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Ain’t no mountain high enough!

October 14, 2018 (Afternoon)

Exercise Type: Run

Comments:
I celebrated my 33rd birthday by running up a mountain. Along the way, it turned out to be a long run, hill workout, tempo run, 800m race, and intensity club all rolled into one. Here, let me explain...

For many weeks now, I’ve been gazing wistfully up at the peak of Trebevic, the mountain that rises majestically over Sarajevo and which my host family’s neighborhood sprawls across the lower slopes of. There is an iconic radio tower near the top that is easy to spot from almost anywhere in the city and many times on runs I have glanced up at it and thought “I need to go there! That mountain is calling to me.” No matter how far away I am, I can look at it and know where home is. I’ve run up it before as far as the bobsled track and the state highway behind it and a little farther still but even that hourlong climb is barely halfway. And so, last Tuesday, I promised myself that I would run it on my birthday. After all, a mountain like that deserves to be saved for a special occasion.

I begin the run from a friend's house on the other side of the valley. I had my backpack on but after a couple miles I reached my host family’s house and dropped it off. My calves felt pretty sore initially but without the backpack, I stopped noticing them so I think the weight really made a big difference. I grabbed my GDS jacket in case it was cold at the summit and tied it around my waist. I also stuck some Turkish delights in a pocket to use as fuel and had a quick drink of water since I didn’t plan on stopping until I reached the summit.

The main trail starts at City Hall, winds up through the settled lower slopes where my host family resides, and then heads off into the woods. The signs posted on it said it was a 4-1/2 hour hike each direction, but I figured if I was running I could probably do it about half that time. This gave me good motivation to keep up an aggressive pace and to speed up every time I caught myself slowing down to a self-pitying trudge. I also tried to follow my own advice that I’ve given many of you and constantly gave myself positive words of encouragement and told myself I was doing a good job, out loud if no one was around to overhear. It helped!

The woods were absolutely goreous. The leaves are starting to turn here and its almost (but quite) as vibrant as New England. I took pictures fairly often. Since I didn’t want to stop I would simply slow down and take the photos while running, sometimes snapping a couple in case the first one was blurry. The trail was empty almost the whole way, and I was delighted to have the abandoned 1984 Olympic Bobsled track all to myself. It’s my favorite part of Sarajevo.

When I got to the one state highway that crosses the mountain, I was stopped by police and forced to run in place for a minute while I waited for an auto race to go by (or at least, a long gap between racecars). However, I never stopped running entire way from my host family’s house to the summit, a total of 1:21, broken into two 38-minute stretches of non-stop uphill with only brief downhill in the middle The trail got pretty steep at some points but never too hard to run. On the gentler stretches, I raced ahead at a 7-8 min pace. Each time I reached a signpost, I would quickly look to see how many more minutes away the summit supposedly was and was always thrilled to see that I had covered a stretch that was supposed to take half an hour in only 10 to 15 minutes. There are no views along the trail, or if there were, they were not directly visible from the trail itself, so when I finally reached the summit I was in for a breathtaking surprise. The landscape is downright stunning and words cannot do it justice. I sat down by the summit marker and soaked in the sun for over an hour, basking in the joy of my accomplishments. I have gone from the City Hall to the summit in an hour and 45 minutes, far faster than the four hours and 15 minutes the signs had predicted. A few other hikers came past but for the most part, I was able to have this magical spot all to myself. It was an hour of sheer bliss.

Eventually, though, I knew I had to start down if I was going to get to my friends' house by 3 o’clock which is when we had agreed to meet to bake a cake for my birthday. I checked the map and saw there was an alternate way down, a road in fact, though unpaved. I decided that would actually be ideal for my descent since it would have been hard to go very fast on a narrow root- and rock-filled trail. I really enjoyed the first couple miles as it felt like a great shakeout for my legs after yesterday’s 8-mile hike, yesterday evening’s 8-mile run, Friday's highland adventure, and of course today's massive climb. But as I stopped take a photo at an overlook a quarter of the way down, I started to wonder how fast I was going. Why not measure it on Strava, I thought, At first, I appeared to be going at seven-minute mile pace while I'd have been pleased enough with, but this only spurred me on to an even brisker clip. The next time I looked at my phone I was under 6:10. Eventually the road became paved and that’s when I really start to fly. My legs were quite weary by this time and I was actually looking forward to reaching the trail or highway shoulder and the end of this road so I would have an excuse not to keep running so hard. I ended up running 2.8 miles, almost a 5K, at an average pace of 5:48 per mile and was thoroughly exhausted by the end. I don’t know if I’ve ever run downhill this fast for this long in my entire life and just like skiing downhill for more than three or four minutes can become pretty tiring, downhill running can really take a toll on you. I had a little uphill once I reached the state highway in order to get back to the main trail that I came up that morning and when I reached the abandoned bobsled track I knew what my heart, if not my legs, demanded of me: I turned Strava on again and set off at a dead sprint dodging families and picnickers and couples on a romantic stroll along the historic concrete half pipe for over half a mile until I reached the finish, blazing out an 800m time of 2:17, my fastest in many years. In fact, I had to slow down and weave through a big crowd of folks right at the start, so were I not for them it would probably have been 2:14 or 2:15. I was super excited when I finished.

When I got to my host family’s neighborhood I thought about stopping but then figured what the heck, five more minutes of downhill I’ll be at City Hall so that I can say I actually ran bottom to top to bottom again. Reaching the bridge over the river where I had officially started the morning's climb I felt simultaneously overjoyed by my accomplishment and overwhelmed by a desire to reward myself with a birthday burek (meat pie) and ice cream. You may recall that I hadn’t eaten anything all day except handful of Turkish candies, so by 3pm the idea of a greasy Bosnian meat pie accompanied by a heavenly vanilla soft ice cream sounded pretty darn appealing. Ten minutes later, as I started to walk back up the hill to my family‘s apartment with one Burek in hand and another in stomach along with the ice cream, it occurred to me that ultimate way to finish this run would be as a proud member of the intensity club. So, with a stomach full of dairy, carbs, grease, and meat I set out at a brisk trot the final quarter mile home. Uphill of course.

I finished feeling very happy and very satisfied and ready for a long long rest. I probably won’t go for a run till tomorrow morning :)

I think the run was about 20 but since it took me two hours and 48 minutes in all I’m going to credit myself with 24 miles since that roughly reflects the distance this effort would’ve gotten me on a flat surface. Either way, a good morning trot.

Photos here! https://photos.app.goo.gl/keKMVcEpScmaw5ZF7