Burgas Run 2022, early September. I'm trudging towards the start-finish, stopping at every drinking fountain and aid station to douse myself with water. The combination of heat and humidity has already flattened me, and I haven't even finished the first lap. And I've still got another 21 km one to do… Nikolay Ivanov meets me at the finish. I must look really bad. I can tell from the worried look on his face.
“Mate, you're in a really bad way…”
I look at my watch. I'm going through halfway in 2 hours. Normally I do it in under 1:40. I know he's right. But not for a single second do I think about quitting. I just have to get far enough away from the start-finish. Once I get going, I'll finish somehow. Niki walks beside me. He knows as well as I do that there's no way I'm stopping.
“No nonsense, you know you just have to finish.”
“Have to”. I really do have to. So what if it's well over 30 degrees, there's another 21 km to go and I've already got sunstroke. If I have to, then I can.
To understand why I so urgently had to finish this marathon, I'll have to take you back almost a year.
Athens Marathon 2021, November. Adidas Runners Athens invited us to a screening of the film Seven Minutes of Soul. The film tells the story of Spyridon Louis, the first winner of the Olympic distance at the modern Olympic Games, and the controversy around his victory. The director decided to test whether it's possible to run 2 marathons in a week and, despite the lack of recovery, run the second one 7 minutes faster, the way Louis did over 100 years ago. I won't say any more – the film is really interesting and I recommend you watch it.
Early on the morning of the marathon I caught the bus from Athens that was to take me to the start of the race in the town of Marathon. My good mood was darkened by the fact that in all the commotion I'd left my watch at the hotel… Looks like I'll have to run by feel and whatever happens, happens. It turned out, though, that I have no feel whatsoever! I finished in 4:00:40, and even though I'd beaten my time from my previous go by 9 minutes, I was furious about those 40 seconds that stopped me from at least getting under 4 hours. I was so furious I couldn't sit still. I didn't want my running year to end with a failure like that, so I went online to check where there was a marathon nearby sometime soon. I was literally like a gambler who's already lost a lot of money and is wondering how to win it back.
Thessaloniki Alexander the Great Marathon 2021, November. Luckily for me, it turned out there was a marathon that met my needs – the Thessaloniki Alexander the Great Marathon. Although the start was only a week away, I decided on the spot that I'd do it. Buses take us from Thessaloniki to Pella, Alexander's birthplace. On the map, the course looks like it's downhill the whole way.
My friends started in on me: “Sasho, you're mad, how can you do two marathons in a week, you haven't recovered, you'll get injured, you'll get nowhere, there's no point, give it up.” Inspired by the film, and having clearly built up a fair bit of sporting spite, I ran my strongest marathon to this day – 3:27, and exactly like in the film I improved my marathon PB by 7 minutes. And from that moment on I stopped being so afraid of the marathon distance.
Let me fast-forward a little. On Facebook the dates of the 2023 marathons started popping up non-stop, and it turned out that this year there'd be a whole nine road 42-kilometre marathons in Bulgaria. I looked into it and it turned out there had never been so many in a single year in the country. The record until then had been a mere six.
The first problem I noted was that to run them all, I'd not only have to avoid injury for the whole year, which is a bit tricky when every weekend I'm at 5kmrun + some race + a match in the amateur football league. I've seen people protect themselves for a particular race and get injured right before it, and I've seen people who don't spare themselves one bit and nothing ever happens to them. So I decided not to change anything in my schedule and to keep running every weekend and kicking a ball about. Besides, even though the league I play in is one of the roughest, most of my injuries over the years haven't come from it but from running.
The second problem was how packed the calendar was. Twice I'd have to run two marathons in one week, and twice I'd have to run 3 marathons in a month. I decided to look on the bright side – “At least there aren't three marathons in two weeks or two on the same date.”
1/9 The first marathon was Sri Chinmoy at the rowing canal in Plovdiv. Last year I ran a half marathon at that rowing canal. The day before the half, Emo, the husband of my kuma Nia, broke his leg literally out of nowhere during the Plovdiv 5kmrun. During the half, every lap, as I passed the same spot, I couldn't help shuddering at the thought of it. During the marathon it was the same. With every lap the thought of a stress fracture got to me more and more, and I also had to think about the marathon the following week in Stara Zagora. Antonia Georgieva joined me to run 10-ish kilometres, but after she left me I started slowing down. And so, slowing more and more, I eventually finished in 3:52. The organisers of this race are really lovely and always have tasty home-cooked food ready for us after the finish, which I wolf down happily.
