Filed the race on the sand, I don't remember particular situations until a new electrifying challenge, a further increase in maximum distance, I was constantly trying to push the level of distance covered a little further in a single race, a sort of game, and the first edition of an event, very fascinating on paper, suddenly appeared in my eyes, something more than the 20 km of the "Rimini-Riccione-Rimini", an equally hard route, but on asphalt, with a difference in height, of over 700 meters ....... "Rimini-San Marino" ...
25 km and 900 meters, we started from the historic center of Rimini to get to the top of San Marino, a good blow, it was not easy to convince my father to let me play that race, in the end I won, managing regularly to take the start.
Midweek training had become a rule by now, I strengthened myself on that and on the fact that you were one year older, 14 years, compared to the previous challenging race, I felt ready for that undertaking, with the recklessness of my young age . The day of the race arrived, the first 15 km rose gently by about fifty meters in altitude overall, in the last 10 km the music changed significantly, the whole San Marino highway to go, then a false final plan of about 3 km with which skirted the rock of Mount Titano, to arrive in the Centro Studi area.
I braked my impulse that I always had to do a fast start, checking the speed in the initial flat stretch, it was a serious race with correctly marked mileage along the route, almost an exception for those times, when the climb started I was still relatively fresh , and a little step after the other slowly the kilometers passed.
Every 5 minutes I found my father on the sides of the path asking me if I was tired and wanted to retire, in response I always told him that everything was ok, and in fact it was so, so now every km I had that tax to pay, with his proposals to drop everything and get in the car.
It was a real torture that constant man marking, only when the climb ended and there were about 3 km left my father disappeared, to finally wait for me at the finish, letting me enjoy that last part of the race in perfect solitude, at the finish I was greeted with a good amount of applause from the audience, I was the smallest runner registered in that competition, which regularly completed it, so I made, in a sense, a sensation.
It took me a total of 2 hours and 34 minutes to complete it, definitely a good time analyzing the structure of the route, I was very satisfied with my undertaking, to the point that I immediately decided that the following year I would try again, with bellicose intentions to calmly tear down the wall of 2 hours and 30 minutes ....
Keep it going...