It's hard to believe I was part of two near sporting triumphs in the same week, but that's what happened. Last Sunday, I ran the annual Lincoln Mile, and even though I was the lead female in the 30-39 yr. old heat for exactly 1/4 of a mile, I couldn't sustain that pace and ended up coming in 4th in my age group with a slower than usual time. Had I just trained a little bit instead of only deciding to do the race the week before, or just ran as fast as last year, I would've easily placed. I've decided this is the last year I come in 4th, I'm winning a Lincoln Running company gift certificate next year.
Last night, our coed softball team played our second summer tournament game in the hopes of making it to the final game where a win guaranteed us a free t-shirt. (Quite the spoils!) Our game was very close, we just needed to find a way to score a couple more runs; we lost 6-5. The good news was we got to go to the bar earlier, and we also didn't have to sit around in the 90 degree heat for an hour waiting for the championship game. Ah well, the fall season will be here before we know it.
In between the sporty heartbreaks, I finally figured out where our outdoor friend, Itty Bittiest, had been the past week. After she didn't show up for breakfast a couple of days in a row, I started to worry that something had happened to her. Then on Monday, she appeared on the porch, had her meal, then scampered around the corner of the house and burrowed into a hole next to the back porch. I thought that was an odd place to go to, then I heard the tell-tale sound of a baby kitty! Itty Bittiest had had kittens!
All week, Itty Bittiest has come out for meals, water, and some petting and stretching, then heads back to her hole. From what we can tell, there's only one kitten who looks like a tortoise-shell like mom. No pictures of mom and kitten yet, but we are on kitten watch now. Tuesday night was very dicey-a strong storm rolled through around 10 o'clock, and water was pouring down the roof by the kitten hole and seemed like it would eventually flood the hole. I stood out in the rain swapping out flower pots to catch the drips (what else is a cat lady supposed to do? I would've stayed out there all night, too), then Corrie came out and crafted a little fort out of a landscape block and the old barbecue grill cover. The rain could then run off onto the patio. Sure enough, Itty Bittiest and baby stayed dry all night. I still wish they'd move to a better home, like on the back porch.
I certainly didn't expect I'd be writing another tribute this month, but here I am. I found out Monday that my friend Ray Frohn had died in his sleep Saturday. I met Ray when he worked in our warehouse back around 2003. Somewhere along the way he found out I ran in the local road races, which is something Ray did back in the day.
It became an annual routine for me to look for Ray from his regular vantage point on the marathon route, Sheridan Blvd. at South Street. Anyone from Lincoln knows that heading East on South Street is a bit of a hill, plus at that time of race morning, if it isn't pouring rain, you're dealing with a lot of sun in your eyes. That has always been one of my least favorite parts of the course, but once I knew to look for Ray at the top of the hill, it wasn't so bad.
I think runners look forward to seeing people they know at particular points in the race, it's what keeps you moving forward. There were always a lot of people around that spot where Ray would be, so I'd quickly scan the crowd to find him so we wouldn't miss each other.
"Hi Ray!" I'd shout and frantically wave. (it was still early in the race, I still had the energy to be frantic.) "Hi Sweetheart! Let me get your picture!" Ray would shout back.
It was always "Hi Sweetheart!" with Ray, and I didn't mind that. Awhile back I was walking down 11th street and heard from the coffee shop across the street from me, "Hi Sweetheart!" and I knew it was Ray. I wouldn't let a lot of people get away with calling me that, but I hope Ray wouldn't mind me saying that his fatherly qualities were always shining very brightly, so his friendly greetings made me feel good. Ray was always smiling and joking around. You couldn't have a conversation with Ray and not leave it feeling good. (although sometimes the conversations went a really long time. Ray liked to talk.)
At his service today, everyone talked about what a good friend and proud father Ray was. His quirkiness touched a lot of lives. The Havelock Run 10k is tomorrow, and I have to find a way to get through that on what has turned out to be minimal training over the last couple of months. I will be thinking of my pal Ray on the 84th Street climb for sure.
The 31st Annual Lincoln Marathon and Half Marathon took place yesterday morning at 7 am. I had decided a couple of months ago that I wasn't going to be doing the half marathon for the first time in five years but I still wanted to show up and cheer on the runners I knew and the runners I didn't know.
I needed to get up at 5:45, not pleasing on a Sunday, but it was a little later than if I had to prep myself for the race itself. I got up, had a bowl of cereal, threw on my clothes, and got my bike out the door. As soon as I stepped out on the front porch, I could hear the loud speaker from the start of the race on campus, which was enough to pump me up and to get me off the porch and on the bike and not regret getting up so early.
The weather was absolutely perfect-upper 30s or lower 40s I'd guess, sunshine, no clouds, and hardly any wind. This was another record year for marathon and half marathon entrants; they had bumped up the entrant number to 6000, and last I had heard, they had less than 100 spots left days before the race. That's a lot of people to comb through at the start to find anyone you knew, but I found Tish and Joeth fairly quickly. After wishing them good luck, I wandered around and took a few photos and videos of the starting line. The race starts outside of our campus recreation center and the runners line up on the Vine St. loop that stretches around towards the football stadium and back towards Morrill Hall. It was hard to get a photo of the entire mass of people, but I took one with a view from the back of the starting line as well as the front. If I watch one of these marathons again, I will do a better job of jockeying for a good spot to take photos and videos. I took a 15 second video of the start of the race. You have to look around this guy in the black to see the runners, I didn't realize he stuck out so much when I was taking it. After calling the runners to their mark, about 10 seconds went by, then finally the canon was fired. I completely forgot about the canon, thus you will note how the video shakes at that moment.
