Swiss runners planning to run the 2011 Missoula Marathon

Since its inaugural running in 2007, the Missoula Marathon has attracted runners from around the world, including Australia, Japan, Sweden, Hong Kong, Scotland, and Delaware. Sometimes, as with our first Delaware runner last year, a participant is willing to tell us a little bit about themselves. This year, the Swiss Family Metzler - Hans, Monika, and Linus - will travel from Switzerland 12 weeks after Hans completed the Zurich Marathon and son Linus finished the relay - while wearing Missoula Marathon shirts. Hans has sent us the following blog post.

I am Hans (49) from Switzerland. We - my wife Monika and our son Linus (16) - will visit Montana this summer. Linus and I are runners, Monika loves horse riding, small wonder we will visit Montana ;-)

I started running after several knee surgeries; I played soccer before and still do some mountain biking. So, when I ran my first marathon and I was hooked. Today, I run almost every day. Why do we come to Montana? For the last 15 years, we often travelled in the region from Northern Alaska south to Idaho, Washington and Montana. These regions are great to be outdoors for hiking, fishing, wildlife, etc. during July (in recent years, July is the only time we can travel). So, this year, it is Montana again, we will hike most of our time in the Beartooth Absaroka Mountains, fly-fishing the lakes up there.

Back to running: I run often, I follow a training program, but I run for fun, for relaxing (yes!) and 5 or 6 times a year, I am joining a running event. Since Linus started to join me (and he runs faster every month, so he will take the lead soon), I enjoy it a lot more, especially after work. When planning our trip, I found out “hey, there is a marathon in Missoula, let’s run it!” OK, it’s only 12 weeks from the Zurich marathon to the Missoula marathon, but I will try. So, we registered for the race, Linus will run the half marathon, I will do the long one. Monika keeps wondering how we are doing the first days backpacking in the mountains after the race (I am wondering too).

I had some questions and soon I got in contact with Jennifer and she offered me some shirts. So, when I was running the Zurich Marathon, Linus, his two cousins Andrina and Domenica, and Marc (a fine substitute for our 4th runner, who had to cancel due to illness) were running the 42 km as a team. For Linus it was clear (and he made sure) that all of his teammates were wearing the proper shirt. Why is the team called “Chatterbox”? I f you would know Linus, you wouldn’t ask! I promised Jennifer to send a picture of some Missoulian shirts in action – here it is!

BTW: It will be my second US marathon. No, not New York, not Boston: In 2007 I was running the first KMXT Marathon in Kodiak, Alaska. It was a very cold October day, so most of the registered runners decided to run the half marathon, and only maybe 20 runners were finishing the long distance. I was the winner, which was cool! You don’t have many chances to win an inauguration marathon in your life, especially when your usual running time is around 3 h 20. The Kodiak run-the-rock marathon is held every year, still very small, but no crowds and so cool (cold).

So, we are happy to meet you on July 10th! There are so many friendly people like Vic and Vo. We hope we can meet you in person. RWM must be very active from what I could gather consulting your website, congrats!

See you and join in

Hans & Family