Munich Marathon

After completing the Lochness Marathon in Inverness Scotland the week before (Oct 3rd, see write below). The Macleaniacs (Rick and Tracy)and the Lascelles (Keith and Joan) travelled on to Munich, Germany to take part in the Munich Marathon (Joan would take part in the 10k, her first running). The trip would take different paths, but once we met up in Newcastle, we took a ferry to Amsterdam from North Shields. Then flew to Munich.
Munich is a beautiful city and the marathon would hilight its beauty. The expo was larger than we expected and we picked up the required "bargains". Munich wasn't cheap though, the race as well, on top of your registration you have to purchase or actually rent your chip for 6 Euros and if you want a race shirt you have to prepurchase that too. But since we probably wouldn't be able to do this again...
T-shirts and "bargains" in hand we headed back to the hotel room and another day of site seeing before race day.

There are 9,000 runners in the marathon so this is a big event, but staging the start and finish in the Olympic park is great location with lots of room. The finish for all events is in the Olympic stadium (1972 Olympics) on the track, and a amazing stadium it is. Not dated at all.

Race morning we took the Metro to what was supposed to be the closest stop to the Olympic part (not sure about that, as we walked along way to get there).
But get there we did and walked to the stadium to the bag drop areas, which were very well organized (well they are germans!). Off to the start area we went, and by this time it was getting very crowded. Rick and myself had decided that we might as well start in the second coral as we weren't in any hurry and we knew this may be a struggle after last weeks race. Remember beer is plentiful in Munich! We said our goodbyes to Joan whose race would start about 40 minutes after ours at the same spot.

At 10 minutes after 10 on the 10th of the 10th month in 2010 the second coral started, and we were off. It was a slow start as it was crowded and again we weren't in a hurry. Tracy was in front of us for a while. At about 4k in we went by a beer station (a little early for us, but we took note of the location because we knew we'd be coming back this way). Shortly after we turned onto the Ludwig Strasse,
a wide boulevardthat we would a couple of times. Majestic buildings and architecture to put north american races to shame. At about 8k in we entered the English Garten, a very large park, which we ran through for about 5k or more before exiting into a very nice residential area. The amzing scenery contiued on through out the race. My injuries started to wear on me and by 19k or so I knew this was going to be a tough go, but Rick said he wasn't at his best either and was willing to just plod along or walk or what ever was required. And so it went on like this for many k's. Back onto the Ludwig Strasse at about 30k and off again to follow some narrower roads to more sites.
Back to the Ludwig Strasse at 36k, counting down the k's to the finish and then there was the beer stand again. I said to Rick to pcik up 2 cups each as we deserved them. There was lots there! And they were big cups, but once we tried it we tossed them just as quick, yukkkk! That was the worst beer we'd ever tried. That last couple of k were extremely difficult, but only because of our condition. I was looking forward to finishing on the track where I watched my running hero's compete in the 72 Olympics (Viren, Foster...). We took a last walk break just before entering the stadium, through a tunnel we ran with strobe lights, dry ice fog and music blaring into the stadium (what a rush). We ran the fastest we had ran all day around that soft track, it felt good finally.
Rick and I finished in about 4:23 and looked for the beer tent, found it and would you believe its alcohol free beer, WTF! Oh well we drank it anyway, Rick waited for Tracy while went ot look for Joan. Joan had completed her 10k in a 1:00 PB, woohoo! and thought that she could hav edone much better, but ran cautiously for the first half. Tracy would finish in 5:44 in another great effort.

An awesome experience, in a big city marathon in part of the world I'd love to come back to. Definitly recomended.

Niagara Marathon 9th Place

An amazing result last week at the Niagara Marathon as our own Darren Collins placed 9th overall in 2:49. To place that high in any marathon is remarkable to place in a marathon as big as Niagara is extremely remarkable. Congratulations on a great race Darren, and judging by your remarks on facebook it was not easy. Lots of other RoadRunners took part in both the Marathon and half Marathon and a good job by all. to see the results go to Sportstats.

