Budejovice – Prague 2025, for me an important milestone

So this year I finally earned a t-shirt with the inscription “Iron Budman”. This “title” is conditioned by ten completed marathons České Budejovice – Prague. I first registered this race as a young canoeing adept in Olomouc, when the successes of several Olomouc club members who were able to win this race were told with admiration. Canoeists Flora + Zaoral on C2 or Svab brothers on kayak (F1 – folding kayaks) were great heroes for me. I didn’t understand at all that such distances can be covered (sit, kneel). I was quite glad that the CB-Prague marathon was a closed chapter at that time and there was no danger that I would ever try to do it too. Years 1922-1959 were still run on the flowing Vltava river and the race was cancelled at the same time as the completion of the Vltava Cascade. But it happened and a group of madmen renewed the traditional race in 2010 and I had no choice but to join a year later.

So I will try to give a short recap:

2011 -2025 I have completed 10 marathons. Until 2022 it went like clockwork, but a bike accident in June 2023 prevented me from completing the 10th edition this year. But I tried not to miss it. After a couple of hours after waking up from my artificial sleep I had to tell Choros that I probably won’t get out in a week and he has to go alone. In 2024 the CB-Prague date clashed with the Loire725 marathon (725 km long marathon in France) , so I had to wait until 2025. This year the Loire725 date was moved and there was an ideal opportunity to get tired by completing both races in 3 weeks. Other friends also thought about it and Choros did this 900 km long double race together with Honza Belka and Marek Splichal (on SUP)

My crew on C2: I tried few of them, but I had fun with all of them. I rode together with Tomas Albey Vanecko, Jan Vlcek, Choros Hron, Standa Hamak, Robert Ourednik and this year with Tomas Kasal.

The most famous opponents in C2: Vrdlovec – Odvarko (we tried to learn from them and we didn’t annoy them too much) , Brezina -Kucian, Venta -Hamak.

The toughest fight that really hurt: Vlcek+Herzan x Venta+Hamak in 2012, when we had only 3 seconds lead after two stages. We were relieved when the boys decided to run over Kolna and we could finish the third stage behind them.

The biggest moral: with Honza Vlcek at the non-stop marathon in 2013. We raced with time and excellent C2 Herman-Hajsky. At that time I had never ridden so long and intensively, so it was a “new” experience.

The most fun: also non-stop race 2019 with Robert Ourednik. We got together for the race and rode quietly against ourselves only and still quite fast.

Biggest stress: this year, when I led Tomas to a wrong run before Vrane. I messed up the bridge with Vrane’s dam wall, and as luck would have it, there was also similar concrete run into the water. Somehow more factors came together (I can’t see very well now, my navigation was down, I hadn’t been there for a long time, Tomas was going there for the first time, the guys on C2 just ahead of us hid somewhere at that moment). When we were running with the boat in the staging lane of the road to Prague, high navigation below us without access to water and in the distance appeared the real Vrane dam wall, we were trying to decide what to do. Eventually Tomas “rescued” me and the boat and with a big loss we continued. It looked like our previous advantage was gone, but we fought on.

So in the end, I thank all my partners for the title of “Iron Budman”. The t-shirt with the inscription is theirs too.