Mr. Brightside

So I ran my first 50miler yesterday, the Stonecat 50mile in Ipswich, MA, and came away with mixed feelings.

The day started, as they all do, with an alarm going off well before I was ready to get up. After a quick breakfast in the hotel with a couple dozen fellow Stonecat-ers, I was at the check-in site at 5.30am. Got my number, milled around and listened to some music until the RD gave his pre-race speech. He gave us the usual info, what colors to follow, what arrows to look for, what aid would be available and then dropped a gem of a comment and said that they had to adjust the course at the last minute and the total distance would now be a solid 54miles and dropped the term Horton Miles.  Now, I fully expect the given distance of a trail course to be taken with a grain of salt, but I’d rather know the total AFTER I’ve ran it. Not before so that I dwell on it throughout the race. So on that bombshell, it was outside to the starting line. Read more

Scoobie Do NYC

It’s 4AM on Sunday, November 2nd,

Shaggy uses the “Jean Paul Jean Paul” technique of alarm setting. First you set the alarm clock on the nightstand making sure the VOLUME is on LOUD, then he calls the hotel front desk wake up service making sure not to upset the wake up person, thirdly comes the alarms on our two watches making sure they reads AM.

5AM: Head down to the lobby to catch a cab to the library were I meet my 5:30 AM bus to Staten Island and the wait begins. Read more

Bimblers Bluff 50K: Exactly What You Think It Isn’t?

The following race report was sent in by runner Siskanna Naynaha

Greetings to all!

Sorry that it’s been so long since my last communication, but things have been so crazy here (I know, you’re sick of hearing that!). In addition to moving from Glastonbury to West Hartford, Connecticut in the last month, Joaquín started school at a new daycare, James started at a new high school, Mekyael has taken on new work territories in addition to New England (namely, northern New Jersey and all of New York except NYC and Long Island), and I have been enjoying teaching a new—to me—class (Latina/o lit) and designing another for spring (Writing Through Research; basically a course in advanced research and writing, which I am focusing on film as a rhetorical “text”). Read more

Bimbler’s Bluff 50k(my tree hugging experience)

The weather could not have been better for my first Ultra Trail Race. As we ran through Timberlands it was quite apparent the storm the night before dumped a whole new thick layer of leaves. The color of the autumn leaves gleamed in the morning sunshine. I coasted through Timberlands touching the old growth trees as I ran by them. I boogied through the race Hill section past the boundary boulders. I yelled at a runner going forward on Race Hill when they should have taken that hard left north into the Genesee Section. Power walked up first long hill. Reassured runners that we were on the right trail once on Red dot. Cruised up to and thru Mattabasset Trail connector (vw green). Carefully navigated gnarly sharp slippery rocks in the Broomstick ledges area. Yelled with excitement on my way down the trail to aid # 2. Met my buddy Nate there. I refueled my water bottle and heard Iggy say “eat like a horse Suds” so I did. Meet and greet with fellow bimblers Iggy and Ticket. Then off up steep trail (escalator) to the top for photo opts. Read more

‘MY FIRST TIME’

As I sit here in my room, with my lap top, on a day quite the opposite of what the weather was like for the Bluff—it’s hard to believe that it’s just been three days since I completed my very first Ultra Marathon Distance Race!!! I can’t help but want to replay Sunday over and over again in my head, because I had such a GREAT experience…and now it is just a memory.

(First I would like to say that Shellygirl and I  took a casual run up and over Bluff Head Tuesday evening…mainly cause we were in search of my long sleeve black shirt I had taken off just past where the photographer was positioned on race day. We couldn’t find it, so if anyone knows the whereabouts of it give me a holler! Oh, and Shellygirl found a pink and black ribbon still attached to a branch—so she took it as a souvenir and tied it on her rearview mirror!) Now back to me and my memorable first time……….

