Tag Archives: switzerland

Wolfer still ticking in his 60s

22 Friday Jul 2022

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Like a fine Swiss timepiece, CRR Martin Wolfer just keeps on ticking. Living a few miles southeast of Zürich, he is ever ready for the next grueling challenge among the beauty of his beloved Swiss alps, where he and his wife, Conny, vacation annually.

photo of Martin Wolfer with Zermatt peak in the background
Wolfer in the early stage of the race, with the Zermatt peak in the background

On July 2, Wolfer completed a rather unique race over varying terrain—the “Top20 Run.” Starting near Zermatt, at an altitude of 1,609m (approx. 5,261 ft.—think Denver, Colo.), the 22.1km (13.7-mile) course rose in the first 10km to about 2,300m (7,521 ft.), then leveled off for the next 6km, before climbing steeply over the final 6km to the finish at Gornergrat—elevation 3,101m (that’s about 10,140 ft.)!

Wolfer’s finishing time was 2:52:30. The other unique feature of the Top20 was that one’s place was determined by using an age-dependent factor. So, even though Wolfer is now 65 years of age, he came in 8th overall among the 143 men who finished, with an age-accounted-for time score of 2:13:46 (a 0.7754 factor having been applied to his actual finishing time).

With regard to the course, Wolfer said, “Above 2500m the air becomes very thin.” He could run over the initial 16km but admitted that, for him, ”in the steep part only walking was possible.” Understandable might be an understatement. So is the word impressive.

photo of Martin Wolfer with other race awardees
Wolfer, second from right, posing among the other award winners

For those of you who weren’t around Creek Road in the mid- to late-1980s, while Wolfer was living in Newark, Del., he was one of the area’s preeminent racers, at one point holding both the Delaware 5K and marathon records in his age group! Back then, he could run around 15 flat in a 5K and had a marathon time of 2 hours, 28 minutes and change.

Nice to see that he is in good shape and still ticking off the miles, er, kilometers.

Result of May madness in Switzerland

07 Saturday Jul 2018

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photo of Martin Wolfer during the SOLA relay

Martin Wolfer competing four years ago in this same event.

Back on May 5, our European representative, CRR Martin Wolfer, competed in a rather unique cross-country relay in the Switzerland—the SOLA-Stafette, a favorite of his near where he lives that he has run annually for several decades. His team finished 11th of 944 relay teams. He provided the details below.

Here are his explanation of the race and the results for his team.

“The name of the race is ‘SOLA-Stafette.’ The name SOLA (‘sun’) originates in Sweden, where in 1967 they organized a relay with that name, from Göteborg to Karlstadt. In Zürich, it was held for the first time in 1972. I [first] participated in 1978…. I [have now] started 36 times in this event.

“In the [map below], you see that the race is located around Zürich [the city at the head of the lake]. The changing points are chosen such that they can be easily reached by public transportation. The overall distance is 114 km, split into 14 [unequal and non-conventional distance] legs.

map of the SOLA-Stafette relay in Switzerland

“In the result sheet for our team [below], you see the distances in kilometers and the altitude-meters (hm) that had to be run (meters of rise in altitude, not the difference between start and finish). My leg was the third to last [leg 12, marked as such on the map above], where men over 50 and women are allowed to take a shortcut. The distance for me was 5.83 km with 75 hm of altitude (not the regulation and listed 6.91 km with 125 hm).”

Team result with Martin Wolfer’s stage results highlighted

“The first column (‘Rang’) shows the individual rank, with ‘Zeit’ [being] the time and ‘Rückstand’ the time behind the best runner on that particular leg.
The ‘Rang’ in the second column is the rank of the team after that leg, with the overall time and the time behind the first team.”

Martin ran 23:02 for his leg, which equates to a 19:45 cross-country 5K. Pretty complicated relay, but it’s clear that Wolfer, who had held Delaware resident age-group records in both the 5K and the marathon back in the late 1980s (when he trained here on Creek Road), is still enjoying the sport and running strong.

 

University ultra-relay, Swiss style

30 Friday May 2014

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If you think the 4-person relay at the Delaware Marathon Running Festival was long, tough, and crowded, take a look at another kind of racing a Creek Road Runner is doing in Switzerland (also see the recent exploits of CRR Paul Amer).

photo of Martin Wolfer during the SOLA relayCRR Martin Wolfer, a native of the Zürich area, has been running in what we would consider an ultra-distance relay for more than three decades. He explains, “[This] relay was invented in 1973 and was inspired by a Swedish relay race. It’s organized by the sport club of the two Zürich Universities—ETH Zürich and University of Zürich. It consists of 14 legs, with distances between 4 [2.5 mi.] and 14 km [8.7 mi.]. The overall distance is about 116 km [72 mi.], and the winning time is just under seven hours.”

The race is held around Zürich, mostly on the hilly parts along the Lake of Zürich. All relay transition areas are easily reachable by public transport, so no one needs a car. “This is a necessity,” Wolfer says, “because this year about 900 teams took part and the roads couldn’t take the traffic.” Participants are mainly students or alumni of either of the two universities.

Wolfer adds, “Of course there is a big party after the race. If the University of Delaware intends to participate next year, I certainly could help.”

This was Wolfer’s 32nd time running in this relay. He finished 6th fastest in his division, and his team came in 17th overall.

Wolfer trained on Creek Road back in the late 1980s while a post-doc in chemical engineering at the University of Delaware. A superior competitor, by the time he had returned to Switzerland, Wolfer held the Delaware resident age-group (25-29) records in both the 5k and the marathon! Those records have since been broken, though they held up for 20 and 16 years, respectively. In 1988 he helped the Creek Road Runners team comprising seven University of Delaware runners place second overall in the silver anniversary edition of the Caesar Rodney Half Marathon.

Amer completes Swiss half

05 Monday May 2014

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photo of CRR Paul Amer before the Geneva Half Marathon“But Swiss time was running out. It seemed that we would lose the race.” —Deep Purple

Though there was no smoke on the water or fire in the sky, one of our own fought through the pain in Switzerland this past weekend. Despite pulling a hamstring, CRR Paul Amer limped the final 6 km to the finish line in the Geneva Half Marathon. Running for the Aseat Toulouse (that’s French for “Creek Road Runners”) team, Amer finished in 2:19:14.

Asked for comment after the race, Amer noted, “I am quite happy in setting the all-time Geneva Half Marathon record for 60-year-old computer science professors from the University of Delaware.”

Congratulations to one of a kind!

photo of Dan SimmonsIn other weekend news, CRR Dan Simmons placed 4th among the 65-69s in the Broad Street Run in Philadelphia yesterday, coming in with a very respectable 1:14:06. Simmons finished 2041st overall out of nearly 40,000 runners.  Well done.

Locally, in the Race Against Domestic Violence 5K, CRR Diane Kukich pulled out her lucky pink shoes and won the 60-64 age group in 24:01.