Slainte 10K Race Hamilton

Congratulations to Angie Tuttle,Liz Clubine,and Jenny Allan who raced the
Slainte 10K in Hamilton Oct 30th.
Liz and Jenny finished in 1:03 which I believe is a PB for Liz, and Angie
finished 1st in her age group at 58:39.
Way to go girls, well done.

Steamtown Marathon

Well since about February I was trying to figure out what I would do to celebrate 10/10/10 and I couldn't think of a better way then to run a marathon, but where?
So after some careful consideration & many questions to my Marathoning Brother in Law I decided on Steamtown Marathon in Scranton PA.

I managed to lasso Cindy Marcelli into going with me on this adventure. Poor Cindy - hang a marathon in front of her and she'll sign up. She has no self control. ahahah.

Jim Cummings is the Asst Race Director and would send out his monthly updates & I swear I have never laughed so much as I did to his newletters, so much so I would have to respond in like. Which he felt the need to respond back. Ohhh the fun we had emailing each other about killer bunnies, rickety old bridges, peeing on wood piles, All sport being Dutch for Can't get another type of drink. I had to take slight offense to the mis-use of Dutch. Everyone knows that's not what Allsport means. ssshheesh.

Cindy & I started our adventure around noon on Friday afternoon, we managed to get stuck in every bit of traffic misadventure that could have possibly taken place on a sunny Friday afternoon. FINALLY at the boarder around 4pm we declared our citizenship and our intent to run in Scranton PA. to which our border guard said " ahhh Dunder Mifflin, say hi to Michael Scott" to which I replied " Who?" He could tell I was a bright spark, so he waved us through. Quickly. Obviously we were not a threat to the security of the United States of America.

As I drove the Tribute down the interstate and Cindy and I were chatting away I looked to my left & what to my wondering eyes should appear but an OUTLET MALL. They had an Adidas store, Under Armour, Guess, Coach, Charlotte Russe, LINDT... *sighs* ohhh it was heaven. So we walked out of the shops four hours later ladened with the odd bag or two. We arrived at our hotel in Clarks Summit some twelve hours after we started our Journey (which should have taken only 6 hours). It was six miles from the start line from the bus pick up in Scranton but it was a wonderful little hotel that served a breakfast from 6-10am THEY HAD A WAFFLE MAKER... Cindy was not leaving this hotel. So after some worry that they, the hotel, couldn't find our reservation ( many calls back and forth to the hotel on our journey) We camped down in our own beds in a nice quiet room outside of the elevators.

We ate our waffles the next morning and headed to Scranton to find the Expo & Jim Cummings, the very funny Asst Race director. And there he was, I could tell immediately - upon introductions we laughed and laughed at each other, but I can honestly say I rhoroughly enjoyed reading his updates and looked forward to the next one. I mean who reads updates right? Well with Jim's I can guarentee most runners did.

The expo was held in the new state of the art high school - which had me a bit worried & yes when Cindy & I got there, it was as I thought, rather small. However; all your runners' needs were met. They had shoes, clothing, nutrition & accessories of all types for sale. The Steamtown line of tech wear was selling like hot cakes. I picked up a rather nifty tech T-shirt myself. I would have made one suggestion, they could have really played up the 10/10/10 date a bit more. I mean it is a BIG DEAL. It's never going to happen again for a thousand years. Whoop it up fellas. Work it Divas. Alas not so much. However; they are really nifty regardless.

We headed for lunch there after; more by accident then on purpose. I sorta got lost and we ended up on Washington Street Plaza so we sat at Alfredos and had our pre carbo lunch. Then found more shops to check out. My goodness I can't get over the bargains in the States. Woohoo.

Then back to the hotel to relax at the Starbucks we had to walk 2 km to. ahah. Then head over to Rite Aid for more retail therapy and then over to Charlies for dinner. Yummy... food. hmmm Carb load food.

Back to the hotel again - do some race prep. Pin bibs to our shirts ( the bibs had the timing chip attached to it in some fancy schmancy way) so no more throwing your right foot over the pads to get a better time. Now it's bellys' first.

