*Today is the seventh and last recap (Jim Hommes did not write one). I saved myself for last, not necessarily because it’s the best, but I get to choose because it’s my website.
For those of you who actually follow this website/blog, I ran a 24 hour race on a track on Labor Day weekend. In the days following the race, I thought I could take off three or four days and start training again. I ran a 10 mile run a week after the race and it felt okay…until the next day. That’s when my body shut down and said, “You’re 55 years old, jackass!” So, for the next five weeks leading up to the GAP Relay, I ran between 15 and 20 miles per week.
On Wednesday, October 13 at 3:00 am, me and the Redhead left Hilton Head for Pittsburgh. We stayed Wednesday night at her parent’s house in Lisbon, OH. Thursday morning, I left (by myself) for Pittsburgh to hang out with my friends. This consisted of arriving in 84, PA, at the Big Cat’s house, get into his vehicle (with Scotty D) and drive to Rio Grande, OH (3 and 1/2 hours) to watch their daughters play a college soccer match. This trip included a stop for lunch with four Guinness. They like to arrive a couple hours early to “tailgate”, but I actually was quite responsible.
Fast forward to Friday morning (race day), I woke up at Big Cat’s, had a coffee and ran three miles. After living in Hilton Head for 19 months, the rolling terrain of Western Pennsylvania had me questioning my decision to run this relay. After my “recovery” from my three mile jaunt, I met my son, Angelo at Washington Beer Company, where we perused each shelf and left with an almost $200 tab. Then we met Melissa (the aforementioned Redhead) and her parents for all you can eat sushi. After saying goodbye to my son and Melissa’s parents, we relaxed until we had to be on the Southside.
We arrived at the UPMC Complex at about 5:00 pm for a 6:30 start (half of the 36 teams started at 5:30 and half at 6:30). Started milling around, exchanging ailments with my DiMarco Workhorse teammates and generally complaining like a group of senior citizens at bingo. Oh, and the obligatory pre-race picture.
At about 6:15, we started walking towards the start, and as I was running the second leg, I decided (as I did the previous two relays) to run the first leg, 4.2 miles, as a warm up. I took off down the trail along the Monongahela River just relaxing and getting ready for my brother, Mike to hand me the baton at the first exchange zone. Once I got to the Riverfront (shopping/dining area) the trail turned into a sidewalk and soon ended with a blue sign telling me to cross the street to the right. I did as the sign instructed and was soon crossing the Homestead Grays Bridge through five lanes of traffic. Well, I knew that this is not right. So I made my way back into the Riverfront to try and locate the trail. I flagged a guy down in the Lowe’s parking lot and asked him if he knew where the trail was, he said, “No, but I’ll look on my phone.” “It’s across the road and behind those apartments.” I take off sprinting toward the river, crossing the road without really slowing down, once I get to the trail, I know I have to go back towards the start. As I start down the trail, the runners are coming at me, I know I screwed up! I cross paths with about a dozen runners, and two or three proceed to tell me that I’m going the wrong way. I finally get back to the exchange zone and my brother is on a borrowed mountain bike looking for me. As it turns out, Scott (who was scheduled to run the third leg) thought it was the third leg and took the hand off from my brother. The driver, Dave, calls Mike and tells him that I am at the van, so he comes back and we take off to get to the next exchange zone. I was asked, “What happened?” I told my brother what I did and he said, “YOU HAVE TO MAKE A LEFT AT COSTCO.”
Once we met the other van and I told my story, every member of my team instructed me that YOU HAVE TO MAKE A LEFT AT COSTCO.
Well, after I screwed the rotation up, and we were in second place (for the first time ever), I was forced to run a 7.23 mile leg, which took a lot out of my already depleted legs. We were now just over five minutes behind the leaders. The coach came out in me and I realized that we needed to change things up to beat the young boys (ages 30-36). I told Scott (team captain) that we needed to have our “studs” run the longest legs to take advantage of their speed.
While the “juggling” of the legs was happening, Brett Mason decided that he didn’t like being in second place, so when he finished his 6.44 mile at sub 6:00 pace, he had us back in first place. Jim and Eric were upset that there was nobody left to pass.
From there it was business as usual as we held our lead over Freddie Mercury and the boys.
My second leg, Eli handed me the baton (snap bracelet) and I got to run a steady uphill in the rain for 6.04 miles into Ohiopyle. My only concern (fear) was not to get caught from behind. Running scared definitely is motivation, not that I was running that fast at this point, but I was motivated. 6.04 done, still in the lead and I received a free pair of socks from Brooks.
My third and final leg was a 4.59 miler that started at 6:45 am. It was pretty cool seeing it start to get light and running across a 500 meter footbridge that a few hundred feet above the valley. I finished in the town of Meyersdale, got on the van and sampled Eli’s beer selection, a lot of IPA’s, had to dig deep to find a stout.
The rest of the relay went as planned and when Jim arrived at the finish line in Cumberland, it was time to celebrate our “3-peat”. 16 hours and 40 minutes, or a much more perfect; 1,000 minutes. This was done with the help of our unselfish drivers, Dave Kraus and Curt Schreffler (see profile on this site ‘#6 Curt Schreffler’ from March 9, 2021). The young boys ended up 75 minutes back in second place. As we enjoyed the victory, shortly after, I called Melissa to tell her about the race, missing my first leg and other minutiae. She listened very intently and when I was finished she said, “YOU HAVE TO MAKE A LEFT AT COSTCO.”
N of 1 Running 