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Sent: Thursday, December 27, 2001 4:59 PM
Subject: Incline Club V6 LR #6
Bring on the ice! For any newbies that are having problems with ice please check out the screw shoe at www.skyrunner.com/screwshoe.htm They can be a butt saver for sure and several club oldbies are already clicking their way up Ruxton. Also this is the last of our “short” long runs. This would be a good week to try to bump it up just a little in preparation for next week’s Waldo/LRR combo:-O
Hope your holidays are going well and hope to see you Sunday!
####
Sunday, December 30, 8:00 a.m. meet at Soda Springs Park
Run out the Ute Pass Trail and turn left and STAY LEFT and head up Longs
Ranch Road which connects back into the Barr Trail at No Name Creek. Run
down the Barr Trail back to the park. 2-3 hours. If it would take longer you
can go straight at the “J” pipe and cut off some time or just do an
out/back.
####
A concerned runner writes:
I know this is an icky topic, but I guess it’s unfortunate reality
here in the Springs. I was wondering if you think it would be a good idea to
send this to all the IC’ers so everyone is reminded to be aware of their
surroundings. I guess I should preface this by asking if you heard about the
sexual assault that occurred yesterday, mid day, in Monument Valley Park. A
girl was jogging alone wearing headphones and was attacked. This kind of
news really bothers me so I just wanted as many people as possible to get
the word to stay alert and be careful!
Attachment as follows:
In light of the sexual assault that occurred on Wednesday, December 26,
2001, the Colorado Springs Police Department would like to offer a few
safety tips for joggers in an attempt to prevent any further sexual assaults
or other tragedies.
· If at all possible, don’t jog alone.
· Be aware of your surroundings.
· Do not wear anything that would obstruct your vision or that would limit
your hearing.
· Avoid running in secluded areas.
· Carry a cell phone for emergencies.
· Let someone know your jogging route and estimated time of return.
· If you choose to carry a pepper spray, there are some restrictions per
Colorado Springs Municipal Code. 9.7.202 Use of Certain Chemicals
Prohibited. A person must be 18 years of age or older to purchase or
carry pepper spray. The device designed to be carried in a handbag
or pocket shall not contain more than 1-1/4 ounces of the chemical.
The chemical may be used in self -defense.
· Carry a whistle, alarm or other device that could make someone notice you
if you were in trouble.
####
Randy Linsey writes:
I read in Science News that some scientists found that people who just “thought” about their workout (but I’m sure they really thought about it a
lot) actually gained something like 80% of the strength that was gained by
people who actually did the workout. They attribute this to strengthening
the nerve impulses to the muscles, since the muscles themselves did not get
stronger.
So aside from the obvious benefits for those who are injured or sick (no, I mean ill...we’re all sick aren’t we?), how about a “T” on the workout board if I just Think a lot about what you all are doing on Sunday? I could drink Tea just to help justify it. And eat Tacos.
####
Gordon Barnett writes:
Merry Christmas and happy, healthy holidays to all ICrs. 12/21 marks the
Winter Solstice, with today having the least amount of daylight — so it’s
all downhill, or should that be uphill from here! This is a great time to
keep running, with the possibility of more snow and dropping temperatures. I
look forward to getting up early Christmas morning, while visions of sugar
plums (whatever the heck those are) still dance in people’s heads, running
out on abandoned trails surrounded by quiet stillness with crunching snow
the only sound. Unless there’s a far off scream from No Name Creek, as
someone discovers the ice flow for the first time.
####
Larry Miller writes (in part):
Thanks for the Champaign — it was real good, we drank it in the park an
weez starrrrt t tttooo feellll goooood, burp!
(MC adds: The rest of this message was cut to protect those who were mentioned but suffice it to say the wine did not go to waste).
####
Keith Lonnquist writes:
Would you please include a * for Kenn’s running on 9 Dec. He & I attended
on both the 9th & 16th this month. Thanks! See you tomorrow.