The weather was going to be 32 degrees in the morning and a high of 66 degrees by afternoon.
And with the injuries and lack of training I had - I was sure I was going to enjoy the 66 degrees for quite some time.

We drove down to Scranton & hopped the bus for our Start in Forest Hill, PA. We hung around the gym for a while until the start was minutes away, I managed to grab a couple of unused sports socks to put over my hands/arms for the first few miles of the run as it was cold ( apparently 32 degrees F is 0 celcius. Who knew) That's chilly. The start of the race was not a starters pistol - nope it was a fully functional canon. There was no mistaking this start.

The first mile was marked by an uphill, then followed directly by a down hill then an other uphill and, you guessed it, down hill.

Cindy & I kept our pace to about 6-6:30 pace and managed nicely for a long time. I felt really good but knew that at some point this would not be the case & I had better enjoy this moment. We managed to pick up a hanger on by the name of Hank. Hank lived 38 miles from Scranton and hadn't trained "really" for the marathon, albiet his second year running it. He regaled us of stories about how his wife was the runner and he just "took it up" and beat her at the Disney Marathon a few years prior. He would sprint off to go pee then sprint to catch up with us. Not at all annoying. Then make calls in his cell phone at the 10 mile mark. Well at that point I needed to be shot of him. Nothing personal Hank - but your sprinting and talking while I'm struggling to not throw up from the pain in my leg is making me even more sick to my stomach.

Oh yeah did I mention from about the 3 mile mark my leg was aching like a son of .... Yeah so Hank had to go.

Cindy & I both dove in to the nearest port o potties and when we emerged a minute later Hank was gone. phew.

I popped a couple of tylenol at this point and prayed that they would work sooner than later. At the half way mark I had a feeling that it could be a long race. For me at any rate. Really it was okay because the support through out the course is beyond belief. Everyone is out and cheering, they had their own water stations & cheering sections. It was unbelieveable. WOW. WELL DONE EVERYONE!!!

We ran across a couple of runners around the mid way point & she was crying her eyes out. Her husband running with her, trying to console her. Cindy & I were as well. She was just overwrought with emotions. I said not to worry I would be having my little breakdown by mile 15. And sure enough.... as we entered the trails I told Cindy to go on ahead & have her own race. I wasn't going to be long for this world. I mean the most I had done was Aug 22nd running 30 K at the Midsummer nights run. Then lots of swimming and spending a couple hours at a time on my elliptical. All really great cross training, but it doesn't prepare your body completely. So I had my little cry as I saw Cindy for the last time. And continued on - running with a lot more walking.
Then by mile 17 it became just walking.

Man is walking hard.

Really hard.

I tried to maintain a 9 min / km pace. In some instances it was more than easy enough. Other moments when I just felt like I couldn't walk another step it was the hardest pace to maintain. At 21 miles I had a brownie. It was the best brownie EVER. And I managed to pass a few people as well, so I started to feel a bit better about myself & my abilities. Then when I got passed by Poopypants I about lost it. This fellow ran like well... his name says it all. There was no way I was going to come in behind a Poopypants. NO WAY. So I started my own personal race, I really started to dislike him. Again no reason, it's just me folks, you know me by now. I'm slightly competitive at times.

When the 5 hour mark of the race hit - all I could think about is with any luck Cindy managed to finish yet and how much longer would it take me. I was having a few problems doing the conversion from miles into kilometres but figured I'd be done at 5:30 which would have worked if the miles were actually kilometres. ACK. Oh well. At mile 23 you enter into Scranton itself - through the friendly neighbhoods. They had sprinklers going, water tables, a huge street party the whole way through. That really lifted my spirits. I felt a bit of a spring in my step and I actually ran a bit here and there. Hurt, but I still ran. And there were some pretty significant up hillls happening as well, and well at that time of the race everything felt like Kilimanjaro.

I started to round the corner nearing the 25 mile mark I was greeted by a very friendly gentleman saying and I quote. " You may not have qualified for Boston but you qualify for a beer" and pointed me in the direction of the beer table some 300 metres down the road. I cried every step of those 300 metres. Thanks buddy cuz I didn't feel horrible enough. Sometimes it's just better to say nothing at all. You know?

