Moving on....

Hello everyone! Thank you for all your emails and posts over the last few days - they provided a well-needed balance to a few considerably less positive evaluations of my race. Don't get me wrong, there is little negativity surrounding my race, but you all know how the human brain tends to focus on the negative rather than the positive regardless of a favorable distribution... For a while, I was wrecking my brain over what could possibly have gone that wrong and alex and I will, eventually, think about this again. However, I got to a point yesterday when I just felt too physically exhausted and emotionally drained to continue worrying about it. One of the possible conclusions is, for now anyway, that it may have been a mistake to have taken ibuprofen when the muscles started pulling initially (at about 20 miles) as this may have masked the pain that could have been manageable (with a few brief stretches), resulting in pain that almost wasn’t. I tried this in Houston and it worked (as it has worked for many other runners in other marathons), but perhaps given the different conditions here it backfired…

In any case, having bought a ticket for Aleksandar to watch some track and field yesterday, I found myself enjoying things again and letting go. Here is a few pictures and a brief commentary.

Aleksandar and his big track and field meet in a while. He was quite excited though both of us kept wishing we could share the experience (yes Albert, Malaika and co.- we should totally make it to London if not as athletes at least as spectators!)

At first we were not sure about Aleksandar’ seat, which was at about 150m before the finish line, right next to the pole vault competition. Little did we know it was to be the hottest seat in town that night. It was unbelievable to watch Elena Isinbaeva to compete against herself and overcome not only the Olympic, but also the World Record! The pictures show her getting one last piece of advice from her coach, and then the celebrations following the event. The movie clip does little to capture the atmosphere on the stadium.

The moment was quite magic. There were no other events-it was just her and her pole. The stadium just erupted at the end-it’s like everyone was just holding back the whole night though- both Alex and I were quite disappointed with the atmosphere in general (compared to your classic European meets, there seemed a lot less clapping and overall excitement). Perhaps cameras should be banned… then we as spectators would let ourselves to enjoy the moment and engrave it in memory rather than trying to capture it and keep it as evidence of our being there… I am guilty as charged though I at least have this blog as an excuse :)).

It was increadible to see just how much better Isinbaeva is compared to everyone else.

That must have been one good piece of advice from her coach as it led to the Olympic Record.

Does one ever get tired of seeing the excitement of a fresh Olympic champion? It's like getting an instant happiness shot. Seriously, next time I'm down, I am going to watch some reruns of the finish of some Olympic finals....

Sadly, we missed the actual event, but it was still fun to see the medal ceremony for 10000meters. I was curious to see Haile all happy in the dinning room (I knew he did not get top three). Once I realized two of his countryment took first and second, I knew what the reason for his infamous big smile was.

Jelimo was DOMINANT in 800m.

We also saw the 400m hurdles final where the three Americans took 1, 2, 3 and the long jump final (though only from a distance). The only really magical and special moment was during the 3000m Steeple Chase final. The race was exciting with a Frenchman getting second in a fabulous finish and an injured runner running his own race, almost getting lapped. He was blowing kisses and waving to the crowd- I thought it was quite refreshing to see someone do something like that. He got huge applaud on every lap.

PS: Those of you who worry about Aleksandar-he did get his visa today and will be able to come back to the US with me. Though he is becoming quite a Beijinger as far as moving around town goes, he said he'd rather avoid living in China :))).