Rozaje Ibar River Marathon – MonteNegro

RACE RESULTS CAN BE FOUND LATER DOWN!

Rožaje is an old Illyrian town located in the Northern Region of Montenegro, situated along the Ibar river. The town is the cultural center of the Bosniaks in Montenegro with a population of 13,608 inhabitants surrounded by hills to its west and mountains to its east.
To be able to reach MonteNegro by car we need to pass the mountains and Rozaje is the most close area to Kosovo that I could find. It is only 2,5h driving one way.

I had an early wake up. Tom, Deb and Dayo came to pick me up at 06:00. The weather forecast estimated rain for our marathon but in the morning it was cold, chilly and cloudy, but not raining. We drove with Tom´s car towards Rozaje. The mountains were still covered by snow and in few places we drove over the clouds. On the way Team Finland saw a farmer with his cows passing. On the top of the mountains there were so much snow I could believe we were in Finland still.

We started our marathon in two starts. Team Finland came a bit later with the minivan that we used as race office and service station. We took a short brief with Dayo and Tom about the route. The first lap we all went together.

Team Finland joined us after I passed my first lap. I took the second lap with the teams so everyone is familiar with the route. On the way in downtown we had to take this mandatory Rozaje picture.

We parked near the police station where we could find the only free spot. Our start was at the City Market in the city centre but there were no ”market”. From here we run along the river and turned back into city center. The city center was partially for walking only so we took this section quite easlily. One laps was just about 5km, so we had 8 laps to go.

I was suprised about the beauty of this small village. Yes, we were strangers. Everybody was looking at us. We, with our sport wear did simply not fit in the city picture. The people around were very polite. Several people stopped me and asked what we were doing. Even one man with a nice big car stopped, opened the window and said ”welcome to Rozaje”. This happened to others as well. This made us smile.

Here are some pictures of Rozaje and our marathon route. The first red building with a tower is a church. Kučanska Mosque is a part of the cultural Heritage of Rožaje. The church was built in 1830 by the believers of the Kučanska mahalla. It is preserved in its original form unlike some other mosques in Rožaje.