What pairs well with a full-bodied red wine from Bordeaux?
A marathon, apparently.
The Marathon des Châteaux du Medóc, a themed race through vineyards in the Medóc region of Bordeaux, France, features nearly 20 wine tastings along the way. It draws 8,500 runners a year and tens of thousands more hopefuls on a waiting list.
Laura Visconti, a restaurant manager and sommelier in Oslo, had always wanted to tour France’s vineyards. “This is the most fun way of doing it,” said Ms. Visconti, 30, who had never previously considered running a marathon. “Why not?”
At the start line on Saturday, the crowd of runners wearing various interpretations of this year’s theme, the ’80s, cheered and pumped their fists. It was 9:30 a.m., and no wine had even been served yet.
“It is a full-on party,” said Richard Pacey, 44, who wore a pink Care Bear costume. “The fact that there’s a marathon coming up is almost a secondary situation.”
Dominique Laurent, 68, who lives in Bordeaux, has completed the race 16 times. “Fast is not a word to use in Medóc,” he said. The marathon is intended to be savored, leaving ample time to sample wine, dance to live music and enjoy delicacies like croissants, freshly shucked oysters and steak.
Most runners finish the race right before the official cutoff of six hours and 30 minutes. Anything faster is a “waste,” Mr. Laurent said.
He sipped a glass of wine — estimated at $100 a bottle — and raised his eyebrows in appreciation. “I will have a second one,” he declared. We were at a chateau about 10 miles into the race. Soon after, I jumped in and started running myself, hoping to make it the rest of the way to the finish.
The wine along the course is intended to be sipped, not downed, said Vincent Fabre, the president of the association that organizes the marathon.
While few fitness experts would recommend combining alcohol and running in this way, athletic performance isn’t the point at Medóc. “I don’t think most people are at that marathon for the run,” said Jo Wilkinson, a running coach and former elite marathoner who ran the event a few years ago.
Still, the organizers prepare each year for potential adverse side effects. Volunteers handed out water bottles nearly every quarter mile. There were doctors on site at several chateaus, as well as kinesiologists at massage stations ready to knead out muscle cramps between miles.
Michel Bach, 80, has participated in more than 30 Medóc marathons. After sustaining an injury during an ultramarathon in Cambodia in January, he spent this year’s Medóc marathon in a tall cardboard cake on wheels he built. He was pulled by four friends for all 26.2 miles.
Medóc stands out among the hundreds of races he has completed, he said, because of the focus on joy, rather than results. “It is a shared happiness, and we need that, with the world in which we live,” he said.
As I approached the halfway point, volunteers holding containers of canelé, Bordeaux’s signature pastry, flanked the road. Runners, many of their shirts brown with wine stains, swarmed them. The slightly overcast skies cleared, giving way to direct sun and oppressive heat. (When it’s especially hot, as it was this year, the race organizers sometimes extend the cutoff past seven hours.)
“I have to say, this is harder than a normal marathon,” said Will Ash, 32, who lives in Oslo. This was his 20th marathon, he said, but his first while wearing a not-very-breathable white jumpsuit, dressed as a member of ABBA, and eating and drinking everything in sight along the way. “You’ve got to factor in that you’re also kind of purposefully dehydrating yourself,” he said. He folded his jumpsuit down to his waist and kept going.
Near the 16-mile mark, several runners passed by pushing a cart made to look like a Viking ship, covered in records and Rubik’s Cubes. One of them pulled a leg of cured ham out of the ship’s belly, withdrew a large kitchen knife and started distributing slices of meat to his group. He smiled and handed me a fatty hunk. “For energy!” he said.
The most indulgent food comes in the race’s final miles — to give the runners an extra push to make it to the finish. “You can almost taste the glory,” said Aiden Westaway, 30, who lives in London and was running as part of a bachelor party. Sweaty runners approached platters of freshly shucked oysters and slurped several down without a second thought.
At mile 24, runners swarmed tables of volunteers plopping cubes of freshly grilled steak — cooked rare and topped with flaky salt — directly into their sweaty palms. I forced myself to try a piece as I limped by. It was so tender, I barely needed to chew. I went back for seconds.
A group of shirtless Frenchmen in their mid-20s — who I’d seen grabbing three wine glasses apiece at a chateau earlier in the race — jogged by. Which of the wines was their favorite? I asked. “The red one!” one shouted, slurring slightly, before chasing a photographer on a motorcycle.
The road eventually narrowed and a row of trees provided a welcome canopy of shade. Two ambulances raced past — containing runners who needed medical attention because of heat exhaustion, the organizers later told me.
Someone behind me let out a loud burp.
The runners half-jogged, half-staggered toward the finish line; some cried and hugged one another after they crossed.
Ahead, one man uncorked a bottle of wine from his prize bag and started chugging. Another runner crouched on all fours off to the side and vomited as a woman rubbed his back, two medics standing around them.
By the time they collected their medals, many of the runners were tired of fine wine. It was time for a celebratory beer.
The post At This French Marathon, Runners Make Pit Stops for Wine and Oysters appeared first on New York Times.