(MC adds: With that the tie was broken and a new club record of 73 was set on the 9th:-)
####
Gary “the non organizer” Scott writes:
It has been rumored that a group of people are going to meet on Saturday,
January 19th at the start of the Barr Camp trailhead to decide who is the
KING OF THE MOUNTAIN! The deal seems to be that people are to carry no less
than 1/3rd of their body weight to the top and back down, not including
water that they will use on the way. This “event” is supposed to start at
7AM; people will no doubt meet in the parking area earlier than that. I’ve
heard that there could be someone at the kiosk on top to check and weight
people in, and the first person back at the parking area at the end of the
day. It will be done on an honestly system, but a person could get time
added to their finish time if they are under weight. Perhaps ten minutes
for every pound, or something like that. And since there will be no
assistance along the way people should bring whatever they need including a
tent or bivi-bag, sleeping bag, spare clothing, emergency equipment, food,
stove, etc., etc. The “non-organizers” are hoping for the worst weather
possible. See ya there!
####
Dave Sorenson writes:
I’d like to get the word out again about the Rescue Run. It’s on New Year’s
Day at Palmer Park in Colorado Springs. Both the 5K and 10K courses are
challenging and hilly. The t-shirt is a long sleeve mock turtle neck (color
is ivy), and there are tons of raffle prizes that will be given out after
the race. There are currently 83 raffle prizes of various items. These
include water bottles, Runners World calendars, socks, gloves, entry to the
PPRR Winter Series, Cog Railway tickets, 1/2 day rafting trips and much
more. The entry fee is $17 pre-registered or $20 day of race. You can
register at any of the three running stores in town. Thanks, and I hope to
see you there.
####
Jim Freim plots:
Attached is a plot of the sunshine hours during the year. For those of us
with SAD.
(MC adds: Some servers do not accept BCC attachments and rather than mess things up please just let me know if you want the excel spreadsheet and I will send it to you. )
####
ICer to ICer:
For sale:
I know you probably don’t want this to become a community bulletin board for
For Sale items, but....Tom & I are also trying to sell our house downtown @
417 E. Willamette, 3 bdrm, 1.75 baths, completely renovated in 1999. I know
how the IC’ers love a challenge & this house comes with some additional
requirements — must be a 1st time home buyer (or not have owned a house in 3
years), low to moderate income. Please call (475-1075) or e-mail me for more
details. You can also contact the Rocky Mountain Community Land Trust to see
if you qualify for this program @ 447-9300. If the club sells this house -
we promise free pizza, an Australian slide show in our new house, and the
appropriate accompanying Aussie beverages!!!!
PS: We really miss being out there with you guys — our New Year’s resolution (and for the past several months) is to heal up first. Hopefully we’ll be seeing you soon! Laura & Tom Kelecy
(MC adds: Actually I think it is kind of neat to list stuff like this in the newsletter. There have been several “For Sale” and “Job Offer” posts over the years. It is easy enough to skip if you want but on the other hand someone just may be looking. However to prevent it from becoming a free for all let’s keep it first person. In other words, please don’t sell your neighbor’s or friend’s stuff. If they are runners then they can run with the IC and post their own stuff. That should do for now, we can tweak it as we go if it starts to get out of hand.)
####
Non “R” reports:
Tom Kelecy reports:
Merry Christmas!
PART 3: Racing the Thin Blue Line
Let me digress for a moment. “Nooooooo..” You scream. “You’ve been digressing for several thousand words now. Tell us about the @*$&^# race!” OK, but first I must tell you of the circumstance that really made it possible for us to run the race.
