It was the start of a new sporting world for steeplechaser Gesa Krause – but it failed. The 33-year-old had to give up on her marathon debut. She now speaks out very honestly and in detail.
She had been looking forward to this day, longed for the starting signal for her marathon debut and had long planned the change of world from the obstacle course over 3000 meters on the track to the 42.195 kilometers on the road. Gesa Krause’s start at the marathon in Valencia on Sunday was well thought out. And a matter of the heart. Their disappointment is now all the greater. The 33-year-old had to give up the race – her debut start ended at kilometer 34. Things went very well for a long time.
What exactly happened and what happened to her – the running community had been puzzling until now. A day later, the two-time World Cup bronze medalist and European champion in the steeplechase spoke in detail. “Yesterday’s experience hurts incredibly. I invested a lot and had no outcome,” she wrote on social media: “But that’s sport. It’s part of life that sometimes you fail. Not every story has a happy ending.”
She passed the half marathon mark with a time of 1:13:35 minutes and was therefore exactly on schedule, completing the kilometers consistently – “evenly in 3:29 minutes,” as she writes.
“Am I too ‘weak’ for marathon?”
A little later, however, the body went on strike. “The heater suddenly went out at kilometer 26. I could no longer maintain my pace,” she writes. Over the next eight kilometers, Krause tried to recover and mobilize his strength again. It was a long eight kilometers – and not just for the body. Because when the body reaches its limits, the head has to take command.
Krause honestly says that from that point on she was faced with the big question of “why I was suffering so damn early.” It was a mental battle to ignore the pain and stay positive. Then came the realization that she would probably miss her time goal: “And finally the acceptance that reality is different and that I will not finish my first marathon that day.”
She doesn’t yet know what the reason was. The questions are piling up in her head. “I wish I had an explanation as to why my body suddenly went on strike at kilometer 26. Why I couldn’t stay on track so early. Am I too “weak” for a marathon? Were eleven weeks of preparation simply too ambitious and simply too short? Or was yesterday just not my day?”
“I’m deeply sorry”
At this point, Krause expressly thanks her family, her team, her coach and the spectators and addressed Nic Ihlow: “A very big thank you to @nic_ihlow, who did an incredibly great job as a pacemaker and motivator yesterday. I am deeply sorry that we were not rewarded with this epic finish.”
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Now for the 33-year-old it’s time to analyze, but above all to switch off and relax. She is not yet revealing what will happen next with her marathon ambitions. But even before the start in Valencia she had said in the WELT interview: “I’m not 100 percent done with the subject of obstacle running yet, because it’s simply my passion, I love this discipline and I still have the feeling that I still have a lot left in me. I would actually like to really show again what I can do over a 3000 meter obstacle. But at the same time I also want to think long-term, I would like to give myself the opportunity to look for new challenges.”
And this new challenge is the marathon. It was clear to Krause that she wouldn’t just start and be in the lead on her debut. Her respect was great; she didn’t expect miracles. “It is a discipline that takes a few years until you reach your best performance. A discipline in which the kilometers and the competitions also shape you and make you better.”