2/9 Stara Zagora Marathon. Not having recovered properly after Sri Chinmoy a week earlier, I had to take on a course that's anything but easy. Some people don't like marathons with lots of laps, which most of them in Bulgaria are. I, on the other hand, love them because:
– you can leave stuff at the aid station at the start – gels, salts, honey and lemon
– I manage to calculate the trajectory of the ideal racing line to perfection
– passing through the start/finish fires me up
– I cross paths with other runners on the course and we greet and cheer each other on
My kuma Nia is making her marathon debut. Besides her, I've also talked Katya Mozheyko and Iveta Madzharova into doing the 42 km. The 21 km is the national championship. I'm gutted to be missing it, but my goal is more important. Nia and I agree to run the first half at 4:50 pace and then she'll speed up.
We start, and it's my job to stop her speeding up. On the very first kilometre she went off at 4:20. I explained to her that she had two options: charge off like mad now and then blow up and hate marathons forever, or listen to me and speed up later. She got it. Several times I had to grab her by the hand, because she runs with headphones and doesn't hear me when I tell her she's going too fast. I also had to run in front of her, because it hurt me to watch how far off the ideal line she was running. At least that way I shielded her from the wind. At halfway it became clear I couldn't hold her pace any more and we split up.
What I'll remember this marathon for was the hailstorm that hit me on the last lap shortly after I turned round past Metro. It appeared out of nowhere and vanished just as quickly – I even started wondering whether I'd imagined it. I finished in 3:39, and I was even happier when I saw the women's results: Nadezhda first, Iveta second, Katya and Nia fifth and sixth, and they'd be getting their awards on the stage in front of the town hall.
3/9 Varna Marathon. I love this race because there's lots of shade on the course, something not a single other Bulgarian marathon can boast. Plus Varna is one of my favourite Bulgarian cities. Still, I have to keep one thing in mind. I've passed out at marathons twice. Once was 50 metres before the finish in Sofia, and the second time was right on the finish line in Varna.
On top of that, this marathon would be the first of three within a month. At the start I met one of the regular podium finishers at Bulgarian marathons – the Black Sea machine – Borislava Videva. This woman has an inexhaustible supply of willpower that carries her at an excellent pace over the far-from-easy marathon courses in this country. I decide to test my will against hers in this marathon and latch on so we run together. We're moving perfectly at 4:50 until the 27th-28th km, when she tells me to slow down because she's started “to flag”. And flagging as she was, shortly before the end of the 3rd lap one of her rivals caught up with her. Bore said: “Oi, that one's only gonna try 'n' beat me!”
And that's when I saw it. Her competitive fire charged her up like Asterix's magic potion. I literally saw her movements become quicker and more determined. The rival had no intention of giving in, and I was faced with a huge dilemma. Should I charge off with them and watch the battle for 5th place from the front row, or let them go? After all, I don't want to wring myself out too much, I've got another 2 marathons this month, and on the same day I have to drive myself and my family home to Sofia. What helped me decide was the fact that not long ago a runner had driven home on the same day after an ultra and had crashed. So I silently wished Bore luck and slowed down. Even so, I managed to beat my course record and ran it in 3:34.
Last year I drove home with Niki Nikolov after the Varna Marathon in the dark. That time I'd set a PB and was so wrecked I could barely drive to Sofia. Niki fed me gels while I drove so we'd get to Sofia alive and in one piece. This year I was with my family. I realised I was falling asleep and stopped in a village. My wife bought me a Monster and a Red Bull. I perked up and started the car. The ironic thing was that the village was called “Probuda” – “Awakening”.
