We left me sitting on a bus wrapped in a plastic sheet having fairly successfully completed Day One. Once I was back at the hotel I prepared Bath Mk II. The loose shower head holder was easily fixed using the screwdriver on my 'ultramarathon' Swiss Army knife. I didn't find an application for that blade in the Sahara so it was nice that I finally got some use from it. The palsitc sheet was to solve two problems. By smoothing in out over the bottom of the bath I could use it to make the plug fit a bit better and also to protect my skin from the effects of the anti-slip paint. 'Bath 2 - The Engineer Strikes Back' was most successful!
The evening concluded with food, beer and a short Hungarian lesson from the hotel barman. The 'goody bag' I was given included fruit, cake, a packet of the straight pretzels... and a can of beer! There is much debate about whether you should drink alcohol between runs on multi-day races however as it was supplied I thought I'd better in case it was actually a mandatory requirement. As I said I don't speak Hungarian (although by now I knew three words, please, thank you and beer) and so as far as I knew the race briefing could have told us it was a condition of the race that you drank the supplied half litre of beer each day. One of the rehydration fluids available at the checkpoints was 0% beer so I felt it was entirely possible that the post race can was compulsory.
The next morning was a slightly earlier start as we were to be bussed back to Fonyόd railway station for the start of Day Two. Day Two was the longest day and, according to the supplied race profile, concluded with a scramble up a cliff. As there was no mention of any requirement to bring crampons (although see previous comments regarding fluency in Hungarian) I assumed it would be significantly less steep than the elevation profile made it appear, however it was still bound to be challenging after 52.9km.
Whilst waiting at the start I met Nick, the only other person in the race I could find that admitted to being British - although he told me that there was at least one other Brit in the race who lived in Budapest.
According to the race guide today we would be starting in pairs at intervals of 2-3 seconds according to our race position. What this appeared to translate to was a man reading out a list of names very quickly, alternating between relay runners (who started on the left) and individual runners (on the right). I heard my name called, ran up and tapped my tag in the reader and was off into Day Two.
Today there were 9 checkpoints before the finish in Szigliget, again divided into three sections for the relay so I would get two split times at the end. The route was quite flat apart from a small hill at the last checkpoint and the previously mentioned cliff ascent at the end. Today would be notable for a number of things, the longest single day, passing the 100km point for the event and probably the most times I will ever cross a railway line in a single day - ten. The railway line also runs around the lake and the cycle path we were following doesn't seem to be able to decide if it wants to be between the railway line and the lake or have the railway line between it and the lake. Fortunately trains appeared to be few and far between and I didn't have to wait at a single railway crossing. There were also a few road crossings in the course of the event, all of which were well marshalled by the Hungarian Police. The locals also seemed to take the traffic queues caused by so many runners crossing the road in their stride, indeed I didn't come across any resentment from any of the locals about the disruption caused by the event.
Day Two spent the least amount of time of any day actually by the edge of the lake but still managed to be quite scenic and very pleasant. As on Day One the weather was perfect for running and again I managed to complete the marathon distance in slightly under four hours.
There was still over 10km to go which included both major climbs of the day. The first climb was dispatched and the final checkpoint reached. From there it was a downhill run and on to a long flat section which afforded me my first view of the climb to the finish. I could see the hill, my main concern was how far up would I have to run to get to the end? The answer was about half way. The first section was a short climb past a vineyard followed by a right turn which led to the sting in the tail. It wasn't a long climb up the cobbled path to the church but it was enough to make me decide the best way to approach it was to shout at it and then power my way up as hard as I could. This not surprisingly attracted a fair amount of attention so it was with a certain amount of relief that I managed to cross the finish line and tap in before collapsing rather than endure the embarrassment of collapsing before the finish.
As before I collected my result and was delighted to find I'd completed the day in under 5 hours, 4:57:33 to be precise. I was even happier to be given an identical goody bag to Day One, i.e. one including beer. I was slightly less happy to discover the coach to take me to the next hotel was at the bottom of the slope I'd previously run up...
It was on the coach I first met Ruth, a Belgian runner who would be of great assistance to me at the start of Day Three - about which more will be revealed in the next blog instalment...
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