At adidas Runners Budapest I have met Laszlo. Even though he’s Hungarian, he was born in Cluj-Napoca and speaks Romanian fluently, of course. He runs great, but with long pauses in time. Never ever ran a marathon and now the idea keeps him more awake than ever. I told him that I just found out about Esztergom. The first capital city of Hungary, even though not in the actual meaning. Wanted to visit it. Not far away from Budapest, only less than 40 kilometers. At the border with Slovakia.

It was Laszlo’s idea!

“Let’s run there!”, Laszlo tells me. Well, it is not a great distance for me, even though it is not easy. I was planning, some years ago to run from Bucharest to Ploiesti. But 60 kilometers were quite a lot then so I’ve decided to wait. I did ran between Hunedoara and Deva, but there were only 28 kilometers and, of course, it was an organized race. Anyway: “I’m in!” By myself, I would never run a marathon between these two cities. I might have ran another 42K in Budapest or in the outskirts, but for sure I would have taken the train to Esztergom.

Bacsi utca, meeting point

The challenge looked perfect though. I was not necessary nervous, but a bit uncomfortable. I mean, it was something unknown and pretty new. I would have preferred to start at 9 or 10 AM on Saturday, 31st of October, but Loți suggested 8. Quite early for me, but I realized we will win some time and it was, indeed, an inspired move. Normally, we will be meeting at Nyugati train station, but from there we would have to run 47 kilometers. “Let’s meet at the Bacsi utca, in Obuda, we will have only 40 something kilometers and the rest can be covered in the destination city.”

Perfect weather for a long run

He agreed so off we where! Wind, clouds. Perfect weather for me. Except the fact that it blew quite heavily from front. Of course, as a former colleague of mine was saying, the wind always blows from the front. Indeed. Took my cap on and the marathon was waiting us. Shortly after a few kilometres, the road become almost exclusively trail. Liked it, to be honest, even though Laszlo didn’t share this feeling. He was always in front and dictated the run with a perfect pace about which you could have believe that it is of a very experienced runner. Of course, he runs, but never above 27K.

First pause: km 18, because of me

We all now that marathons, especially the first one, get messy after kilometer 30. At 18th kilometer we stopped because I needed to get hydrated. The longest pauses of them all. In Hungary you don’t see abandoned dogs, so I was very surprised when I noticed a dead animal body on the side of the road. Looked strange, but only a few hundred meters after I realized it was a wild pig. Never saw one that close. It was smaller than I imagined.

Always run on the opposite side of the road!

Our route takes us through several villages and I observe, very surprised, that even in the country side, people give a big importance to the Halloween. As we count the passing kilometer we try to cross the road, once more, because it is always better to run on the opposite side of the road, to see the vehicles coming, when in this kind of race. Unfortunately, we didn’t calculate our crossing and even though we didn’t endangered the traffic in any way, apart from the first impression, a small car with five guys got very, very angry and swore us. One from the back side even opened the door.

Second break, km 34. Only for me!

Of course, not everybody is friendly. It was the only major incident we had so it doesn’t need to be developed further. We pass the barrier of 30 kilometers and my thirst is back heavily. Didn’t eat anything, didn’t drank too much so, at kilometer 34 I tell my companion: “Go, we will meet in Esztergom. I really need to get a drink from this Spar.” This happened because we had different problems and it wasn’t worth struggling with them, because one of us should have do that. I needed to hydrate very quick and I just decided not to put myself through pain for other 8 kilometers. Meanwhile, Laszlo’s feet where giving up on him.

My final time – without breaks – 3:59:50

I mean, I know the feeling. At some point it is better to keep on running, than to stop. Because if you stop, then you might find it extremely difficult and painful or even impossible to restart. Not for me, though, but I have a lot of exercise. So I know the best option for us is to split ways for now. These being told, Laszlo reached Esztergom 10 minutes before me. I was struggling, but made it and also made a couple of turns in the city center to mark my 42.195, which became a 42.24 marathon. 3:59:30 my time. Couldn’t ask for better than slightly under four hours. After, I raise my head to see the wonder city.

First big shock in Esztergom!

A deserted building lays in the exact center. “What the fuck? No wonder we couldn’t find Esztergom on any traffic sign…” Because as Laszlo tells me, this, at the border with Slovakia, is one of the main attractions from Hungary. Really? Really?! Wow… I am disappointed, but nobody cares that much. I just congratulate him for his first ever marathon, I am happy for my great achievement of running between two historic cities as well and now the only important thing is to grab something to eat. Hmmm… We’ll see what’s up next after. Not really friendly, the city, in terms of restaurants… More candy shops though. Wow. I need to eat real food.

A wonderful church and the Danube

So we find in the end a nice place and I grab a vegetarian burger with French fries and some beer. It couldn’t be anything better. It felt far better so off we went afterwards for a walk. To the Bazilica. Things changed. We see that Esztergom has, indeed beautiful places. That part is sublime. We like it a lot and the church is incredible! The view as well, at the top. The sensational Danube and on the other side, Slovakia. The city from over the border looked quite communist. Not really important. We glance a bit more around and immediately back to the train station. We’re not going to run back, of course.

Great achievement!

We cut the whole town and we come back to the initial conclusion. Because apart from the wonderful hill with the big church and the landscape that showed us the wonderful Danube, Esztergom is sad and deserted. Like an almost abandoned city. It is small, of course, doesn’t have many things to offer nor much perspectives. But it is over for us and the conclusions are sealed. I’m very happy that we did this. And I am so especially for Laszlo who fulfilled his first ever marathon. Now he won’t forget me for sure! :)))