4/9 Pleven Friendship Marathon Everyone had scared me about the Pleven marathon, saying the heat is really brutal. They turned out to be right. At the start of the race I set off, supposedly, with Bore and a runner from Varna, Viktoria Nikolova. Bore, though, shot off ahead early on. Up to halfway I was more or less OK, but then I started struggling. Nia, who had run the 10k, joined me to run the next 10. I absolutely tortured the poor thing. I was dragging myself along at 6:30 per kilometre, she'd hurry ahead, turn round, look at me, wait for me. After we'd pushed through the 3rd 10 as well, Niki Ivanov took over from her and he and I went for a stroll to Kaylaka and back. Up to that point I'd never walked so much in a marathon, and in the end I finished in 4:13. At the finish they handed me a bottle of beer, which I sipped from at the line, and so, despite the heat, I came away with positive feelings about this marathon.
When they handed me the beer just before the finish, I understood why they call it the friendship marathon.
5/9 Rose Marathon – Kazanlak. This new marathon in early June combined the town's festival with the sporting event. The evening before the start there was a concert and a drone light show. Nia had put us up at her country house in a village near the town, together with Hero and Nadezhda.
The promo video for the marathon showed a cycle path perfect for running, with poppies along the side. I couldn't wait to run it. It was at this marathon that I started wondering whether heat isn't a bigger enemy for a runner than elevation. There was hardly any shade anywhere on the course. Coming into the town of Shipka there was an almost vertical street (Rosen Rusev did design the course, after all). At the aid stations I started stopping and pouring water over myself. Over me, my cap, my T-shirt. But it was so hot that by the next station I was dry. At one of the stations the volunteer had settled himself in the shade under an umbrella but had left the cups in the sun, and in my rush to splash myself with cold water I drenched myself in warm!!!
I had a pretty rough time of it and, in fits and starts, dragged myself to the finish in 4:12. 3 marathons in a month was seriously, seriously tough, especially when the last one's in June.
6/9 Burgas Run. When I was drawing up my marathon schedule, I reckoned Burgas Run would be the place for a record. A perfectly flat course. Two laps along the sea. In early September. Nia had planned the same.
But fate had other plans. Something had apparently collapsed, and one of the seaside promenades near Sarafovo was dropped, which led to a diversion of the course and +200 metres of elevation.
200 isn't much for a marathon, but these were going to be packed into a very short distance. On top of that, of course, I was unlucky with the weather again – as well as hot, it was humid. On the very first hill I felt things weren't going well. By the turnaround I was already dragging myself along at a pig's trot. Katya Mozheyko was playing bottle Klaus (or bottle Kate) for me and Nia, ferrying our bottles of salts and gels around the course. I'm trudging towards the start-finish, stopping at every drinking fountain and aid station to douse myself with water. The combination of heat and humidity has already flattened me, and I haven't even finished the first lap. And I've still got another 21 km one to do… Nikolay Ivanov meets me at the finish. I must look really bad. I can tell from the worried look on his face.
“Mate, you're in a really bad way…”
I look at my watch. I'm going through halfway in 2 hours. Normally I do it in under 1:40. I know he's right. But not for a single second do I think about quitting. I just have to get far enough away from the start-finish. Once I get going, I'll finish somehow. Niki walks beside me. He knows as well as I do that there's no way I'm stopping.
“No nonsense, you know you just have to finish.”
“Have to”. I really do have to. So what if it's well over 30 degrees, there's another 21 km to go and I've already got sunstroke. If I have to, then I can. I walked in fits and starts through the Burgas heat. The strangest thing was that almost nobody was overtaking me. And I wasn't overtaking anybody. I passed the leading man going the other way. Something had happened to him. The leading woman caught up with him and stopped with him. How nice of her, I thought.
I pass Nia going the other way. She looks pretty bad too, but there's determination in her eyes. In Sarafovo I pass Gencho and Desi from Burgas. They're walking too. The heat shows no mercy. The people I pass are either jogging feebly or walking. This heat has clearly beaten the lot of us to a pulp. I pass a guy in a car, and he shouts at me to be careful because it's 36(!!!) degrees. How much more careful can I be, I'm walking and that's that. I just have to finish. I can see the finish, but I still can't make myself run. I cross it walking, doing a few running steps just for Gencho's photo. At least I managed it in under 5 hours. Not that it matters.