Most of our time down in Australia took place in October 2001 which, as everyone knows, followed September of 2001, one of those moments in time where one set of events changed our world forever. Needless to say, there were plenty of security measures due to those events that we had to wade through as much of our travel around the country was by air. There were the newly instituted precautions, with a few Aussie twists, such as the Quantas ticket agent in Adelaide who cautioned us that any potentially dangerous items that we might have in our carry-on bags, such as nail clippers, scissors, and didgeridoos, would be confiscated. A didgeridoo? In my carry-on baggage? Well, for those of you who don’t know, a didgeridoo is an Aboriginal instrument crafted from indigenous trees, and measures 1-1.5 meters in length, and 8-10 centimeters in diameter. Down one of my pant legs maybe, but in my carry-on bag? Anyway, aside from almost losing my didgeridoo, most all of our travels by air while in Australia went remarkably smoothly, with one significant exception. We were scheduled to return to the United States, from Sydney to Los Angeles, on Saturday, October 27. About half way through the trip, we received a message from our travel agent telling us that that flight had been canceled for “reasons of security,” and that they were putting us on a Sunday flight instead. Well, when we got to Sydney and realized that the marathon was happening on Sunday, we began to consider the possibilities. Could we leave Monday instead? No worries. Since Air New Zealand had canceled the original flight, we would be allowed to change the return to Monday at no extra charge. Could we stay at the hotel an extra night? No worries. Due to the recent lull in tourism, they were offering discounts. Instead of the normal nightly rate, $AU 125,000,000.00 (US$ 5000.00), we could stay the extra night at a discount, $AU 124,000 ,000.00 ($US 5000.95). The last thing that needed to happen, of course, was that we would be able to gain entry into the marathon. We called the marathon organizer and. no worries! Not only could we sign up, but the signup location was a mere 5 minute walk from the front door of our hotel. It was meant to be! The only decision now was, should we run the marathon or should we run the accompanying 10 K race that was taking place in conjunction with the marathon? Laura and I thought for a millisecond, looked at each other and shook our head vigorously, “Naaaaaah. The MARATHON!” Now that we had decided which event to do, should we race it, or just dog it, and maybe finish shooting up some of the camera film we had remaining. “Naaaaaah. RACE!”
So there we found ourselves early Sunday morning, now going through the almost forgotten, but still vaguely familiar pre-race routine, only in foreign surroundings. The race was to be run on the same course as the 2000 Sydney Olympic Marathon. Even most of the blue line that marked that course was still in tact, with the exception of a few places where it was deemed a traffic hazard due to an occasional motorist attempting to cut the tangents during rush hour.
As if the prospect of the pain and suffering to come after a spot-on 4 weeks of sleeping in weren’t enough, wake up time came an hour earlier Sunday morning due to the time change. You see, when it’s Fall in the northern hemisphere, it is Spring in the southern hemisphere. So, while everyone back home in the states was “falling back” by one hour, we were “springing forward” by one hour like a punch-drunk kangaroo. Sometimes life just isn’t fair, much less fair dinkum. We passed on a pre-race breakfast buffet and instead opted for a PowerTimTam or two to top off those carbohydrate stores we had been hoarding over the last month.
We took the early metro train to the race start, along with hundreds of other sleepy-eyed runners. It seems that some pre-race rituals are universal, and equally as universal, there were lines to the too few Port-a-Loos. A total of around 7,500 people lined up for the 7 AM start, with 1,500 of those signed up for the marathon. Though there were no “elite” runners, as there was no prize money offered, there were a couple of celebrities, such as former marathon world record holder Rob DeCastella running the 10 Km, and Japanese woman’s marathon winner Nagasaki Quazimoto (I might have the spelling wrong) who was not running competitively, but was there to help promote a national fitness program. And I swear I am probably not making this up, we saw a few Kangaroos and Wombats donning race numbers in the starting line throng. Note: if you are an old, slow fat Wombat planning to run a marathon in the near future, please, oh please do not line up at the starting line with the 2:20 marathoners. Especially if you are an old, fat, slow, DEAD Wombat.
The race started promptly at 7:10 AM, meaning of course 10 minutes late. It was very crowded due to the thousands of 10 Km runners, but the stream of runners flowed smoothly except for the occasional kangaroo carcass which created a willy-willy of humans swirling around the deceased Skippy. Unlike driving a car in the Land of Oz, we didn’t have to worry about which side of the road to run on since they were all closed to vehicular traffic. The course would take us over the harbor and through the heart of this wonderful city. But we were definitely not in Kansas anymore, as this race did have a few hills.
