HillRunner.com RSS

[Andrew A.]

11. I've known Ryan and Andrew since 1998!

It's true, and I met Wilson when he still lived in Ft. Collins around 2000, before he loaded up the van and he moved his family to Beverly, er, Alaska.  His kids were tots at that time. 

[Andrew A.]

6. raced 3 10 mile races and 3 5ks in that ridiculous red costume to make people laugh and just for the sake that it was ridiculous

If I may be frank, it's certainly not an unbecoming costume - hard to believe you've had three kids!

[Andrew A.]

I had lost the competitive fire after high school. I enjoyed running and training and being part of the team in college, but racing was no longer important to me. I was not a big partier like some of my teammates who flamed out and never performed. I just lacked the drive that I once had. I had a couple of instances that showed me what might have been, but I found more injury than motivation. Looking back, I recall working very hard for someone who did not really care about competing, but the fact is that meets were not important to me and I found more injuries than motivation. Eventually, I quit after my second stress fracture. I enjoy racing now more than I did in college.

Pretty much the same boat as you.  Though I liked my coaches and teams a lot, I just had more curiosity about the world in general than I did in running faster in races.  Plus I chose a challenging major.  I also think a heavy diet of intervals with little mileage for a base wound up contributing to many injuries, I did not have a good idea of functional training back then.

[Wilson]

4.  Ran my first 100 mile week in January 1980, during winter break visiting Houston. 

In Houston why, chasing a woman?

I wish, although a strip club or two may have been involved. Coaches just let us take the vans and turned us loose on the town for a couple nights. That'd never happen today!
 
Another runner and I latched onto the swim team who would go down for about 2 weeks of winter training camp. We figured it would be warmer and a good time to get in a lot of miles. My teammate put in 200 that week. He did 30 a day for six days (either a 10 and a 20 or two 15s) and on the seventh he ran 20. Effin' nuts, but he did hold the school record for 2 mile and XC. I think I ran 105 and 116 and the swimmers thought I was a slacker.

[Lighty]

1. My first race was a 5K Turkey Trot that I ran with my boyfriend and his family at the age of 31.  I didn't know what training meant.  I ran about 25:30.  I thought running 3 miles without stopping was a long time to run.

2. After my second child was born I ran my first marathon.  I qualified for Boston... although I didn't know what that meant.  I found out 

3. I've run 10 marathons and 10 BQs.  11 coming up in April... (I'm being positive )

4. I was bitten by a dog and wiped out on the sidewalk in the same week while running my usual neighborhood loop.

5. I made the start of the 2006 Chicago Marathon by a hair by running through a muddy park and climbing a fence into the preferred corral.  I flashed my bib (I was wearing a trash bag since it was drizzling and 35°) at the officials on the other side of the fence and they just yelled, "Look out, runner coming in!"  That was my PR for 5 years.

6. I got stuck in the mob at the 2007 NYC marathon to check my bag before the race.

7. When I ran my first Boston, somewhere near the end, 2 young guys were cheering for me yelling "Go 14!"  It took me until I finished to realize they were referring to my bib number which was a 14,000 number and I was finishing with mostly 8 or 9,000 bibs around me.

8. My highest weekly mileage is 76 miles, so far.  I ran that in 5 days.

9. Another first Boston story; I stuffed so much crap into my bag that it broke and busted open on the sidewalk on the way to the T to go to the Boston Commons.

10. I ran my fastest marathon (so far) in 2011 at the age of 47 thanks to Ryan.  True story. And that's not the end of the story.  Stay tuned :-)