Recorded inspirational music such as the Chariots of Fire song played as the runners started their race. (I continue to be annoyed that a couple of years ago, they stopped asking Nebraska's National Guard band to show up and play some nice marches, which was my favorite part of the race. I guess not everyone shared my viewpoint on that.) There appeared to be an endless number of runners-the last ones crossed the starting line after 10 minutes had already gone by.
Luckily, the Lincoln Marathon uses timing chips that runners tie into their shoe laces. Their individual time doesn't start until that chip is activated at the starting line. So it's no big deal to be starting 10 minutes late.
After seeing the last runners begin, I headed out on my bike to 20th and Calvert, which is roughly around the 9 mile mark in the race. I forgot until I got out there that this is the end of one of the few hills of a relatively flat course, so the runners sometimes look pretty rough at this point. The spectators know this and seem to be even more supportive. Here's a clip of a stream of runners coming up 20th St.
I watched for awhile, then I headed back towards campus so I could see Tish and Joeth at the halfway point. I guess I must be a really slow bike rider because somehow I missed them only 4 miles farther into the course. This made me realize that these spectators who I've seen in the past go from one location to another and then another on the route to see their family and friends run by have it down to a science. It's very easy to miss someone unless you have an almost exact idea what time they'll hit each mile marker. I took a good video nonetheless at 10th and Q St. This is a pivotal spot in the race-those who have signed up for the full marathon continue down 10th Street, or if they need/want to, they can make the turn and finish the race as a half marathoner instead. (People who sign up for the half marathon can't make the choice the other way around.) For me I always knew I was turning that corner and was always ecstatic to be so close to the finish. But for some, they have a big decision to make there. It's the point of no return.
Unfortunately, I didn't see Tish or Joeth cross the finish line, but Tish and I were able to backtrack and find a pretty pooped Joeth on the course back by the capitol with a half mile or so to go. After breezing through various other races in the last couple of years, I think Joeth has finally found a challenging distance for herself.
I headed back home before noon and felt much better than I normally do on marathon day. It didn't stop me from having a tasty DiLeon's burrito for lunch, which would be my normal post-run reward. I had put in my 13 miles, it was on my bike instead of on my shoes.
Well, I wasn't really a weekend warrior, I just feel like one. I played my first softball game of the season on Sunday. We won even with only 9 players, which in co-ed rules means we had to take an automatic out every time the 10th player was up to bat. (It's a very sexist rule. I don't want to get into it any more than that. You can actually play with 5 girls and 4 guys and not take the out. They seem to think you're trying to get away with something if you do it the other way.) It felt pretty good at the time, but of course yesterday various aches and pains set in, even though I went walking at lunch and biked to and from work in order to keep the lactic acid on the move. The pain has eased up today, but I still didn't bother trying to go on a run, I suspected it would've been a waste of time. I always hope my running keeps me in shape for softball, but when most of my running is done at a slow and steady pace and softball is the opposite of that, I guess I run into problems. More pre-game stretching is necessary, I've decided.
I've been reading about running lately, and it has pepped me up about the sport. This fall, UNP is publishing Personal Record:A Love Affair with Running by Rachel Toor and I just finished an advance copy.
This is a collection of 26.2 chapters (note the marathon distance reference!) that chronicles Rachel's path from couch potato to ultra-distance runner. While there are several things I don't have in common with the writer, such as my speed (no speed on my part!), distance that I'm going to run in any given day (I will never be out on a course for 24 hours straight!), I found we had a lot of things in common, admittedly, just like a lot of runners do. I have a big watch, although not as big as Rachel's, I have text messaged my friend Steve all of my mile split times from a 10 mile race, and while Rachel seems to favor peanut m&ms during and after races, I have been known to put away a 1 lb. cheeseburger after the half-marathon. Rachel also explains "speed goggles", a term she gives to her tendency to find the average-looking fast male runner very attractive. I too admit I enjoy the scenery at an out-and-back race, where I pass every single runner who is ahead of me. I think we both dislike stretching as well, thus my softball woes.
I recommend this book for runners of all ages and abilities, and I especially enjoyed the fact that it was a woman's perspective. It's a fast read, and Rachel writes with a great sense of humor.
Actually, I'm in Lincoln, but my running and cycling miles for today put me in Kentucky for my virtual transcontinental trip. This virtual trip is part of national health research being done by Dr. Paul T. Williams at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. I started tracking my mileage last August, and it took me this long to log 555 miles, which is the distance they have you travel in Virginia! I never thought I'd make it out of that state. You can log your miles for running, walking, or cycling. I was skeptical that I'd keep this up, but somehow I did. (maybe because I didn't have a lot of miles to log during winter!)
As you log your progress, they display your location both with photographs of your current whereabouts as well as where you are on a map. Here's the scenery a few miles back while still in Virginia.
And a map of me now just over the Kentucky border:
You can add partners on your trip and track your progress together, or set up various e-mail notifications for when you don't enter data for a week, you don't meet your weekly goal, or a partner passes you. I haven't messed around with any of that-I just want to get across these states! It would be nice to think I could make it through Kentucky before the summer is over.
