Berlin Marathon Expo
Enroute to the expo, I met a fellow American on the train named John. He’s currently living in Dallas, Texas but we found out we both used to live in Richardson, Texas at one point in time. We ended up walking to expo together and chatting. More on John later.
Today was the first day of the expo and the line stretched around the block to get in. Luckily I noticed there were actually two separate lines which means we definitely jumped ahead of at least a hundred people. You had to show your start card and vaccination card to get in, and they also put on your wristband for the starting area on Sunday. Instructions were to not remove it until after the race!
The expo is held in an old airport hanger and parked outside were the official pace cars. This is the closest I’ll ever be to one of those cars as that’s what the elite athletes will be running behind.
I picked up my bib and my pre-race purchased shirt and jacket. John wanted to try his on to make sure that they were the right sizes while we were still there. I am superstitious about wearing anything for the race until after I run it so as you can see mine remained inside their packaging. I did briefly try on another jacket they were selling to make sure it was the correct size.
John and I signed this big wall Adidas had constructed and took pictures with our bibs which this booth, Sharingbox, was using to create a larger collage using stickers of the pictures. I went with the blue background and my sticker went below the E in Together.
Once we finished at the Expo, John said that he wanted to go to the Hard Rock Cafe and asked if I wanted to come. Originally I said I was going to my hotel, but after I remembered last night's dinner problems I quickly accepted his invitation. Oddly enough I have been to more international Hard Rock Cafes than US ones.