Becoming Parisienne

Way back in May I had stumbled over a website called La Parisienne. It is the famous women race which has been organized by the City of Paris for 15 years. Not only does it host over 20'000 participants (all women!!!) but the starting line is at the foot of the Eiffel Tower. How cool is that? What better way to start my Parisien adventure? Just jump in and run!

So last Sunday (my first in Paris) I walked over to the Eiffel tower and stood admist 22'000 other women and despite the rain everybody was in good spirits and smiling. Including me.... and I HATE rain. Just shows you how high my motivation was.

Standing in line to receive number and t-shirt the day before the race

How to dress 22'000 women?

A little warm up session infront of L'école militaire

A little pink chip to keep track of your time

After 1 1/2 hours of waiting for my turn to depart I was off with a batch of 5000 other women all ages, races and origins. Groups of women had travelled from all corners of France to participate in this event making it a girly weekend at the same time. I decided on the spot to invite my girlfriends from across Europe for next year. Get ready girls!

The race itself was 6km which took me about 40 minutes to run without difficulty. The emotions that I felt, however, were harder to control. Running under the Eiffel Tower, over the Seine, passing the Trocadero, the Ecole militaire, the UNESCO just to name a few. I kept on repeating to myself: Yes, this is you! You are NOT dreaming. You are NOW living in Paris!

I must admit Lugano at that point had never felt farther away. The Ticinese had ran the StraLugano the day before, by the way.

The course was facilitated by the applause of an audience full of grinning daddies and happy kids cheering on Mummies, Sisters, Aunties, Daughters and Grannies. Samba bands were playing along the road, even the Scotts were there with their bagpipes. In total more than 600 musicians cheered us on.

So there I was - little me - grinning away from ear to ear feeling very Parisienne. My Parisian adventure has started with a bang, just the way I wanted, and IT FEELS GOOOOOOOD!!!!