Run 4 Cystic Fibrosis

Well, I had to run once more this week. So, this Friday I ran all the way to the MediaMarkt here in Muri. All the way, it is only 25 minutes going back and forward, but I am not greedy. At the moment I once again, want to be out there, where it is cold, but just want to be out. The running once again is not great yet, but for me the most important is being out there. It was already a little longer than last time I ran, and I am just building it up slowly.

Next week, it is Sunday today, I will run at least once more. I feel it is coming back a little, in feeling and not in distance, that will come along

Well enjoy the Sunday and till next post

Friendly greet from Berne

Ferdinand

Well, November 08 has long gone, calendar wise, but it is still one of the greatest memories in my life. A marathon under 5 hours, is that possible? OH YES, it is possible. It has been quiet some time after the race now, over 2 months, and I have to confess, that my running game has not been in the best shape. I have written all over my blog, that I do not like running, not like running at all, and well I guess I have showed it. Till this week, I have not run since I passed the finish line. Getting ready in 11 weeks for a marathon is not healthy, not running after a marathon as a cool down, is not good either. So I guess it just cancels each other out. So I can live with it

But I needed to do something again. Two days ago, I decided to go for a little run. Oh boy, I did not know that I meant more little than run. I ran exactly 15 minutes and it was done deal. I was tired, I did go mountain up, but maybe there was no motivation behind the running. Pretty bad, I do know but I do have to say that I was proud on running, at least. Hopefully the next run will be within a month of today, and a little longer. I still have to think of a goal, a next step, I will have to figure out what it is going to be. We will see

Enjoy the day/ night, wherever you are when you are reading and till the next post

Cheers from Bern,

Ferdinand

As you already may have seen, I received a nice comment on my blog from a tennis player with the initials RF, writing the words “let’s play tennis soon”. The moment when I saw this I went crazy (I also have a picture that was taken when he posted the message on my blog which will follow soon). I cannot fancy being on the same court with RF and my brother. I better believe it because it is going to happen. How did all this happen, Ank made it happen!! Last week she was in London where the ATP world tour finals took place. She actually had a meeting with his team and finally she met him as well. It was a very nice get together and Ank enjoyed it thoroughly. A tennis date has not been approved yet because it depends on his tennis schedule in 2010. I am so ecstatic that this is going to happen, WAOW can you imagine?!?. When I told my brother he had no clue what to say.
This is amazing and we will just let it happen. Ank, it is amazing and this can be truly called the cherry on top of the iceberg, wonderful.

For now my brother and I are going to dream a little more thinking about putting an ace behind RF; eh………. Yeah right !!!

Besides that it is nice to be back in Switzerland. It was tough leaving my family in Texas because it was really a great holiday. And well, the moment, that moment they heard all about the marathon, the blog, the messages, the talks, phone calls, donations and compassion. It was absolutely great and as a friend of mine told me, you will never forget that moment in your whole life. And I have to agree. It was special, it had to be done and it was done. Oh, did I mention it already: 4.58.52; you did not think I could do that, did you now

Coming back was hard, but seeing snow coming down when I was sitting in the train from Zurich to Berne, made it a little easier. I have not run yet since my marathon, but I feel I want to run. I will keep you up to date how that process stays in me. I have shared that I would never run a marathon, well maybe I still have to do that. I will come back on that one. For now sleep tight everybody and for Asia: GOODMORNING

Warm Regards

Ferdinand

Photo’s still to come!

It is NOT a secret anymore and a lot of pressure fell of my shoulders. It started early Wednesday morning. Little Olaf started his birthday and it began all nice. At Chick-Fil-A it was Customer Appreciation Day, so that was where we had lunch with little Olaf. Customer Appreciation Day means what you eat that day, keep the receipt, and get it next year for free. Little Olaf likes Chicken Nuggets, let me re-word it, he LOVES Chicken Nuggets. Leslie, Olaf, Olaf and myself had a nice lunch and I went together with Olaf to his work.

After work, I wanted to go to the barber, in order to present my present with a nice clean cut shave and my brother brought me to Sports Clips. I was MVP, Most Valued Player, and I received a nice shave, a very nice hair wash with very tingly shampoo and a nice shoulder massage. It was very nice, and I was ready for my story.