I find out that Nia has come first but has collapsed and been taken to A&E. Welcome to my club of people who've passed out at the finish, Nia Yotova. Thank God she's absolutely fine, she just had sunstroke, and she even comes back for the awards ceremony, where she's awarded first place. Whether the leading woman was a mirage, I still don't know to this day. We'd come for records, and one of us ended up in A&E while the other walked over 20 kilometres. I'm never doing another marathon between May and September. And now I know: heat is nastier than elevation.
Run towards yourself? In my case it was walk towards yourself!
7/9 Kyustendil Marathon A week after the Burgas heat, I had to run the National Marathon Championship in Kyustendil. Zornitsa Hristova and I left our stuff for the aid stations with Hero and went out to dinner with other runners. I really love being out at a restaurant with other runners – there's always something to talk about. I recommend Friends in Kyustendil to everyone. Zori and I head off to Cheshmeto and discuss tomorrow's strategy. This time I'm lucky with the weather. At the start it's downright cool. I run a decent marathon from start to finish in 3:47. Only right at the end did it start getting warm, but after the Burgas oven it barely registers. After the marathon I feel surprisingly good. I don't even have aches going up or down stairs. My body has clearly started to adapt.
8/9 Sofia Marathon The next marathon, and the third and last within the month, is the Sofia Marathon. The Plovdiv Marathon “screwed me over” and announced there'd be no 42-kilometre distance.
In other words, I won't be able to run 9 marathons in Bulgaria within a year. Still, 8 is a record too, and after all the trials and tribulations I'd been through, I've only got one left. Although it might be wiser to take it easier, I decide not to chicken out and to run the last Bulgarian marathon of the year with everything I've got and improve my PB. The Sofia Marathon will be a sort of final sprint for this marathon of marathons.
For the occasion I get hold of some Nike Alphafly shoes, which turn out to be surprisingly comfortable. Miro Spasov supplies me with “Kipchoge's gel”, from which I prepare 3 doses. Following a tried-and-tested old recipe, in the morning I fire up a “Lime” electric scooter and drop off my bottles at the aid stations. My plan is to sit behind my Adidas teammate Stanislav and, as we near the finish, cut past him in a final sprint.
Stanislav hasn't “shaken me off” yet – he'll only do that on Botevgradsko.
We're moving perfectly together, holding a pace of around 4:50 the whole time, and at moments I even tell him off for going too fast. I knock back all 3 “Kipchoges”, and for the 35th km I've got an ordinary gel ready. I don't know whether the reason was physical or psychological, but when I took the other gel I seemed to collapse… My heart rate shot up and my pace slowed. I pushed as hard as I could, because I knew I was on for a record. I hit the yellow cobblestones and accelerated with everything I had for a final sprint. Years ago, a final sprint like that sent me off in an ambulance to Pirogov. This time I was hoping it would send me to a personal best after 8 marathons in the year.
There's a saying. Be careful what you wish for. A year ago Militsa Mircheva missed the Bulgarian national record by one second. I remember thinking back then what it must be like to miss a record by so little. Well, I was about to find out for myself.
I crossed the finish line. I stopped my watch. 3:27:40. Hmmm. Looks like I've got a record. Looks like I've got a RECORD!!! I open my Strava. I look for Thessaloniki, I find it: 3:27:42!!!
I've got a new record, I did it! Not only did I run all those marathons, but at the end I set a PB too. Alas, I'm far too pedantic.
Once Nia had run 5 km by her watch on the loop in South Park, and I told her that her 5 km record wasn't real. She got cross with me back then. All her friends were congratulating her on the record, and there I was telling her she didn't have one. I've noticed that people get most offended with me when I tell them the truth. And that's why I didn't spare it from myself either. I opened the official results of the Thessaloniki Marathon. 3:27:38 is my official time.