I said no to the beer table and continued on to the next mile marker. I could hear someone behind me & thought I can NOT be passed by anyone else - so I started a conversation with the fellow. He was injured as well. started walking around the 16 mile mark, his hamstring was giving him grief. So we chatted away keeping each other company & me keeping an eye on his pace. I could hear my name, I thought I could hear my name. It was Cindy about 500 metres from the finish cheering me on. As soon as I could see her I told my walking buddy to try some running and we'd run it in. He was a no go. So off I went. As I run up Home Stretch Hill they were taking the sign for it down. Rather sad...

I could see the clock and it was edging near and nearer to 6 hours I sprinted as best as I could and made it in at 5:56. Not my best showing at all - but I made it.

I collected my medal and my pieces of pizza, the pizza was bigger than the medal. Now you all know I'm a bling ho ... so I thought the bling for 10/10/10 would be something awesome. However; the shirts at the Expo should have been a warning to me about the medal. It is something underwhelming to say the least. I'm not being ungrateful - honest. But 10/10/10 they could have done some much more.

I would highly recommend this race to everyone - it's a top 10 race if you want to do a BQ time.

It's extremely well organized & the support along the course is outstanding. This is definitely on my list of races to run again when I'm at 100%.

So until the next race... or adventure.... take care.

Lochness Marathon

Inverness, Scotland is the where the Lochness Marathon ends and wear we gathered ourselves on Sunday October 3rd to board the busses to the start line. Inverness is a beautiful town/city in the north east of Scotland at the north east end of Lochness. We had ventured here after talking about the possiblity of doing this race for a couple of years. Roger and his wife Esther and myself and my wife Joan had flown to London on the Friday before and then Saturday morning flew to Inverness.
The MacLeaniacs (Rick and Tracy) didn't have it quite as easy. Due to Tracy's work schedule they had to fly to London and arrive Saturday morning and then not arrive in Inverness till late Saturday night. We had picked up the race kits and they didn't miss much at the "expo".
We got up early to walk the 2k to the busses taking pictures of nessis on the way.
We (Rick, tracy, Roger and Keith) boarded the busses and waited and by 8 am the busses left for the long journey to... Just where were we going anyway? A stunning bus ride with beautiful views got us to the start line, actually about 1k away or more, in the middle of the scottish highlands with nary a building to be seen anywhere. Something has to be said about the logistics of this race and the great job in putting this together. Bussing 3000 marathoners to a hill in the middle of nowhere, on a road that barely fits a bus is no mean feet. We got off the busses in the cold, wet and windy conditions and there was a beeline for the heather on the hills and the few trees around to relieve ones selves. Followed by a long walk to the baggage drop off trucks and then the port-a-potties, in the middle of a field. Once that was taken care of we realized that it was not long to the start, so we made our way chasing after Roger who seemed more anxious than the rest of us to get near the start. Before we could say.. the gun went off and we were on our way. The first few miles were all down hill (more or less) and with the narrow road and masses of runners it was not possible to do the 10 and 1's we had planned on doing. Eventually at about 2 miles we figured we could walk and did. Roger suggested that 2 miles and 1 minute walks may work better so that's the way we decided to approach it. At 5 miles the first significant hill. . It was shortly after this that Rick dropped off the pace as we were going quicker than anticipated. Considering the journey to get here, it is surprising that any of us were running as well as we did, especially considering the injury problems Roger and myself had endured.
The views continued to be amazing and the light rain continued to fall, perfect conditions. My own injury issues were starting to slow me down a bit and at about 13 miles I told Roger to just go and not worry about me. He gradually pulled away. The 2 miles and 1's went off the rails for me at 15 miles as I took an extended walk break and just as I started to run again I hear Rick behind me. We ran (well almost ran) the rest of the race together. At 18 miles after going through the town of Dores to some unexpectedly racaus support from the town folks, we looked behind and there was Lochness behind us with a panoramic view and the hills on either side (photo op, also known as an excuse for a break).
Follwing this we turned to face the largest hill on the course about 2 miles long (at least it seemded like it). We'd get to the first curve on the hill and think it was almost done and see it go on forever!
We walked the entire hill, all 3, 4 or was it 5 miles? The race was becoming a struggle, but we made the most of it and just enjoyed talking to everyone. We had a laugh at everyone thinking both Rick and myself were called Barrie (hey look its the Barrie's, they would say). When we got to Inverness there was more crowd support and had to run to a bridge to cross the Ness river before doubling back to the finish line. Rick and myself finished in 4 hours and 12 minutes, Roger struggled the last few miles and finihsed in 3:58, not bad for someone who had been told not to even walk a few weeks before.
We then waited for Tracy, as we did so we listened to the announcer talking about the feats of some of the racers, and although admirable they would pale by comparison to what Tracy and Rick had accomplished over the past month or so. So we approached the announcer and let him know, so as Tracy finished he announced that she had completed 5 marathons and one half over the past 5 weeks.
Lochness was a great event in a beautiful location, a challenging course, but recommnded by all of us. Esther and Joan not to be out done, completed the 10k walk and enjoyed being apart of the event too, finishing in 1:25.