Coming back home, I prepared myself sharing the secret with my sister in law, my brother and the little one. I did not know exactly how to bring it, I prepared it but I was not sure if that was the way how to do it! I was nervous and did not know how Olaf and Leslie were going to react. It was of course something personal that I have shared with many people and the question was how they would react to it. I started by putting on all my shirts: the Dam to Dam race, the Freiburg - Murten Race, the Amsterdam half-marathon, and the Ticino Marathon. In total 6 shirts including the Dutch CF shirt for the half marathon and the self-prepared shirt for the Marathon. Here, it is not the same temperature as in Switzerland, so I was pretty warm!

It was pretty hard starting and get the story right. But I found the right train of thoughts and so I told them the secret, or better said what was part of my last 14 weeks. They were very surprised and had no clue that this had happened. The running, the blog, the donations, the knowledge I gathered about Cystic Fibrosis. Many things surprised them a lot. The interaction with dance music and running, all the training, the weight loss, the messages from everybody. the finishing a marathon. They also thought, I would not run a marathon anymore, but surprise surprise. The waffle bunny, the marathon shirt, all the stories, all the reactions, all the donations, it just added up. Tears did flow but that was all part of the story. It was very emotional and how I prepared it, how I thought I would say it…….well it did not go exactly that way. The only thing I can say is that it came from the heart, it was told with passion, because I did ir with passion. As many of you followed the story with passion because many people returned to the blog to read the story; thanks.

Till the moment I actually told them about all the adventures, they had NO clue, ABSOLUTELY NOT, what had been going on. Their Colleagues, my Colleagues, their friends, my friends, their old friends, my old friends, all the people that posted on the site, everything dropped their jaw to the floor.

I am very happy that they are happy. I am very happy that they reacted this way and I am very happy with all the support that I received. Once again, I would like to thank everybody for posting, donating and/ or motivating me finishing this job. It will not stop here though. I will continue keeping this blog in the air and do things for Cystic Fibrosis. Please react to this story if you have a big new goal for me to raise awareness and money for Cystic Fibrosis.

Early next week I wil post some pictures showing my brother, his wife AND my little nephew.

Thanks and wherever you are, sleep tight, or have a good day

Happy Thanksgiving

Ferdinand

Sometimes you find yourself in a situation that you just cannot explain. That happened to me today. I have heard weird stories but this one is definitely topping it, in a good way.

This morning I got up at five to get ready for the final part of the journey. I packed everything and left for the station. It took me a little over an hour to get to the Zürich train station where I bought a Christmas ornament that my brother needed. All fine and took the little train to the gate. In the plane I had a pretty good seat and it turned out that the seat next to me stayed empty and on the far left sat an American young lady.

When we took of, I got the message we would actually land thirty minutes ahead of schedule. That was good but did not really apply to me in a good way or a bad way because I already had enough time for my connecting flight. The young lady, Liz, and myself spoke a little. he was going home and I was going to my Texas family. Liz is working in Boston in IT in a pharmaceutical company. They are making drugs for all kinds of diseases. I did not hear CF but did raise the question if they did? She asked why I asked and told a little bit about about why I was going to TX. CF, running, tennis , twins and the Netherlands were a couple keywords that were mentioned.

I know that I have talked some random stuff in my life, but after today I claim that I have never shared randomness, in an almost unbelievable form, after talking with Liz. It may sound negative, how I describe it, but should not be read that way.

It started with the sentence:

“It may sound weird, you may think I am crazy, but I would like to ask you a question?”

In 1994 Liz’ High school had the chance to go to Paris but she did not go. A year later, her mother offered her to go, together with her, to Paris. So they went in June 1995. This is also the month that Roland Garros takes place and the ladies wanted to go there.

In the metro they met two boys, a twin from the Netherlands, which overheard them. They did not mind helping them. After talking to some “market boys” the ladies were able to buy some tickets and the four of them went for the courts.

Well, I do not think I have to elaborate on that. As I am not too strong remembering everything from FOURTEEN YEARS AGO !!!!!!! I will wait for Wednesday until I can share this story with my brother. It does not sound weird to me or that it could not be my brother and me but myself, I cannot remember it in all detail. Liz would sync up with her mother for details, but was also surprised that she dared to share this……… odd story!

