‘BEN BECKER
Geneva is obsessed by time: shops selling wristwatches and cuckoo clocks are everywhere, and one of the city’s most recognisable landmarks is its 5m-wide Floral Clock, planted with 6,500 flowers and plants. It’s fitting, then, that this Swiss city should boast a race weekend with a range of distances to suit absolutely everyone intent on running a good time on its four fast and flat courses.
The bib pickup in the Jardin Anglais behind the Floral Clock went like clockwork, naturally, and was staffed by friendly volunteers, most of whom spoke English. It only took a few minutes to be issued with our race numbers and stylish blue and white technical t-shirts. That left plenty of time to peruse the small but perfectly formed race Expo and also to spend a few moments taking selfies at the race wall where the names of every single runner registered for the weekend’s events had been printed. Outside the Expo, Rima Chai – aka Tyre Lady, an inspirational eco-warrior who runs marathons dragging a tyre behind her – was encouraging runners to take along their own refillable water bottles; a fantastic eco initiative.