In Sofia the official time is 3:27:42. A 4-second difference… I missed improving my record by 4 seconds. My race number had predicted it – I was number 44! I'll tell you, those 4 seconds stayed with me for quite a while. I told myself that, just like Militsa, who after missing the record by a second then smashed it by 6 minutes, I'd do the same. I consoled myself with the fact that I'm the first Bulgarian to finish 8 road 42-kilometre marathons within a calendar year in Bulgaria. But I'd planned 9…
Plovdiv Marathon. I was wondering what to do about this marathon. I'd planned it, but I'd planned it as a full one. Friends asked me why I didn't just run it twice, but it would have been terribly boring alone on the course and without aid stations…
I remembered an interesting episode. The ladies at West Park had agreed to run the 5kmrun in dresses. I thought to myself these ladies will need a gentleman, so I put on trousers and a shirt and, all dressed up like that, ran the 5kmrun. Even though I expected it to be quite uncomfortable, I ran the West Park 5 surprisingly well, in 22 min. I came away unscathed and told myself that one day I should try running a half dressed like that.
And that's why I decided to do it in Plovdiv. Shortly before the start, hidden in the post office, I pinned my race number to my shirt. I warmed up inside the post office and came out at the last moment before the start. I stood right at the back – the idea was to overtake as many people as possible. When a runner obviously not dressed for the occasion goes past them, it'll fire them up. At the beginning it was a terrible bottleneck. When I looked at my watch, it was over 7 pace. I only started running properly after the first kilometre. People on the course and in the crowd kept teasing me non-stop. For each one I made up a different reason why I was dressed like that:
“I'm late for a meeting! I'm coming from work! I'm late for work. I've got a date at the finish! I was late for the start, I didn't have time to change.”
The trousers had soaked up so much water and sweat that I could barely lift my legs in the last few kilometres.
One lad latched on to me. He didn't want to let me get away. After the finish he thanked me, saying that when I passed him I fired him up for a record. I ran it in 1:38. I took off the trousers and shirt. They'd turned into a mix of sweat, lube, water and salt. They weighed over 3 kilos. I honestly don't know how I ran in them. I didn't have the heart to hand them to my wife for washing. So I just chucked them straight into the nearest bin. The trousers were the kind with shorter legs. There was a fashion a while back for showing your ankles. That's why I didn't run in my standard PRO MARATHON socks, which protect me from blisters, but in some new long cheapies. Later, while I was wandering along the main street in Plovdiv with my friends, I felt a burning. It was obviously a blister on my left foot, and I made the mistake of ignoring it.
Two days later I couldn't walk any more. I got home from work, took off my sock and saw that the blister had gone GREY. I discussed the situation with Valeriy Mozheyko, who, as an experienced surgeon, prescribed the following treatment: cut off the skin, clean out the pus with hydrogen peroxide and a cotton bud, and then douse it in surgical spirit. I've always liked the drastic solutions of Mozheyko medicine, and in this case I didn't have much choice anyway.
My wife had a hard time cutting off the skin, and the pus made her so queasy she nearly threw up.
Poor Detelinka managed the procedure successfully, cleaned out the pus, and when she doused me in spirit I very nearly kicked her in the face by way of thanks.
It turned out I couldn't walk. I'm limping. And the last planned marathon, even though it's not in Bulgaria, is in 2 weeks. I console myself: “Well, at least this didn't happen in between the Bulgarian marathons.”
Normally I heal like a monster. My wife has always marvelled at how quickly everything heals on me. But this wound just wouldn't, wouldn't heal. I had a hole in my left sole the size of a two-leva coin, and every step hurt. As a result I started limping strangely, walking on the outside edge of my foot. From this skewed walking my knee and abductor started hurting.
A week passed, and the wound was still weeping and hurting, despite everything we were putting on it and despite the fact that I spent the whole weekend in bed. And Athens isn't one to miss, either. The first year I took part, they'd put the letter M on the medal. In 2021 I got the letter A. And so on, until you collect MARATHON and hang them all up on the wall. That's why I had to finish 2022 at all costs. But how do you finish a marathon on one leg?
Athens Marathon 2022. On the day of the flight, for the first time, I feel the pain easing. I start trying to walk normally, but my brain won't let me and I keep protecting the sore spot, walking all crooked. The day before the marathon I go out to test 5 km. I feel a strange pain in my stomach and decide it must be something I ate. There's nothing for it, I have to try. I get all my kit ready and go to bed. In the morning I get up and go to catch the bus to Marathon. The Burgas 5kmrunners have hung a flag at the stadium in Marathon, team Labrador turn up too, and we take a big group photo together. I think to myself, “I hope the photo isn't all I come away with.” I took 50 euros and tucked it in my sock, sensing that trouble might be on the way.
