The Me-me-link.Amsterdam (written in English): 10 Mile Run. The 26th 'Dam tot Dam loop'

Last week Eric and friends took part in the 'Dam to Dam run'. They're a great bunch of people and (most) meet up several times a week for training.

The 10 mile run from Amsterdam to Zaandam is a well known event. Many world famous runners take part in it and use it as a warm up for the next marathon.
I didn't run (no surprise there), but went to wave them off at the start and then hopped on the train to join up with Eric's mum and Henk to see them cross the finish line.

The team was sponsored by one of the team member's employer and they all looked very professional and 'snazzy'.

Group photo in front of 'Schreierstoren'

There was a happy, jovial buzz over Amsterdam. There were 2.700 teams in the 'business' part of the run.
The organisers had put a limit of 35.000 on the number of contestants but there were so many applications, that they'd sold out within two hours.

Hordes of runners, on their way to the start.

And once again there were tv camera's and press present on the ground and in the air.

4 balloons and a chopper (uh-oh)

We were standing by the side of the road, close to the finish. There were thousands of people cheering the contestants on and different types of loud music were blasting our ear drums.
There were people of all ages and sizes taking part. I admired them all.

Watching out for the red and grey T-shirts, we first recognised Ron and Sjors and then suddenly, there was Eric. I tried to take a picture of him, but he was too fast. Never mind, here is a happy, blurry Eric, just before he crossed the finish line.
Turned out, he ran faster this year than he had in the last 3 years!