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Race Report: My First 50k

Or, “The Bluff Course is Actually Shaped Like a Cherry”

I could say all the normal things about my first 50k, like how intense, dramatic, or world-changing this half-day race had turned out to be. Or, how the training worked, the diet held up, the equipment was well-planned. Instead, with tongue firmly in cheek, I would like to describe how the first 50k in fact closely mirrors another important milestone in life - the loss of virginity.

You see, like my 50k race, the voyage into maturity also required a great deal of training and experimentation. It’s not like reading a book can quite prepare you for everything that you might experience or encounter. Much like the 50k, the journey into adulthood required research, planning, coaching, and a good deal of strategy and luck. Here are some of the things that I found were similar - or very different - between the two events. Read more

Chi town urbanathlon Oct. 18, 2008

I was excited at the idea of traveling to chicago and running a race, but the fact that this was an obstacle course over a good distance, 10.5 miles, intrigued both my adventurous and endurance sides. I was also pumped to see my high school buddy Todd since we had been planning this trip for a couple of months.

The day started at 5.30 am in the hotel. Normally, i enjoy staying at hotels because of the breakfast in the morning, so imagine my excitement when i found that there was no complimentary continental breakfast. NO FREE BREAKFAST!!! I was devastated. To add insult to injury, there was a resturant in the hotel that offered a buffet but that didn’t start till 6.30. We left at 6. Read more

The Breakers Marathon October 18, 2008

Ah, the marathon.  The culmination of months of training, endless hours spent on your way to the Guilford docks or on the way back.  And then the months of over analysis and “what if’’s”. 

2008 marked the second year that the Breakers marathon was run on the “new” course, that is, starting in downtown Newport, bimbling along the coast and then heading out to Middletown for the second half.  Fellow runners told me tales of yore when the entire marathon was run in Middletown, circling four laps of an unchanging course.  Happy for the variety in scenery I was about to experience I dashed off at the gun with approximately 700 other runners only to find myself negotiating some of the most dangerous neighborhoods in Newport.  It was shocking to observe the blight of urban decay and the real life examples of how the credit market collapse has affected main street America - Rockefellers, Carnegies, and Astors sleeping in cardboard boxes on street corners, topiary animals gone wild, crumbling mansions by the sea.  I found myself wondering if I could manage to scrape up a few million dollars to purchase one of the many properties for sale along the course – do my part for the local economy.  But, who am I kidding?  Dan doesn’t have time to mow those lawns and train for Hellgate at the same time.  

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Superman at the Mohawk

On Sunday I ran the Mohawk Hudson River Marathon. The weather was perfect last weekend and I started out early enough on Saturday to watch Downhill finish the Hartford Marathon on my way to the race. I met up with Hardware and Quiet Man who had just completed the half. It was a good feeling to see Downhill qualify for Boston.

I stayed at the host hotel in Albany, NY and had to wait a little while for my room when I arrived. I decided to take the elevator down to the ballroom level to pick up my race packet per my runner instruction sheet. When I opened the door to Ballroom A directly in front of me I found the room filled with people wearing spacesuits with antenna’s on their heads. There was a science fiction convention going on in the hotel and i would spend the next day or so with these folks riding elevators and listening to them talk on weird communication devices. Imagine working there with these two groups of sci-fi nuts and runners doing all kind of silly stretching poses in the lobby. It was quite the sight. My race last fall at the Bay State Marathon found me in a hotel filled with old Quiltters from all over New England. I sure know how to pick them. Read more

Hartford Marathon

Okay, it’s Wednesday and I still see no race report for the Hartford Marathon. Granted it WAS a road race – yes, Ticket, a ROAD race – but since a few Bimblers and myself ran it, I figured I could step up to the starting line and write up my vague recollection of what happened (at least to me) that day. The race had one major thing going for it and that was perfect weather. Couldn’t have asked for better, and it was worth the chilly wait at the starting line. I wandered down the street, noting “New England’s Finest” (some of the most elite runners in NE personally invited to run the marathon), as well as a number of individuals planning on walking the half marathon, standing at the very front of the starting line. Read more

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