An Alumna ran a half-marathon – join the race!

Ms Gribonika, could you please say a few words about yourself (your Marie Curie project, your host country, host city).

I’m a Latvian national, Ph.D student in the group of Professor Nils Y Lycke at the University of Gothenburg, Sweden. My Ph.D project aims to investigate the role of mucosal IgA antibodies in protection against influenza infection in experimental and humanised mice models. This project is part of a UniVacFlu consortium within a Marie Curie Initiative Training Network (ITN).

The Marie Curie ITN provides me and other ITN Fellows with excellent networking opportunities and I believe that it has helped me to speed up my progress towards becoming an independent researcher. Gothenburg University provides different programmes and welcome activities for international researchers, which makes the settling in process smoother. I like Gothenburg as it’s a perfectly sized city with lots of parks, hiking trails and islands in and around the city, which makes it a perfect place for nature lovers.

Tell us about the half-marathon that you ran in May. How would you describe this experience?

Last year’s half-marathon took place on 23 May and my participation was totally unexpected. I used to dream of the race way back, but could not find the motivation to register. On 12 April, the whole department got an e-mail saying that my office mate was giving up her place. I immediate replied saying I’d take the spot, and I never regretted it.

I had run half marathons before, but with long-term training. This time I had only a month to work on 21 km as my routine running distance is 8-12 km. Another concern was my starting time, which was at 14:30, and it was a really warm day. As I hardly tolerate heat on a normal day, it was quite a challenge to run, but in reality these worries didn’t come close to slowing me down during the race.

The real issue I faced was fellow marathon participants. I started at my own usual training tempo but soon after the second kilometre, I realised I would have to adapt to the crowd’s speed as I was wasting more energy finding my way out of it. In despite of this, the race gave me an amazing feeling. I overcame myself psychologically (as brain always says “stop” although legs can still move fast) and physically. God blessed us with fantastic weather and the supporters in the streets were cheering us with music, smiles, and encouraging words, while Gothenburg City gave us great joy thanks to its beautiful scenery. I felt very motivated to move forward and never stop until the finish. I did it. Even with bleeding elbows (at the third kilometre I fell) I could not stop smiling when I crossed the finish line. I was so proud!

Nobody at home knew that I was running this year and their surprise to hear that I had finished in a good time was huge. I want to say thank you to my lovely office mate and all the organisers who made this race so special to me! Also, thanks to our postdoc – brilliant researcher and fantastic photographer – Rakesh K Chandode who took pictures of the event.

Do you intend to run another half-marathon? If yes, where and when?

I’m going to run next half - marathon in Gothenburg on 21 May 2016.

How are you hoping to promote the MCAA by running a half-marathon?

This time I would like to promote not only the MCAA, but Marie Curie ITNs, the UniVacFlu consortium and science in general. I think that we have to spread the message of our mission to the public and where else do you get so many people gathered together? Gothenburg half marathon hosts around 65 000 participants and 20 000 spectators each year – this is a huge number of people who we can inform about the MCAA network, research it connects and science in general. It can be done in different ways – talking to people, distributing flyers, posters or just simply running for our scientific cause.

What would you like to say to our Members to encourage them to join you?

In society we have the perception that scientists are always hiding in their laboratories, doing research and thinking only about work. In most cases this is true, but each of us is a human being with hobbies, interests and a private life. We are real, just like any other members of the society. I think it is the right time to spread the word to the public of our research, project and network. It is time to show how active and healthy we are, therefore I announce the MCAA 21km run on 21 May  2016. It is time to challenge ourselves in the largest half marathon in Gothenburg!