One of the highlights of the course was running over the Sydney Harbor Bridge, also nicknamed the “coat hanger.” The day was sunny and bright, and the harbor a deep blue, and the beautiful skyline, including the magnificent Opera House, shone on the opposite side of the harbor. Of course, I noticed none of this as I was preoccupied with attempting to dodge a flock of sheep, which I believe were entered in the herding category of this event. Running in big cities in the absence of car traffic is always a treat. But to run in a world-class city such as Sydney, surrounded by all of the natural and man-made beauty, it was an amazing feeling. At the 10 Km point, most of the runners peeled off and there was soon a little more elbow room. The course was well supplied with aid stations every 5 Km, stocked with water, Gatorade, and wet sponges.
Even though this race is in its infant stages of development, it still felt like a world-class event. Throngs of people lined the course cheering on the runners. In spite of the novelty of running “Internationale,” it was still a marathon, and as it turned out, a stinker of a day (warm). By the half-way point, I was beginning to feel the wear. By the Anzac bridge at mile 15 (or was it kilometer 25?), my pace began to slow to what felt like a hobble, and I had to dig down deep in an attempt to keep my place, whatever that was. Laura was lucky that her watch gave out just prior to the start of the race. It is always somewhat demoralizing to run below the level to which you are accustomed. But we were having fun, weren’t we? And, hey, we would have the rest of the day to kick back and enjoy our last day in the big city, all day tomorrow on the 15 hour return flight, and heck, why not take the rest of the year off to recover? All we had to do was keep following the thin blue line to the finish.
The marathon finish took place on a track in Homebush Stadium, the venue for many of the 2000 Olympic events. Stopping at ALL the water stops, and making ample use of the sponges, I felt a renewed energy the last 2-3 miles, and finished strong, meaning on my feet and moving forward. Laura finished a little while later, and we both traded war stories at the death march it had felt like the last half of the race. We were utterly amazed at how quickly one can lose that racing edge after only 2 months of eating, sleeping, wine swilling, and did I mention we had only run 10-15 miles total since running the Peak in August? Oh well, maybe we’ll try training a little harder next time. Naaaaah! The post-race set-up was nothing very special, the usual fluid replacements, oranges, bananas, tomatoes. But it doesn’t take too much of a run to whet the appetite of most runners, and as in the states, they were descending upon everything that was edible with all the etiquette of a pack of wild and hungry dingoes. Come to think of it, I do believe that was a pack of wild hungry dingoes wolfing down the last of the Emu sausages just before we had a chance to try some.
So how did we do in the race? And I suppose you probably want to know what our finish times were. Well, you know what they say, “it’s not the destination, but the journey.,” or in this case, “it’s not the destination, but the journey to the destination of the journey.,” or something like that.I suppose we probably went into the marathon somewhat over-trained after 4 weeks without a break, but we decided to accept the “no worries” attitude of our host country. And we have to admit, we were both just knackered pink to finish the race, and to receive our race T-shirts and finisher’s medals. But for those of you who really care about those things, let me just say that we both finished well ahead of the DEAD Wombat.
####
WWW post:
12/23/01 Another big group of 66 came out for what seemed like the first day
of winter. Quite a bit of snow and ice were to be had and there were a
couple of spills but nothing too serious. More than a few sighs of relief
were heard when we got far enough onto UPT to get into the sun. Most did the
UPT/Waldo/UPT run with a few opting to take the Bail Trail down through
Williams. Three of the group made a big loop out of Rampart/Williams/UPT
with one also doing LRR! After the run several took part in a little wine
drinking to celebrate the holidays. Or were they just celebrating that
someone brought wine?
####
Go out hard, when it hurts speed up...
Matt Carpenter
www.skyrunner.com
Barr Trail Mountain Race
www.runpikespeak.com
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