Know yourself inside out

In preparation for the marathon I have read a lot of articles in magazines, done internet research and talked to other "marathoni". One thing that comes up again and again is the sudden death of apparently healthy and well trained runners. The most common causes are infections that the runners either had not fully recovered from or that had not appeared yet. Also, cardiac defects that hadn't been diagnosed were high on the list. I have never had an ECG, so I decided it would be a sensible, albeit expensive, thing to do. But I don't really want to die. Especially not from running a marathon!

So, I took today off and spent the morning at the institute for sports medicine at the University of Sports, Cologne, for a medical check-up. They turned me upside down and inside up, carrying out a large number of tests: examination of my general condition, orthopaedic examination, ECG on admission, excersise ECG, lung capacity, ultrasonic examination of my vital parts, blood test... (that bill is going to hurt!)

But now I can say that I truely know myself inside out! My vital parts where checked using ultrasound... boy, they are beautiful! I was very impressed by my kidneys and the spleen is much bigger than I thought. But the most beautiful and awesome organ is the heart. When the doctor switched on the colour on the screen, it looked like an 80s disco light machine. Pumping away happily, turning blue, red, yellow... Funky! Yes, the winner of the vital parts beauty pageant is... the heart - Miss Organ 2005. Sorry all you other vital parts! I know, I couldn't live without you either. But the heart is in a league of its own. Unfortunately I did not get any of the pictures the doctor took and she only had print-outs anyway.

Overall result of all of this medical madness: I am as healthy as can be. My blood pressure was a bit low (no surprise: I got up in the middle of the night, because the appointment was EARLY and I did not have any coffee!!!) and the surface of my left thyorid gland looks a bit "unhomogenous" (even I could see that it looked different from the right one). But the doctor wasn't too worried about it. She said, that she would check for any signs of malfunction in the blood test and let me know if they find anything.

The only bewildering examination result was, that they think I am two centimeters taller than I really am. I have been 1m 57 cm (5' 2") ever since I stopped growing! Very strange indeed.

In the end I even got to meet the head of the institute, Professor Dr. Predel, if my memory serves me right. We had a nice chat about my marathon ambitions and he too looked at the results of my tests and seemed very pleased (if I was sarcastic, I'd say it wasn't the results that made him smile but the amount he was mentally billing me for it; I hope I will not have any unforeseen heart problems when I that bill arrives; his time must be at least twice as expensive than everybody else's).

London Marathon, here I come! 18 days, 15 hours, 39 minutes, 40 seconds