Interesting:

Liz talked about two brothers, twins that were playing for the dutch rankings (A tournaments)
Liz mentioned Roland Garros all by herself

I think that it is just an interesting story that I just needed to include in my blog, very funny indeed. At least it made the traveling to New York go VERY fast

Beside this interesting story, it was a plane full of interesting situations. A son around 50, traveling with his mother, hitting on stewardesses and setting up a date in San Diego; another man sharing oranges with the stewardesses, he brought from home; two youngsters drinking absolutely too much and sleep through the flight; three people changing chairs like they were playing musical chair and Ice Age three was not that good. Definitely better than Dog Hotel, the second movie, but it may have been the missing three D effects.

At the moment I am on my way to Lubbock to see my brother who is going to pick me up from the airport. Leslie and little Olaf more than likely will not be there. He needs to sleep And so I will see Leslie at home and the little man tomorrow. I cannot wait to see them, tell the stories and see the reactions.

When I post this message I will be in Texas. I know Sunday will be tennis and Saturday will be the birthday party of the little man. My present though, they will need to wait for till Wednesday

Warm regards from the skies between New York and Lubbock

Ferdinand

Officially we are having Thursday in Europe at the moment, it is 01.05 AM in the morning, but it is still Wednesday in the US (-7 hours in Texas). I could still say it is seven days till I am going to tell my Texas family my big secret, if I was in the US. Here in Switzerland it is only six more days though, until the birthday of my nephew. I must say I am getting ready to tell them what has happened in the last 12 weeks; all the running, adventures and stories to share.
It has been quiet intense and I have not kept a story from my brother for so long. Today actually my finishing picture appeared on the site by accident and the question was: did my family see it? Well, I spoke with my brother, I spoke with my sister in law and both still seem to be clueless, if they even know they could/ should or must have a clue, or something like that. So in Europe 6 more days and in the US 7 more days to make it till the end, keeping it a surprise/ secret whatever you want to call it.
Today I met with the Swiss CF Association and it was nice to sit around the table. Hopefully I can donate some money to them, but I will know more about that in a couple weeks. The question is not really whether I can do it, but more how much am I going to donate. I feel that it is the right thing to donate here in Switzerland too, especially because the Association sits in Bern also.
I am very thrilled to go to the US. Only two more days and then I will actually fly, so I have a couple more days that I have to be quiet and than I can try to explain my adventures in some structured way. How that is happening? I do not have a single clue, but I can share with you it is going to be emotional. I would like to mention it on my blog though, I do not feel like a hero, and I am NOT the hero; It needed to be done and it was to raise awareness for Cystic Fibrosis. Did I manage? Well I only need to say one thing about this blog.
Using Google Analytics I found out that 31.63% of the visitors only visited once. That is the biggest group. The second largest group is a group that stands for 12.48% and those visitors visited between 101 and 200 times. To me that is amazing. This talks about Visitor Loyalty and well, I can definitely say that my audience has been loyal. I do know that I sit close to PR, but is it rubbing of so well? I guess so! I guess so.
I feel good, physically, and a little feeling inside me tells me, maybe I should grab my running shoes soon to go and run a little. It may be fun to do. Do I care to find out? Well, it may happen. There is a Thanksgiving Run in the US, so I may run a 10 miles race, together with my brother, in a turkey suit. I hope my brother has trained, but I do know that I am not worrying about 10 miles (16 km). You should have asked me a couple weeks ago, literary a couple weeks ago what I would think about 16 K, eh…………. no thank you.
So, about one more week and then it is going in the open. I will write about reactions and maybe I will put some pictures up. There is only one way to find out, let’s meet next week? I will write a story, will you read it?

Warm Regards from Berne

Ferdinand

As I promised, some evidence that I DID run the marathon. Today I started to feel better, but I got the advice it might take me a week before I would feel like I felt before the marathon. Which is totally fine, because it makes me feel proud and reminds me of what I have been doing.

Do I see the Loof Meister on the Right?

It is the Loof Meister!

Miranda enjoying the scenery

Ferdi is Running, and WE are having lunch! N I C E ! ! !

And THAT is the Finish Line

After 42 Kilomers/ 26 Miles eh……. YES, tired!

Also tired from this angle

And I am back ! ! !

Just a little impression of the Marathon Day. It was great, a whole new experience and three people that are absolutely great!

Warm Regards from Berne

Ferdinand