A Fine Cuppla Days

Good morning Cooterinos! It's Friday, it's my "day off" and I'm sitting here digesting chocolate chip pancakes and sipping freshly brewed coffee. It's been an exciting couple of days: some good, some bad, and some pedestrian. Before I go into any of the details, I'm going to hook you up with a piece of photojournalistic gold...

Pardon the poor image quality, it's a photograph of a newspaper photograph. In the center of the picture you can see your favorite one-time triathlete "El Guapo" running from the kayak to the shore moments before I began the last leg of The Josh - the run. Note the chiseled legs and cool Curious George Astronaut cycling jersey. In the lower left is my Entourage, HECOW, waiting with my running shoes, socks and a towel to dry my dogs.

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Post Pre

To give anything less than your best is to sacrifice the Gift. - Pre

A friend of mine recently lent me his copy of a book entitled Pre. It's the story of one of the world's best runners of all time, Steve Prefontaine (affectionately called 'Pre') who took the world by storm during the 1960s and 1970s. He could have easily been considered arrogant, but in reality he was just confident. His story is incredible and inspiring.

In Pre's world there were no limits. He went to the Olympics knowing he could never out kick (sprint) the world's best at the end of the race, so he turned up the heat the entire race, forcing his competitors to abandon their race strategy and just hoof it the whole way. He came in 4th that race, but the fact that a young kid from Oregon could make the world's elite runners run his race because they respected his ability is incredible. After all he didn't care who was the fastest, he wanted to see who had the most guts. One of my favorite quotes is:

A lot of people run a race to see who is fastest. I run to see who has the most guts, who can punish himself into exhausting pace, and then at the end, punish himself even more.

After reading about his life and running career, I was inspired to stride to more than mediocrity in my running and bicycling. The night before The Josh I decided on my game plan - to race each leg like it was the only one I was racing. Basically, I wanted to see if I had the guts. From my excitement after the race (in my last post), you can see that I had the guts. I may not have won, but it was certainly a better effort than I thought I was capable of.

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Riding with the Big Dogs

After my stellar performance in The Josh, some people at work who constitute what I consider an admirable section of Berkshire County's cycling community realized that I'm not a tourist in their world. I was invited to ride with one of the better cycling clubs on Wednesday night and gladly accepted.

My friend (coincidentally the one who lent me Pre) told me beforehand not to be intimidated. Intimidated? As long as I was riding with the "Fast and Friendly" group (as opposed to just "The Fast Group") I had every confidence that I'd be able to keep up, no problem. I had no problems whatsoever. We averaged 20 MPH over 30 miles, often cruising for extended periods at upwards of 27-28 MPH, and I was right there with them.

I now get nods from the cyclists at work.

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Guts in the Woods

Last night, at our weekly Thursday Night Run, we were standing around the parking lot bullshitting when one guy asked if we were going to break last year's record. He said last year, the week after The Josh, we (by 'we' I mean he and some other guys) ran the course in 41:55. To put it into perspective, my personal best is probably 45 minutes, maybe high 44s. It later occurred to me how strange it was the he remembered that one run and the time they ran it in.

I was definitely up for the challenge. I hadn't eaten much yesterday, had drank about 5 sips of water and 4 cups of coffee, and my legs felt like lead. Work had shat upon us though, so I had anger on my side. We set off at a blistering pace (for the trails anyway) and I was going to beat that record!

Through the first two miles we were right on pace to beat the record, but by the third we had lost a full minute. Apparently dehydration and a lack of proper warm up were coming into play. By the fourth mile we were two minutes behind and we hadn't seen the front runner in quite some time. But at the last hill I got my second wind and was cruising.

I emerged from the trail at 41:15, a course record, but over a minute and a half behind the "winner". In fact, the first three of us out of the woods broke the record. Yup, we're a force to be reckoned with.

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Third Thursday

After the run, we headed to the Crowne Plaza for dinner. It was Third Thursday in Pittsfield and North Street was filled with all sorts of things to do. We dined on lobster and gator Jambalaya. $10 for a lobster, you can't turn it down.

After dinner, we meandered down to Spice where there were rumors of a Brazilian band. When we got there, they had the front of the restaurant opened up to the street, the band was jamming and people filled the sidewalk and spilled out into the street. People were partying and having a great time, and it was the most eclectic mix of people I could have imagined. I've never seen anything like that in Pittsfield.

We ended up staying there until 12:30 AM dancing, laughing, mingling and having a great time. It was just what the doctor ordered.

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Over and Out,
Old Coot