Tuesday, May 17, 2022

He grins like a baby

 Some men you just can’t reach.  It felt like this on Saturday as I attempted my 20th finish at Ice Age.  Knowing it was going to get into the 80’s I went out very conservative.

 My training partner Crawford was gracious enough to let me stay at her place on Friday and Saturday.  We went out Friday with her, Ryan, and my two kids met with us at Olive Garden.  It is relaxing to be around friends and family, though I wasn’t really that concerned about power shuffling a 50 miler the next day.

 Ice Age has always been one of my top runs to attend. Great organization, volunteers, and you know so many of the folks there.  Andy and Parker were aiming for their 30th finish, and Deb and Bill going for 25.  Stuart, Angie, and myself gunning for 20.  

 Getting to the race, I never had it from the start.  I was under coffee’d and felt like the line in Phantom 309.  “He was a big man, about 210.”  It wasn’t long before I was very near the back of this crowd.

 I’m not going to do an agonizing report of some random guy finishing in 11:57:31.  Here are some memories from the day.

- Dewey was excellent as crew and had a whale of a job that day.  He had an iced down towel that I really looked forward to.  No Dew Man no finish.

- Andy and Parker finished their 30th together.

- Bill passed me at about 44 miles and offered strong encouragement which I needed.  He finished #25.

- Stuart nailed #20.  He was way up there.  Joey, Crawford, and Robert finished well.

- Bill H had a strong run.  At the beginning he told me Jimmy Carter was his favorite President which is a Jedi move.  Meaning he is one of the solid 11 who read this blog.

- I requested coffee at 12 down and a random lady had a big jug.  That was needed.  Dewey contacted the state champ and he rose from the ashes and hand delivered me a second cup at 12 back.  It got my mind right.

- I was at Easterly when Pat Gorman dropped.  His brief words just before 25 miles had started to become my thoughts.

- Duffin back is 30.5.  This is the place doubts were high as I can read a watch and am excellent in math.

- I did not drop at Horseman’s 37 because I knew Dewey only had access at Emma 40.3 miles into it.

- I forecasted at about 33 miles that I had to get out of Emma 9:20 into the race to have a chance and I got in at 9:19 and left a minute later.

- Arena and Fred were at Young Road 47.4 and ran down what needed to happen.  I had 40 minutes and they seemed confident.

- I knew in another half mile I would make it and struggled in with the now famous lean.

- Everyone cheered.  Thanks Jason for the kind words. Thanks to all the people who looked after me at the end, or came over to say hi.

- Thanks Jeff, Angela, Tina, Jose, Sam, Joel, Julie, Bruce and especially my gracious hosts Ryan and Crawford for taking care of me.  Basically delivering and extracting me from the course back to their place.

- I wanted to enjoy the day and I did.  Maybe not in the way one feels like they want to, but in a way that was deserving of the Ice Age 50 mile adventure we all look to in May.

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