We start, and with every step I begin to feel this pain in my stomach. I take a painkiller in the hope that it'll stop the pain.
I've always wondered what these “stomach problems” are that good runners use as an excuse when they fail. I'd think, “Oh come on, just say the other guy beat you, why do you always make up these stomach problems?” Well, now I understood too.
By the 21st kilometre I couldn't run any more. Every step sent pain to my stomach, and from there it went on to my backside. I go into a toilet. Maybe if I unload, I'll feel better.
But I don't feel better. It's just as awful. I start walking. I have to finish for the medal. And so I trudge on to the 29th km, when I saw a girl with a sign in Greek. All I could make out was Metro and 10 metres. A treacherous thought began to persuade me to take the metro and go home on it. “You've got a flight to catch in a few hours too. Are you going to miss it for a stupid medal? And what if you wreck yourself completely? You don't know what this stomach thing is. Just catch the metro and stop torturing yourself.”
No way. I'll walk to the finish if I have to. I walk past the metro. I even decide to break into a run to get past it faster and not give in to these thoughts.
And as I ran, I realised I was definitely heading for the metro. The pain was very bad. I walk and it feels like it's still hurting. I turn round. I see the metro in the distance. And I begin the “walk of shame”, against the flow of the marathon… I go down to the platform. The people are either foreigners or don't speak English. There's nobody to point me the right way. I wonder whether this is a sign to carry on with the marathon. In the end a woman showed me the way.
I catch a train. After one stop the same woman tells me: “You need to get off and catch the metro from here.” I get off the train and go to the metro station. I've got 50 euros, but the machine won't take it. The cashier at the station refuses to take it too. Again I wondered whether this was a sign to go back and finish the marathon. I broke the note in a shop and paid for the ticket. I caught the metro. I asked a random woman if I could call my wife, who, seeing on the live tracker that I wasn't moving, would probably decide I'd passed out again. I get to Syntagma. I walk towards my bag, where my phone is too. I pass people with medals… I feel really stupid. There goes my medal collection.
I meet up with my wife. I look over at the course. I wonder whether to pretend I'm finishing so I can get the coveted medal. I don't deserve it. I turn my back and head for our flat. Detelina pulls out a little black box. She hands it to me with the words “Merry Christmas!”
It turns out the Greeks were selling medals! And she'd bought me one and won't tell me how much she paid. TO PAVLIN TODOROV: Now this, Pavka, really is a bought medal!
Good thing I caught the metro. What with the slow limping to the flat and from the flat to the airport, we were held up far too long and only just made our flight in time.
The next day I go to see my healer, who tells me that my organs have “sagged” and that I'll have to pull myself together, both literally and figuratively, because things could head towards a hernia.
2022 was my year of road marathons. I learned a lot about myself and about running. I also gave birth to the following maxim:
“Tell me your half marathon time and I'll tell you what kind of athlete you are; tell me your marathon time and I'll tell you what kind of person you are.”
In reality, a person can always run one more kilometre at marathon pace – the question is whether you'll manage to impose it on your body.
I also drew the following lessons:
– The slower you run a marathon, the more miserable it is!
– Never leave another town on the day of a marathon, especially if I'm the one driving.
– No experiments from the waist down at marathons and half marathons. I've seen now how a little pebble (the blister) can overturn the cart.
– Eight is clearly the annual limit for marathons. All right, let's make it 8 and 1/2.
– Heat castrates you more than elevation. Pouring water over your face and neck cools you right down and helps a lot. It's no accident that Western marathons have sponges with water at the aid stations. Always wear a cap!
– Comfortable shoes > fast shoes.
– Watch the ideal racing line. Running on it isn't cheating. Abroad there's a line painted on the ground, but in Bulgaria we have to work it out ourselves. Many times I catch up with runners without changing my pace, simply because I'm running the course more efficiently.
– Don't be afraid of “the wall”. I actually look forward to it now so I can wrestle with it.
– The best preparation for the next race is the previous race.
