Aries Jizerská 50: Olympic Medalist’s Broth-Fueled Race

Not yet. When I arrived, I lent it to my daughter because she hadn’t held one of my medals in her hand for a long time. She hung it on the locker. But I have to put this one somewhere, it must not get lost. Every true athlete should complete the Jizerská 50 once in their lifetime. I will definitely have a great memory of this race. First of all, it’s legendary, and secondly, I think I might never cross-country cross-country this long in my life… (smiles)

It was great, I’m definitely looking forward to next year. It will be the 60th year, so it will be a great celebration. It’s an iconic race that’s great on TV, but live the atmosphere is absolutely divine. But I don’t know if I’ll run fifty. I’ll probably show up on a shorter route next year. Now I didn’t have time to train at all, so it was really zero to fifty. It was challenging, but I’m glad I did it. For the first two months after I promised to participate, I thought it was fine to train. And now for the last two months I started panicking because I knew I couldn’t make it anymore. And I had no idea what was waiting for me.

At the beginning, I held back so I wouldn’t get carried away. I started from the fourth wave and it was great. At first it was too much, and then I took it easy. Then, of course, the hounds from the fifth wave rushed over, and along the way I also noticed the hounds from the sixth. But I was mainly worried that my knee would start to hurt somewhere. I didn’t have the route loaded, so I didn’t know exactly what was waiting for me and I always asked someone. I just knew that there would be a big hill behind Smědava. And someone told me that Smědava will be at the 21st kilometer, so I was preparing for it. But he was only 29th, so I was surprised. I kept telling myself that it would come now. And it came later, when I really wasn’t expecting it.

No, it was fine in the end. Just before that, there was a snack bar where there was a great broth. I rode it probably the most. The worst was about the 5th kilometer. Since I wasn’t running, I started to feel the muscles between my shoulder blades. There I started to wonder how I could go ten times as far… At the 15th kilometer I thought to myself, it’s only three more times and I’ll almost be there. Sometimes I exchanged a few words with someone, sometimes I grabbed someone, but then I always let them go. Given my time, I didn’t quite belong in the fourth wave, I should probably leave later.

At 41, I started to feel my right groin, which I suspected might be a weak spot for non-runners. But then it disappeared within a kilometer and it was fine. There I already felt the joy that it was coming. I was more worried before the race than how it went afterwards. No crisis occurred. I didn’t say it anywhere before the race, but I wanted to finish under six and a half hours. I gave it in 5:26. I’m happy with the fact that it was my first start and I’m not running. I will display the medal somewhere at the cottage.

I still have the Olympic one in the office under the desk in a backpack that I specifically set aside for it so that I can have everything at hand quickly packed. As I keep going around the schools, I always catch him when we go out for a discussion or fencing with the children. So it has no special place anywhere.

When my dad and I were writing, he was with the young people at a world fair in Egypt, and there something happened. He told me I was crazy for going. My sister also wrote to me: You brat, you gave it. It must have become some kind of family announcement. (smiles)

A few people recognized me. But much more when we ran the team relay in fencing on Friday. People cheered, asked questions, sent us various messages. I also heard ‘you brat’ there. There were four of us, we are great friends, together we have about forty national championship titles. We took it as a joke. I had three kilometers in about 18 minutes, two around 15 and one didn’t quite make it, he fell several times. He doesn’t do much sports anymore, he has a lot of extra kilos. He sent us far behind in the overall time, but it wasn’t about the performance, but rather about enjoying the atmosphere with friends.

If a person trained, it would probably slip away somehow. But it doesn’t seem like it, but the mask on the head weighs two kilos. And having a mask on your head for six hours, which you would also have to constantly take off and put on because of blowing your nose in that winter, probably wouldn’t be too much. In addition, it looks bad in it. And if the sun shines a little, you can’t see at all. You can’t really see a trail, only dim people or trees around. Even during the relay, we had a problem with it in some sections. So it wouldn’t be the same at fifty. (smiles)