The Slovenian athlete – who took 4th place in the 800m discipline at Sydney Olympics – did not opt for the longest running distance. Instead, she chose the shorter, 12.5 kilometre one. Nonetheless, she did not find the race easy: “I was the weakest link in the trio. My running teammates were Nada Rotovnik Kozjek and Lea Einfalt. At Golovec hill, when running uphill, I also had some help from male runners who saw I was suffering. Our trio crossed the finish line in 1 hour, 7 minutes and 42 seconds. Lea’s record is around 47 minutes, while Nada’s best results is approximately 49 minutes.”
Not enough practice
The athlete from Škofja Loka admits she does not get enough practice, now that she is no longer a professional runner. “I only run when I’m in the role of a recreation leader, and even in this case only with the beginners’ group. But I do a lot of exercise, a lot of yoga, which I also teach, mostly to employees of companies that hire me. Perhaps yoga helped me breathe easier while running.” Lea Einfalt, a very talented cross-country skier (also this year’s junior world vice-champion at 10 km distance), had a different experience with the Trio Run: “Since I’m a former mountain runner, this is my favourite way to practice. I always enjoy running.” Trio needs to cross the finish line together.
Sunny spring days have lured many people out for recreation. The Walk around the Wire, which celebrated its 60th anniversary this year, attracted a record number of 42,680 participants. On Saturday alone, 9,746 people hiked the 35-kilometre circular walkway around Slovenia’s capital. The main event of Saturday is the above-mentioned Trio Race, which is a special running competition of three-member teams – composed of men, women, or both genders – who are required to run together throughout the race. Namely, only when the last, slowest runner of the trio crosses the finish line at the Congress Square, the stopwatch is stopped to record the team’s result.
Heroes of the day: trio of mountain runners
The majority of runners do not focus much on the result, but near-professional runners participate, too. The winning team at the 29km distance was the ‘FritidLAB-športna prehrana’ team, which consisted of three mountain runners: Peter Lamovec, Sebastjan Zarnik and Gašper Bregar. The three runners crossed the finish line in 1:50:53, improving last year’s best result by four minutes. Among women, the best trio in the most prestigious category (i.e., longest distance; 1,905 trios in total participated) came from the town of Žiri: Katja Rakušček, Valerija Mrak and Saša Pisk finished in 2:20:23.
Tomaž Okorn, MMC
