Halloween Hustle 5K

This was my first crack at a race following the cross country season. I was pumped. I planned the outfit well as it was super easy to run in. Everyone knows that I am the type of guy who will run in shorts in the middle of winter, so I dressed up like an old lady. To all other real grandmas out there, eat your heart out. I was pretty cute. The race was won overall by local Duluthian Eric Hartmark. He ran a speedy 16:27, but one of the race directors said that his time was really slow and that he was having an off day. I would hate to see what a great day was like. I did get the pleasure of keeping up with him for the first half mile before he pulled away into the distance. I finished in 18:54, which was not too bad for getting back into running. I was 6th overall out of 138 runners. I was a little disappointed I didn't win one of the prizes in the costume contest. The costume contest was won by a guy who wore a pair of underwear and a cape and was called "Captain Underpants." Sounds like an idea he thought of an hour before the race, but congrats to him. Angela also ran the race as well as shown in the picture. She hates dogs ("hate" is not a strong enough word for how much she dislikes dogs), but yet her mom had this costume sitting around and somehow Angela didn't hesitate to wear it during the race. At least she was warm during the run. She finished in 31:04.

Woolly Mammoth Run

I was super pumped for today's race as one of the kids that I coached during the previous year of cross country who had made it to the Wisconsin State High School Cross Country tournament showed up. He was signed up for the 10K race and I was hoping he was going to do really well. As a cross country coach, you love to see your kids do well while you are coaching them, but you also love to see kids develop a love for the sport that stays with them and encourages them to pursue running later in life as well. This kid that I coached had not run a lot over the summer and he told me he had only run about three times over the summer. He led until about the 8K mark as he told me, finishing second overall. I think with some training he would have dominated the race as this runner was one of the top runners in the State during his senior year. I finished the 5K as the first place runner in a not-so-stellar time of 19:39. This race is a well-run race which tends to not attract too large of a crowd. It is mostly composed of local runners, but it would be great to see it expand to bring in runners from further away. I am on the committee for helping to promote this race. It continues to bring in more runners year after year which is definitely a great thing.

Boyceville "OK" Cucumber 10K

This year my goal was to stick to the path and not lose track of the sign markers. Not wanting to repeat what happened last year, I made sure to check out the route very well. One of these days there needs to be some competition brought for the 10K, as it is won on a yearly basis by the same guy for something like 10 years. On a funny basis, some guy in his forties or fifties ran and won the 1 mile race and stood on the podium with a couple of kids under 10 (who finished 2nd and 3rd). It would have been a funny picture. I am sure the picture of that would have some label underneath it such as "easy as taking candy from a baby" in reference to the forty/fifty year olds accomplishment, but congrats to him anyway. I ran the 5K race with a good early pace, but at the halfway point it was by no means a record-setting pace. I actually was on pace for a time about 19 minutes at the halfway point, but I think the push for the finish kept we working as I finished 2nd overall in a time of 18:53. The winning time was 10 seconds faster than my time. One of these days I will find a way to get a hold of one of those famous cucumber trophies. It would be a great thing for my collection.

Cumberland Shooting Stars 5K

Last year I didn't look closely enough at the newspaper listing the Shooting Stars 5K. I drove out to Cumberland only to find that the race was the next weekend. What a let down. This year I made sure to watch the date closely. It was fun to hear the race director describe the course. He mentioned it was a fairly flat course through the whole length of the course. It was anything but that. A huge hill that continued on for about the first 1/2 mile, then a steep downhill, and a real grinder at the end when you are ready to be done. It was a fun course. I finished in 19:09, with the male winner being a friend of mine, in 19:03. The female winner finished in 18:54 (I hear she is on a full-ride scholarship to the University of Washington for their cross country team). The post race festivities included a fun pancake breakfast. Pictures were taken by Katie Wilder from Katie Wilder Photography.

Complete results are found at
http://www.raceberryjam.com/indexrr.html

Eau Claire WORS Firecracker race

This was a great weekend of fun. Many of the guys I ride bike with camped out the night before the race. We were able to watch a movie on an outdoor big screen TV about Lance Armstrong winning the "Race Across the Sky." The next day started with a nice 10K trail run which coursed through the woods following much of the same course that the "Rumble in the Jungle" snowshoe race followed during the winter months. It was a beautiful course, but it was certainly tough. I finished third overall with a time of 52:53.5 and was able to earn a nice medal. The mountain biking race was a different story. My goal in this race was just to finish. In the mountain bike race, I finished 186th out of 192 riders. During the ride I came around a bend too quickly and crashed into a tree with my front tire (I was fine, but my bike wasn't). After the crash, I later realized that my rim had bent. Every revolution of the tire made a rubbing sound, causing a loss of speed and motivation. The tire rubbed against the front fork. My buddies thought that you could just true the rim to fix it, but there was no truing this rim. It was scrap metal. I finished with a time of 1:37:15.6 for the 15 mile course. This day made me realize that I am better off focusing on wide open bike races like the Fat Tire Race. I am much more comfortable on the wide open trails than narrow, technical routes.

Turtle Lake Turtle Trot

It has been a few years since I have tackled the Turtle Trot race. I had the pleasure of running with Andrew Rohlman, who won the cross country sectional that the Rice Lake High School cross country team ran in Amery last year. I ran with Andrew for the first mile or so. He ended up winning the race, but not by much. He said he is running in college, but he kept it close with the second place runner. I finished fourth, with a time of 39:46, just 3 seconds from the time of the third place runner. I didn't know the end of the course well enough to know when the finish would be so I struggled to pass the guy who finished just ahead of me. I guess I should have drove the course to check it out. Quite a few people from our local running community participated, including Danette Hellman, Nicole Finsted, Dave Gerber, Ted Romportl, and Brian Arnold. This course is a relatively flat course which is run through the countryside south of Turtle Lake. I enjoy this race since I am a Lion Club member in Rice Lake, and this race is put on by the Lions Club of Turtle Lake.

Fishy Four

Traditions. . . I will probably always give out joke gifts to my family members at Christmas. I will always give respect to the wonderful Minnesota Twins. I will continue to celebrate the 4th of July and Thanksgiving with running races as there is no better way to celebrate the holidays than with an intense workout followed by fireworks or intense eating. This year was no different. We gave up the wonderful Tofte Trek which is still perhaps my favorite all time race for the fantastic Fishy Four. I have only done this one time before. This year, my biking buddies decided to make it interesting. You had to predict your time at the first mile. I got a little greedy. I thought I could run a 5:46, but settled for a 5:55. I didn't win the bet. . .I think the pool was up to $8. I did achieve a 24:41 for an average pace of 6:10/mile. I was happy with this since it was an improvement over my previous time in the run. Wouldn't you know it, I was 11th overall out of 506 runners, but finished 3rd in my age group, so no medal today. I was probably the highest overall age group finisher to not take home any hardware since the overall winner does not usually win an age group award, but instead takes an overall award. Well, I was very satisfied with the run and enjoyed seeing many good friends during the run and afterwards during the postrace ceremonies.