeper.

On my last km I had managed to make up some time, and even had overtaken the pacer, who tried to verbally recruit runners to join him. Since he had lost his balloon (I had not asked him why), apart from the unassuming white 4:00 shirt he wore, his pacer status was easy to miss. Since he was now again behind me, I felt pretty safe hitting it. So I motivated another guy to keep running on the last hundred meters (which worked), tried to find some scenic stuff for final stretch pictures (which I didn’t) and almost dropped my phone when I tried to do a finish line video (which now only shows the guy who I had motivated shooting past me, including my irritated face in response). Towards the end, there was a bit of more confusion: the dominant arc, was not the finisher arc, but the one behind it (or was there even a third?). Suddenly it seemed important to communicate with marshals about the correct lane. Because the left was for half and the right was for full marathoners. When I eventually passed the time display and saw 4:00:25, I still had some (but not much) hope my chip time could be under four.

It turned out it wasn’t. 4:00:13 is my office chip time. 14 seconds too slow. Hahaha. I genuinely don’t mind. It is a nice reminder that numbers don’t matter. The experience was great. The motivated guy thanked me. I thanked the pacer, who laughed it off because he felt bad for not getting it right. The Welsh lady joined in saying how tough it was for her and how much the group had helped, and I even bumped into barefoot guy, who now seemed to have plasters between his big-toe to next toe gaps. It turned out he did not speak English, so I couldn’t find out how it was for him and why there were plasters, but we smiled and that was enough. So what are 14 seconds really, compared to new running stories and shared finish line experiences!? Exactly. Nothing!