CIBC Run for the Cure Oct 3 2010

So this is the third year I've done the CIBC Run for the Cure in support of the CBCF with my work colleagues in Downtown Toronto.
This year they moved the venue from Nathan Phillips Square to the U of T campus. Not a bad spot really, however; being unfamiliar with the locale, our team didn't meet up ahead of time for a pre run/walk WHOOOAAAA BUNDY!

However; I headed from Barrie to Yorkdale Mall to catch the Red Rocket to Queen's Park. I know this well from going to Toronto General often for my check ups, but U of T - I was a little shaky on, however; as the sea of pink clad runners emerged from the underground, we were greeted by numerous University student Volunteers that took us to our run destination which started and finished at King's College Circle.
We ran along University, Bay, Bloor, Queen St W ... I ran right by the ROM and didn't even realize it. How could you miss that? I guess I was concentrating on not falling apart.

See I haven't run since the Midsummer Night's Run way back in August, mind you I have been using my eliptical and swimming heavy workouts to keep the cardio up and the legs in motion.

So as I lined up for the start, I kept thinking - okay your boss isn't here running with you, you have nothing to prove. RUN SMART - don't injure yourself.
The starters pistol went and off I trotted. I looked down at may Garmin - 1 km in 5:03 YIKES... that is SO not good! That's including running around folks, dodging slower participants (although they separated the walkers & runners) & as I got to 2k I checked again & my pace was a blistering 4:48 WHAAAAT? No NO NO NO!!!!!
By the time I hit 3 k my leg was protesting severely. This was NOT what I had decided to run after my daughter broke the news to me that she couldn't walk the run with me.
So the only way to stop running is to STOP RUNNING - so I did. I walked about a minute & let my calf muscle relax a bit.

I started off again and stayed at a steady 6 min / km pace & my calf was very pleased with that. So I maintained that with the strict vigilance of a Nun at a co-ed school. I also allowed myself to walk a number of times more to that end I finished in 29 minutes.


Once again the CBCF put together a wonderful post & pre race "expos". Our friends Revlon were there, once again, selling all sorts of glosses, mascaras, etc. at such bargain basement prices that Honest Ed would be proud. Purina Cat Chow was represented. CIBC had their tent there with all the CBCF merchandise on hand to purchase.
The food tent was totally OUT OF THIS WORLD. Probably the best food of any "small distance only" race I've been too.
Mind you the distance may be small but the size of the participants is not! Toronto has thousands upon thousands of participants. There were runners and walkers as far as the eye could see, in fact it was remincient of Sporting Life 10K. It was outstanding to be part of that.

And a huge big ENORMOUS thank you to all the kind and generous folks that sponsored me again this year! With out your support ... well... many tata's would be in jeopardy.

Thanks CBFC for hosting another spectacular event!

Thank YOU for giving your hard earned dollars to this worthy cause.